OK, shoot me now - but you can tell when you are watching a film at the cinema and the audience start to get a bit restless. Well mine did with this overlong, and frankly rather dreary film. The opening few, somewhat dystopian, scenes reminded me of "Blade Runner" (1982) and we do hit the ground running. Amidst an hotly contested mayoral election, a chap in a gas mask ("The Riddler", we learn later) brutally takes out the sitting candidate enticing the "Batman" (Robert Pattinson) to come help his policeman pal "Gordon" (Jeffrey Wright) to investigate. Seems that the killer wanted that to happen because he leaves our caped crusader a card with a clue. Soon the great and the good of the city are dropping like flies and a web of corruption and deceit at the top echelons of government is emerging. Personally I found this all a bit dull. It flows terribly slowly, and after a while the relentless darkness and a really pretty soporific, moody, effort from Pattinson just started to bore me. There are loads of plot holes - not least just how the "Riddler" manages to pull off some pretty heavy duty crimes without having to scale any tall buildings, or sneak past the heavily guarded victims of his spree. The scenes with the completely unprotected DA (Peter Sarsgaard) in a dimly lit street are just plain daft. Colin Farrell is probably my highlight as the duplicitous "Oz", and Zoë Kravitz ("Cat Woman”) offers us some decent acrobatics but otherwise, this is an hugely over-rated affair that has a serious paucity of dialogue, is heavily scored and during it's almost three hours, not enough actually happens. Indeed, it is very reluctant to let us leave. I will admit that my first guess at the ending was a bit optimistic, but it could conclude at least another four times before we are finally allowed to stretch our legs. It might look better second time around, but for now it's nothing at all to write home about.
