[imagesource: Jonathan Olley / Warner Bros]

Any Batman movie gets the full treatment.

Teaser trailer, trailer one, a succession of follow-up trailers, and then the media blitz that follows the first round of reviews.

We have reached the review stage and after scanning the headlines this morning one point is being stressed almost across the board.

First of all, the fact that the film stretches to 176 minutes long is a common theme.

Then there’s the angle that Robert Pattinson’s Caped Crusader is dark – darker even than The Dark Knight, according to CNET:

You absolutely 100% can’t show The Batman to a child. This new flick is PG-13, but it’s on a whole other level from the relatively bloodless Dark Knight movies — and on a different planet from any Marvel film — immersing you in a nerve-shredding three hours of escalating dread and simmering pain garnished with some astonishingly nasty touches.

Kids these days see far, far worse on the internet than a broody Pattinson.

Anyway, back to the review:

Batman himself stalks from the shadows with a heavy tread and heavier fists, meting out pitiless vengeance with a chilling lack of affect behind his mask…

Pattinson genuinely inhabits the Batman, expressing despair with just his perfectly angled jaw and soulful eyes…

Why don’t you just marry Batman?

Before we look at other reviews, here’s the trailer:

Variety is in agreement and says “A Tortured Robert Pattinson Goes Even Darker Than The Dark Knight“:

Whereas [superhero] movies are typically defined by their villains, “The Batman” gets under your skin by asking: What if the good guys aren’t really the good guys? What if the person we were counting on to protect us might actually be making the situation worse?

…Pattinson is the most sullen of the actors to have played the character, which reads as a kind of daredevil nihilism whenever he’s in costume…

Brooding and withdrawn, he’s a damaged loner with unresolved daddy issues, saddled with all kinds of complicated emotional trauma.

The Daily Beast calls it “the Best Batman Movie Since The Dark Knight“- high praise indeed – and labels Pattinson “an angry, emo, brawling Batman [who] matches the darkness and despair of our time”.

It was a five-star review from The Telegraph, with praise lavished on Pattinson and co-star Zoe Kravitz:

The two stars generate an astonishing sensual charge in a brilliant addition to the Batman canon that refuses to behave like a blockbuster.

…there is a dark brilliance in the decision to have the climax involve rioting, terror and bloody insurrection – and set it on an election night. If we’re to have so many of these films – and Hollywood remains determined that we are – is it too much to ask that one per year is this good?

I don’t really watch superhero movies but I fully intend on watching The Batman.

One more for the road? This from The Hollywood Reporter:

Led with magnetic intensity and a granite jawline by Robert Pattinson as a Dark Knight with daddy issues, this ambitious reboot is grounded in a contemporary reality where institutional and political distrust breeds unhinged vigilantism…

It’s a soulful nocturne of corruption and chaos, and as much as I longed for a few more glimmers of humor, at no point during the hefty three-hour run time did my attention wander. But Reeves’ film hammers home the realization that somewhere along the line, someone — probably Christopher Nolan — decided that Batman movies should no longer be fun.

Again with the jawline stuff.

We know the film, released in South Africa on March 4 (this Friday), is going to be dark.

If that’s your thing, and you can hold in a piss for nearly three hours, enjoy your trip to the cinema.

[sources:cnet&variety&dbeast&telegraph&hwoodreporter]