Directed by Christopher Nolan
Written by Christopher Nolan
Starring Christian Bale, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes
Release Date
Published 2012
Henri Ducard: Are you ready to begin?
Bruce Wayne: I-I can barely stand...
Henri Ducard: [kicks him] Death does not wait for you to be ready! Death is not considerate, or fair! And make no mistake: here, you face Death.
And that is how Bruce Wayne began his journey some seven years ago in writer-director Christopher Nolan’s first Bat-masterpiece, “Batman Begins.” It’s appropriate that Bruce Wayne, the man who would be Batman, would be trained as a ninja; the nerd culture that deified the caped crusader are of the same ilk who’ve turned the Asian legend of the ninja warrior into an outsized caricature.
It’s that knowing of what the audience wanted combined with his own particular, peculiar interests that have made Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy both crowd-pleasing and deeply personal. We will see in “The Dark Knight Rises,” Nolan’s Batman thesis statement, just how well the director combines his ability to dazzle the masses with his deep seeded philosophical aims.
“Batman Begins” is certainly a remarkable opening statement. In retrospect it’s much easier to see in the film how Nolan wanted to use this iconic character not merely to entertain but to critique and enlighten. From the opening moments when Bruce Wayne loses his parents to crime informed by poverty to the attempt by Ra’s Al Ghul to raze Gotham City by rotting it from within the philosophical aims of Nolan and his co-writer and brother Jonathan Nolan are vague but emerging.
We will get to the philosophy in a moment; let’s dig in to the surface story first. Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) lost his parents to a horrendous murder in a back alley. With years of guilt and anger boiling within Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham City from a failed stint in college with the intention of purging himself by killing his parents killer. When the man is murdered by a Mob Boss, Carmine Falcone (Tom Wilkinson), Bruce needs a new path and winds up somewhere in Asia.
In Asia Bruce meets and becomes a student of a man calling himself Henri Ducard (Liam Neeson). He’s allegedly a minion of a man known as Ra’s Al Ghul but we will come to know that Ducard is Ra’s and he has plans for his new pupil that involve the destruction of Gotham City. Ra’s Al Ghul is the head of a secret society that has for years restored the balance of the world by laying waste to areas of the world that have grown decadent and out of control and Gotham City is set to join Rome, Sodom & Gomorrah and others on the ash heap of history.
When Bruce leans of Ra’s Al Ghul’s plans the compassion instilled in him by his late father compels him to hope for Gotham City and soon defend it. Bruce’s decision sets the stage for what will be a clash of will and philosophy that will carry audiences through “The Dark Knight Rises;” Ra’s Al Ghul’s cynical belief in the cleansing fire and Batman’s scarred optimism that good can somehow triumph over even the worst evil.
Is it really as simple as a glass half empty versus a glass half full? Of course not, though Ra’s Al Ghul’s nefarious plot to poison and weaponize Gotham’s water supply has a certain ironic quality in my thesis. The deeper meaning of “Batman Begins” and what carried forward through “The Dark Knight” and comes to fruition, allegedly, in “The Dark Knight Rises” is a belief in hope against great odds; the belief that a once great city or country can be great again but only after a great struggle.
Surely, Christopher Nolan’s vision of America in Gotham City is one on the road to complete ruin. It’s a vision that is littered with the bodies of the brave and beleaguered, the good and the evil, but is still a vision of hope. Is not America’s past stained with the same blood? Are we not hopeful that from the horrors of the past greatness can be recovered?
Hope, dear reader, is at the heart of Batman and “Batman Begins” is a far more hopeful movie than many are willing to give it credit for. Just check that hopeful happy ending as Bruce Wayne and his best friend Alfred ponder a future where the ruins of Wayne Manor are restored to an even greater and more effective glory.
Not having seen “The Dark Knight Rises” my theory of hope among the darkness of the Batman series may be completely disproved but I don’t think so. Christopher Nolan may have dark visions of a rotting society but he’s far too savvy to give into the cynicism that is the true enemy of his vision. Batman/Bruce Wayne himself may not be so lucky, but Gotham City will survive and a new hope will be born from the ruins with Batman, man or legend, as its symbol of hope.
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