After the highly successful but critically slandered string of Batman films (most notably Batman Forever and Batman & Robin), director Christopher Nolan helmed the project to completely start anew, and redefine the famous Dark Knight. Batman Begins takes the story back before Tim Burton’s original film, and goes more in depth on the childhood of Bruce Wayne, his fear of bats and the death of his parents. The sobersided and weightier tone first adopted by Burton is again present, crafted to extinguish the overly colorful and nonsensical design of Schumacher’s attempts - two films that seriously hurt the image of what was once a foreboding vigilante hero.

Young Bruce Wayne loses his parents to a tatterdemalion thief with an itchy trigger finger. Years later, distraught at the overpowering amount of crime that blankets his home of Gotham City, Bruce runs away to lose himself in inner turmoil, battling prisoners in a remote Asian camp. Ducard (Liam Neeson) discovers the embittered Wayne and leads him to the training base of The League of Shadows, where he undertakes rigorous training from master martial artist Ra’s Al Ghul (Ken Watanabe) to become a vigilante warrior who can bring justice back to the disheveled streets of Gotham.

When Al Ghul demands that Wayne take the life of a convict without witnessing a trial, the once-confused man realizes that his mission is to protect the innocent, not to become an executioner. A fight ensues, resulting in the training camp burning down, and Al Ghul perishes. Wayne returns to Gotham City, takes back his father’s multi-million dollar company and begins to piece together the image of dread that he wishes to strike into the hearts of the numerous criminals. Donning custom armor in the likeness of a giant bat, he descends upon the underworld of the seedy city and wreaks havoc on crime boss Falcone (Tom Wilkinson), who orchestrates most of the unlawful dealings. If that wasn’t enough for the newfound hero, the League of Shadows makes a shocking reappearance, and plots to exterminate the citizens of Gotham, a civilization that has reached the pinnacle of its decadence.

Christopher Nolan wisely chose to employ the darkest tone possible with the limitations of PG-13 and a man in a bat costume. All of the characters take themselves seriously and there is little comic relief, except in the form of Michael Caine as Alfred, who appears naturally witty, and the sarcastic Lucious Fox, played by the inimitable Morgan Freeman. This grimmer approach dispenses with the silliness of the most recent Batman films, and the idea to completely start over allows the redefinition of some of the greatest of Batman’s villains, including The Joker who appears in Nolan’s follow-up, The Dark Knight, in the summer of 2008.

Only two weak links appear in Batman Begins, which are easily engulfed by the many impressive and superior ideas that flourish. Katie Holmes’ Rachel Dawes is a flat character that we can never really get used to as a femme fatale or as a love interest, and Cillian Murphy’s The Scarecrow lacks pizzazz. His design is worthy, but he never reaches a level of sinister that can match the allure of The Joker or even DeVito’s imperfect Penguin. And since his scare tactics rely on hallucinatory chemicals that result in acid-trip visuals that aren’t really happening, his fearsomeness is nearly nonexistent.

With an all-star cast and recognizable faces popping up at every turn, including Gary Oldman, Tom Wilkinson and Rutger Hauer, Batman Begins is one of the finest comic-book inspired films to hit the big screen. With an excellent focus on practical reasons for each piece of equipment and every trick up Batman’s sleeve, this superhero has become much more admirable due to his utter lack of superpowers. With more realism, a perfectly dark atmosphere, the Tumbler (Batman’s armored tank that predates the Batmobile), cool stunts (despite difficult-to-decipher fight scenes) and a few new surprises not witnessed in the previous four films, Batman Begins is a refreshing new take on the classic crime-fighting character.

- Mike Massie

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