The Importance of Being Idle

Fatman Begins

Okay, so I did laundry and THEN watched Batman Begins. I have the feeling I already sang its praises on its theatrical release, and my feelings now are much the same as then: I love the movie and I want the sequel (with proper, scary Joker) NOW! I'm not saying it's the Citizen Kane of superhero movies, but it is a good movie as well as being a great superhero movie. It is easily the equal of Sam Raimi's Spiderman flicks, possibly their better. Okay so what we'll talk about here is the DVD, not the movie: its a fucking blinder. The transfer is great, the sound is clear and crisp and the layer transition (not something that many people seem to think about terribly much) is in such a sneaky place as to be all but unnoticeable. Sadly the menus aren't anything exciting, although the ones on the bonus disk are interestingly inserted into a kind of hyperlinked comic book, which is pretty cool (although it leaves you wanting for a proper menu system in case you've missed something, and lo! there is a normal menu too). The bonus disk itself is pretty spectacular, with lots and lots about the whole production process, the writing, design, stunt work, set building, effects.... the whole nine yards basically. I just spent a very enjoyable evening sifting through it and discovering things that surprised me (there are several things in the movie I'd assumed to be real which are in fact CG - in fact one easter egg shows a test the animators did for CG Batman, I'll be buggered if I can tell which one is CG and which one is Christian Bale), and then there is an absolutely astonishing amount of stuff in the movie which is done 'for real' which I think adds to the whole feel of the piece. Much as I love Star Wars (and you all know I do, only nine more days until Sith is released on DVD!), I think that BB is the cream of the summer blockbusters, and it owes it (almost) all to Christopher Nolan. If you'd known me when Insomnia (have you seen that? That's another fucking awesome movie) came out, I'd have been telling you that he was a guy to watch, and look, I was right! Christian Bale was my pick for Batman even before I knew they were making a new movie, and see how that worked out? Man I should be a producer somewhere, cos when I'm right, I'm right!
Yeah you can tell I've had a bit to drink can't you? Trust me, you would too if you'd had the kind of phone call I had this evening... and no, I'm not going to elaborate.

posted by BadMonkey @ 11:55 PM