I’ve been starving, and I mean starving for a good movie for quite some time now. I was disappointed with Star Wars III, somewhat satisfied… but overall disappointed. And last year with the exception of Spidey-2 and The Incredibles, there wasn’t much to watch. There were a few cheap thrills like I, Robot and such, but it was a horrible, horrible year for movies. This year I’ve been disappointed, but am very optimistic for the next few weeks, not to mention the rest of the year, for all of the new movies coming out.

Batman Begins was the first of hopefuls, and I must say, I was extremely, and I mean extremely impressed with this movie. Tim Burton (the director) took Batman single handedly down the toilet bowl with Batman Returns (the one with the penguin and Cat-woman) and Batman 3? I don’t even recall the actual title… “Forever” was it? The one with the Riddler and Two-Face. Man alive… if that wasn’t bad enough, the next director, for some reason thought people enjoyed those and made another one with Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy, and Mr. Freeze, with the Schwarzenator himself. It was completely pathetic. The Batman TV series was a joke, but it was good for its era, but they should have never given the present day movies that type of look and feel. The first one with the Joker was well done. And considering there was no CGI except for the few seconds of showing the Joker fall from the tower, they did very well with what they had. Especially considering it was made about 15 years ago… can you believe that? It seems like only yesterday. But that is how Batman should have remained. He is a vigilante, a man who struggles with his inner-self and evil. He wants to do good things, and help the helpless, but he still wants justice to be served and the evil to pay for the innocent suffering. Which is rightfully so. If you do the crime, you have to pay the time. Without getting into a political debate, that’s point-blank what should happen. But then it comes down to HOW much punishment per crime? That’s where Batman struggles, but he has always prevailed. He was always honest and just, and was always helping those who were preyed upon by the evil-doers.

This movie is very deserving of it’s title “Batman Begins.” It is very fitting, and I hope that is truly the case. I hope we can forget about all the other Batman movies and just start from scratch. They have sinned against the franchise with those awful productions, and as far as I’m concerned they have fully redeemed themselves with this movie. It has it’s flaws, don’t get me wrong, but they are so widely outweighed by all the things they did right in this film, that I am not even going to bother you with them.

This film tells the story that no one has ever covered about who Bruce Wayne was. There are a few adlibs they threw into the movie that aren’t entirely true, but it all comes together and is completely understandable to make a good movie. Just as they did in Spider-man where they made the webs actually shoot from his arms instead of the real comic-origin of Spidey, where he only had the strength and abilities of a spider. He had to MAKE his own webs, which was very annoying and a big hindrance towards the comics. I was very glad to see that change in the films.

This film covers who he was as a boy, why his parents were multi-millionaires, why he inherited all the family fortune, why he is skilled in fighting (instead of every other film where they just say he studied martial arts because he felt like it and he was rich enough where he could afford them.) It tells how he came about making his suit of armor, his utility belt. It talks about his fears, his loves and hates. It even talks about why he chose the bat as his symbol, which is an adlib to the comics, but I personally loved it. You don’t even SEE the Batman himself until midway through the film. That is a complete bonus, because it builds you up to get ready for who he is and will become. And of course, it leaves it completely wide open for a sequel. I was happy to hear and read about the actors and the director especially, that they have signed up for a trilogy deal. I hope to see at least 2 more films in this same atmosphere.

This film delivered and my wife and I were both well pleased with the ending result. It was much darker, and it’s kinda’ funny to hear a latter-day saint say they are hoping for a “darker” movie. To quickly put that into perspective, to appreciate the “good” of a movie, you have to have “bad.” The “badder” (I know that’s not a word) the bad guy is, the better the good guy becomes. The bad guy is scarier than all the other Batman’s so far, and is very mean and evil. But Batman is more pure and powerful as well. He’s an acceptable and realistic superhero in a more realistic world that we know today. If the bad guy was goofy, and lame, and made dumb jokes or had unrealistic behavior, such as “Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, Two-Face, Riddler… and just about every other Batman movie in the past and their villains” then you just flat out don’t really care about the outcome. It becomes a joke, rather than a plot about good verses evil, and the good prevailing. This truly was a feel-good movie for me. Even with the scary parts. Because good does prevail, the innocent is saved, and the bad go punished for their crimes. I loved it.