Prepare yourself for a different kind of Caped Crusader in "The Batman" as a ripped Robert Pattinson dons the cape and cowl. A grave looking Bruce Wayne wonders after two years of crime fighting if he is making a difference. Pattinson's version of Bruce Wayne may be the youngest iteration of The Batman. In fact, he refers to himself as 'Vengeance' rather than Batman and spends more time on crime than climbing the social ladder. Get ready for some heavyweight drama, too. "Cloverfield" writer & director Matt Reeves and "Hunger Games" co-scripter Peter Craig put Pattinson through the wringer in what amounts to a "Mad Max" spin on the Detective Comics hero. Awash in shadowy 1940s film noir lighting, nothing about "The Batman" is either lighthearted or romantic. Gotham City is a sinister Sodom and Gomorrah on the eve of a critical mayoral election. This grim murder mystery about byzantine corruption in both the police department and the district attorney's office has a sliver of the sadistic "Saw" franchise in its DNA. A nonentity who calls himself 'the Riddler' wants to wash away all that evil with some Old Testament retribution. Meantime, The Batman encounters slinky Selina Kyle, (Zoë Kravitz of "X-Men: First Class"), aka Catwoman, who is searching for a friend gone missing. Predictably, the Bat and the Cat team up for different reasons to contend with a hazmat clad Riddler who looks nothing like the spandex-clad Jim Carrey in "Batman Forever" (1995). Watching this grim, serious-minded melodrama, you'll feel like you're caught in a storm without an umbrella because "The Batman" is dark, rainy and ominous. Basically, you'd need a hacksaw to carve the doom-laden atmosphere, especially when it clocks in at 176 marathon minutes. Reeves deliberately takes his time piecing together each part of the puzzling plot without giving away anything. Oscar-winning "Up" composer Michael Giacchino's orchestral score heightens both the suspense and sharpens the chills with a variety of musical cues.
"The Batman" feels more like David Fincher's serial killer thriller "Se7en" (1995), co-starring Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman, than a luminescent, lightweight, costume-clad crimefighting caper. Mind you, nobody has solved the murders of Thomas and Martha Wayne twenty years before, and the tragedy still clouds Bruce Wayne's psyche. We see this younger version of Bruce suited up more often as The Batman rather than modeling the latest sartorial fashions with a gold digger hanging onto his elbow. Crime preoccupies The Batman, and he has trouble keeping out of trouble with the Gotham City Police. Although he has won the trust and support of Detective Lieutenant James Gordon (Jeffrey Wright of "No Time to Die"), most of Gordon's skeptical superiors and subordinates regard the Caped Crusader with considerable suspicion. Mind you, the criminal element have even less use for him. Blue collar crooks cringe when the Bat signal illuminates the skies. Mob boss Carmine Falcone (John Turturro of "The Big Lebowski") and the Penguin, Oswald Cobblepot (an unrecognizable Colin Farrell of "Daredevil") dismiss The Batman as a rank amateur. Carmine knew Bruce Wayne when the latter was a child, but he doesn't suspect the orphaned Wayne is The Batman. Neither does Carmine take Selina Kyle seriously either. Actually, she serves drinks in the Penguin's shady nightclub that serves as a front for Carmine's minions. Rarely do we see The Riddler (a bespectacled Paul Dano of "Swiss Army Man") until the last half hour. He doesn't appear very intimidating and that makes him seem twice as intimidating. The Riddler's riddles aren't bright and witty, but dark and dangerous. He has orchestrated a massive maneuver that makes the January 6th riot at the Capitol in Washington, D. C. look like child's play. The huge difference here is writer & director Matt Reeves makes everything appear both plausible and chilling in its audacity. No, extraterrestrials don't enter the fray like in "Batman Vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice" (2016) or either version of "Justice League" (2017).
"The Batman" begins as a slow burn whodunit as our protagonist assembles clues, but there is no shortage of action. This Batman isn't afraid to tango even when the opposition outnumber him. The harrowing demolition derby freeway chase through Gotham City with The Batman hauling butt after the Penguin is a genuine showstopper. The new, stripped-down, Batmobile muscle car looks nothing like any earlier incarnations of the renowned vehicle. Indeed, this Batmobile has a predatory appearance. Interestingly enough, The Batman relies on his trusty Bat motorcycle to zip from here to there with his cape fluttering in the breeze. Reeves doesn't dwell on many Batman gadgets like a James Bond thriller. While Reeves and Craig are more focused on narrative realism, they equip our hero with some clever gadgets. For example, the smart contact lenses with built-in cameras that recognize and identify people are extraordinary. Occasionally, things don't always work out as smoothly for our hero as he expects them. The scene where The Batman BASE jumps from a skyscraper at night to elude capture goes awry when he deploys his parachute too early. Reeves and Craig surround Pattinson with a sterling cast of infamous characters, and they put the Caped Crusader into some predicaments he cannot get out of even with his gadgetry. Unlike previous incarnations of Batman, Pattinson will have the chance to age in the role, because Warner Brothers has signed him up for a trilogy. He has the tenacity of Michael Keaton's Batman, the guile of Christian Bale's Batman, but he lacks the brawn of Ben Affleck's Batman. Nevertheless, in his freshman outing, Pattinson looks like he has gotten off on the right foot. All quibbles aside, "The Batman" is off to a promising start!
CINEMATIC REVELATIONS allows me the luxury of writing, editing and archiving my film and television reviews. Some reviews appeared initially in "The Commercial Dispatch" and "The Planet Weekly" and then later in the comment archives at the Internet Movie Database. IMDB.COM, however, imposes a limit on both the number of words and the number of times that an author may revise their comments. I hope that anybody who peruses these expanded reviews will find them useful.
Sunday, April 7, 2024
THE BATMAN (2022) **** OUT OF ****
THE WAGES OF FEAR (FRENCH-2024) *** OUT OF ****
No, “Earth and Blood” director Julien Leclercq’s remake of “The Wages of Fear” doesn’t eclipse the grim, black & white, Henri-Georges Clouzot original made in 1953, starring Yves Montand. Nevertheless, Leclercq generates more than enough thrills and chills to keep spectators poised on the edge of their collective seats during its brisk 104-minute runtime. This taut tale chronicles the Herculean efforts of a group of desperate men and a woman driving trucks laden with Nitroglycerin across treacherous terrain to snuff out a calamitous oil well fire. Earlier, terrorists had sparked this blaze when they attacked the site to keep it from being resupplied. Mind you, Leclercq’s version should not be dismissed entirely as disposable. “Cannabis” scenarist Hamid Hlioua and he have reimagined this classic Man versus Nature showdown with similar but different predicaments. Shrewdly, they have altered elements of Clouzot’s masterpiece without tampering with the basic premise. This sprawling spectacle of men against insurmountable odds accomplishing a virtually impossible mission amounts to a tribute to Clouzot’s masterpiece.
The chief difference between this version and previous ones is the setting. Unlike the South American locales in both Clouzot’s classic and William Friedkin’s dazzling remake “Sorcerer” (1977), Leclercq and Hlioua shift the setting to an anonymous Middle Eastern nation bristling with heavily armed rebels, corrupt military officials, and lethal minefields. Specifically, Leclercq lensed this epic in Morocco with its sprawling desert wastelands and towering mountains. Our gritty heroes and heroine must brave an obstacle course consisting not only of an arid desert with mountainous terrain but also trigger-happy gunmen at roadblocks and gimlet-eyed female snipers who kill without a qualm. Were it not harrowing enough, the drivers must cover about 500 miles in under 20 hours to deliver a sufficient amount of nitro to quench the blaze! Two trucks transporting more than enough nitro to excavate another Grand Canyon constitute part of this small convoy. Several armed guards accompany these intrepid truckers, but at least one of them is untrustworthy. Everybody displays credentials that identify them as medical relief personnel. Similarly, they plaster their vehicles with medical relief emblems.
Appropriately enough, Leclercq and Hlioua whittle down the number of characters gradually from the get-go until only a couple survive this white-knuckled odyssey with its nail-biting timetable.
Basically, the premise hasn’t changed much since the 1953 original. An oil well inferno rages out of control in the middle of the desert. Leclercq and Hlioua have upped the ante considerably. Now not only will the well eventually explode, but also the explosion will obliterate an entire village of innocent souls. The clock is literally ticking as our heroes and heroine embark on their mission of mercy. The heroes in Leclercq’s version differ considerably. In both, Clouzot’s original and Friedkin’s remake, the protagonists were destitute individuals. Owing to their extreme character flaws and the hand of fate, these men turned their backs on civilized society and fled to a sanctuary deep in the South American jungles. They gambled that neither the authorities nor any other adversaries looking for payback would follow them to the ends of the earth.
In the Netflix remake, our protagonists are siblings caught up in slightly better circumstances. Fred (Franck Gastambide of “Restless”) and Alex (Alban Lenoir of “AKA”) have reconciled after a tragic incident that landed his brother in prison. Initially, a wealthy client had paid Fred to get him aboard a flight out of a country teetering on the brink of a revolution. Before they could leave, the military gunned down Fred’s client. Earlier, before this man of affluence died, he had paid Fred for his services. When his client wasn’t looking, Fred caught a glimpse of huge stacks of currency which were crammed in the safe. Since the military knew nothing about this loot, Fred wasn’t about to leave this payday behind for them to discover.
After the soldiers shot his client, Fred told Alex about the cache. With this fortune, Fred assured Alex they could return to Paris and live like kings. Moreover, he convinced his reluctant brother to blow the safe because the risks were minimal. Unlike Fred, Alex has a wife and child to consider. Fred had posted himself outside the building as a guard and had watched in mute horror when the soldiers stormed it. Alex had commenced the countdown to blow the safe when the soldiers surprised him. This part of the plot appears in two flashbacks that explain why the brothers were separated. Afterward, the military arrested and imprisoned Alex in a barbaric prison where he was forced to fight his fellow prisoners to survive. Since he is an explosives expert, the corrupt oil company bribed prison officials to release Alex. The brothers resolved their differences and embarked on this journey of hardship. Basically, the relationship between Fred and Alex amounts to this remake’s weakest element because it is rather contrived. Another major departure from Leclercq’s film and the earlier versions is a woman, Clara (Ana Girardot of “Saint Amour”), who accompanies them on this road trip through Hell. Clara is Fred’s girlfriend, and she comes along for the ride as one of the medical assistants.
Of course, Leclercq’s “Wages of Fear” suffers from other contrivances. At one point, a bandit with a machine gun mounted atop a pick-up truck careens after the convoy along a switchback road. The gunner pours a hail of lead into one of the trucks. Miraculously, none of his ill-aimed bullets strike the nitro in either of the vehicles! Had either truck been hit, the entire convoy would have been atomized in a fiery cloud of smoke. Now, the villains could not have destroyed the convoy, otherwise the movie would concluded on an anticlimactic note. Later, the brothers must clear a road sewn with land mines using a spider web of chains to find the mines. Although it suffers from its share of weaknesses, Netflix’s “Wages of Fear” qualifies as an entertaining epic with a stalwart cast and several genuinely traumatic moments.
The chief difference between this version and previous ones is the setting. Unlike the South American locales in both Clouzot’s classic and William Friedkin’s dazzling remake “Sorcerer” (1977), Leclercq and Hlioua shift the setting to an anonymous Middle Eastern nation bristling with heavily armed rebels, corrupt military officials, and lethal minefields. Specifically, Leclercq lensed this epic in Morocco with its sprawling desert wastelands and towering mountains. Our gritty heroes and heroine must brave an obstacle course consisting not only of an arid desert with mountainous terrain but also trigger-happy gunmen at roadblocks and gimlet-eyed female snipers who kill without a qualm. Were it not harrowing enough, the drivers must cover about 500 miles in under 20 hours to deliver a sufficient amount of nitro to quench the blaze! Two trucks transporting more than enough nitro to excavate another Grand Canyon constitute part of this small convoy. Several armed guards accompany these intrepid truckers, but at least one of them is untrustworthy. Everybody displays credentials that identify them as medical relief personnel. Similarly, they plaster their vehicles with medical relief emblems.
Appropriately enough, Leclercq and Hlioua whittle down the number of characters gradually from the get-go until only a couple survive this white-knuckled odyssey with its nail-biting timetable.
Basically, the premise hasn’t changed much since the 1953 original. An oil well inferno rages out of control in the middle of the desert. Leclercq and Hlioua have upped the ante considerably. Now not only will the well eventually explode, but also the explosion will obliterate an entire village of innocent souls. The clock is literally ticking as our heroes and heroine embark on their mission of mercy. The heroes in Leclercq’s version differ considerably. In both, Clouzot’s original and Friedkin’s remake, the protagonists were destitute individuals. Owing to their extreme character flaws and the hand of fate, these men turned their backs on civilized society and fled to a sanctuary deep in the South American jungles. They gambled that neither the authorities nor any other adversaries looking for payback would follow them to the ends of the earth.
In the Netflix remake, our protagonists are siblings caught up in slightly better circumstances. Fred (Franck Gastambide of “Restless”) and Alex (Alban Lenoir of “AKA”) have reconciled after a tragic incident that landed his brother in prison. Initially, a wealthy client had paid Fred to get him aboard a flight out of a country teetering on the brink of a revolution. Before they could leave, the military gunned down Fred’s client. Earlier, before this man of affluence died, he had paid Fred for his services. When his client wasn’t looking, Fred caught a glimpse of huge stacks of currency which were crammed in the safe. Since the military knew nothing about this loot, Fred wasn’t about to leave this payday behind for them to discover.
After the soldiers shot his client, Fred told Alex about the cache. With this fortune, Fred assured Alex they could return to Paris and live like kings. Moreover, he convinced his reluctant brother to blow the safe because the risks were minimal. Unlike Fred, Alex has a wife and child to consider. Fred had posted himself outside the building as a guard and had watched in mute horror when the soldiers stormed it. Alex had commenced the countdown to blow the safe when the soldiers surprised him. This part of the plot appears in two flashbacks that explain why the brothers were separated. Afterward, the military arrested and imprisoned Alex in a barbaric prison where he was forced to fight his fellow prisoners to survive. Since he is an explosives expert, the corrupt oil company bribed prison officials to release Alex. The brothers resolved their differences and embarked on this journey of hardship. Basically, the relationship between Fred and Alex amounts to this remake’s weakest element because it is rather contrived. Another major departure from Leclercq’s film and the earlier versions is a woman, Clara (Ana Girardot of “Saint Amour”), who accompanies them on this road trip through Hell. Clara is Fred’s girlfriend, and she comes along for the ride as one of the medical assistants.
Of course, Leclercq’s “Wages of Fear” suffers from other contrivances. At one point, a bandit with a machine gun mounted atop a pick-up truck careens after the convoy along a switchback road. The gunner pours a hail of lead into one of the trucks. Miraculously, none of his ill-aimed bullets strike the nitro in either of the vehicles! Had either truck been hit, the entire convoy would have been atomized in a fiery cloud of smoke. Now, the villains could not have destroyed the convoy, otherwise the movie would concluded on an anticlimactic note. Later, the brothers must clear a road sewn with land mines using a spider web of chains to find the mines. Although it suffers from its share of weaknesses, Netflix’s “Wages of Fear” qualifies as an entertaining epic with a stalwart cast and several genuinely traumatic moments.
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