The icing on the cape
New Batman movie to hit screens summer 2005
By Nick Nunziata
CNN Headline News
(CNN) -- Actors Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine and Liam Neeson, "Insomnia" director Christopher Nolan and "Blade" writer David Goyer are just a few of the incredibly robust and talented people involved in the making of a new movie.
The idea of all of them in one film is an enticing prospect, and there's sure to be a lot of award nominations in that group.
Now consider this: They're doing the new Batman movie, "Batman Begins." Not some sprawling epic. Not an awards-grubbing drama. But a movie about a man in a costume who fights crime. Oh, how the times have changed.
You remember Batman don't you? He's the hero who ran off licking his wounds after the utterly disastrous "Batman and Robin" slammed into screens like a lead zeppelin and forced its cast members to repent in the less profitable but more stimulating waters of independent film.
That film's commercial and critical failure was one of the deciding factors in a certain Austrian bodybuilder and movie star's decision to enter the scarier world of politics as well. Yeah, blame Batman.
A funny thing has happened, though. Comic book movies have prestige now. Ang Lee makes them. Ian McKellan appears in them. Comic book adaptations are the current carriers of film Zeitgeist.
No event season is complete without at least a few, and surprisingly none of the recent efforts have been of the DC Comics variety, the house that delivered the Batman and Superman films so many of us grew up on.
Although Tim Burton's 1989 "Batman" was a monster hit, it set an example of style over substance. Now, in the era of "Spider-Man" and its tag line "with great power comes great responsibility," it's a different world for ol' Bats.
Grandstanding villains, costumes with questionable sensuality, and bizarre gadgets are passé. While Marvel filled its coffers, the DC stable of comic book properties fluctuated in various stages of development hell.
The Nicolas Cage "Superman" project became the Josh Hartnett "Superman" project. Eventually it became the dead project. Now "Charlie's Angels" director McG is apparently taking a stab at giving it life.
This new movie, "Batman Begins," is a beacon both for DC Comics and the film industry. If it succeeds, it will raise the bar to a new level.
The golden goose for the genre has and always will be Batman. More than $400 million in domestic ticket sales for "Spider-Man" suggest otherwise, but there would be no big budget theatrical Spidey film had the Caped Crusader not broken the territory first.
This film is shaping up to be something more than escapism and more than cinematic junk food.
With its cast and crew, "Batman Begins" can be something to elevate the seemingly tangential genre of comic book movies to a cornerstone of film itself.
Right now, they are a bizarre hybrid of action and science fiction. Next summer when the film's released, who knows?
It could create a robust new genre or kill the trend. Either way, I will be there on opening day with bells on.
