Men in tights

Saw Batman Begins last week. Thought it was pretty good movie, but not a great comic book movie. Which is to say, it was not entirely faithful to the material.

I know a lot of folks will say I'm being a geek; that being faithful is not that important to making a great movie. I think it's entirely important. The spirit of a comic book is what Hollywood hopes to capture.

For example, I think director Christopher Nolan glossed over the whole detective part of Batman's persona. This is a superhero who investigates and deduces. He has no superpowers, so he has to rely on his wits to solve crimes. So far, every movie carnation of the Caped Crusader has played up the gadgetry and hardware.

I also am not a fan of Batman/Bruce Wayne's whole Tibetan training program. The Batman I know learned his moves form the school of hard knocks on the streets of Gotham. This was what writer Frank Miller (Sin City, Ronin, The Dark Knight Returns) captured so well in his Batman: Year One series.

One thing that every Batman film suffers from is the lack of action when it comes to the fight scenes. It's not Hollywood's fault. Batman, unlike most superheroes, is human. He doesn't have adamantium clams, he can't shoot webs or leap tall buildings in a single bound. He doesn't engage in fisticuffs while dropping from skyscrapers. He's mortal, so his battles are all earthbound, thus, the lack of spectacle.

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Invariably, after every comic book flick that comes out, my friends and I geek out and go into "which comic film is best" discussion. I will shamefully reveal my list here:

5. X2
4. The Rocketeer
3. Spider-man
2. Superman
1. Spider-man 2

I have chosen to only include superhero films. If I included all movies based on comics, the list would include Ghost World and American Splendor.

One film not on the list is Mark Steven Johnson's Daredevil, recently released as a director's cut. I have a lot of admiration for this picture because Johnson hewed pretty closely to the source material, even duplicating shots in many scenes.

I think this movie is unfairly maligned because of Ben Affleck, who I think does an okay job of portraying the blind crimefighter. It certainly doesn't help this movie that they spun-off the terrible Elektra movie from it.

The director's cut restores a subplot, some additional violence and language. While it probably won't change anyone's mind about the movie, it's definitely a better version than the release one.