The Batman (2022) review

Yet another "reboot" of the Caped Crusader franchise, this time with Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) partnering with righteous police detective Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) to decrypt puzzles from The Riddler (Paul Dano), forming an alliance with Selina Kyle (Zoë Kravitz) to locate her missing friend, winding up in a high speed chase with The Penguin (an unrecognizable Colin Farrell) and learning about his own Father's past ("he made a mistake").  The "angle" taken by Reeves this time around is that the central character is more of a "gumshoe" than just an action hero (which is how it started with the early comics), but none of this is structured in the proper way to make that approach effective: there's no mystery as to who the "bad guys" are, and I doubt the original creators thought of him as being Sam Spade in a bulletproof suit - the dialogue also runs on the hammy side ("I am vengeance," "The city's eating itself," etc.).  It's hard to knock the performances or the ambience: it's a rain-soaked, neon-lit and moody depiction of a world that rarely sees sunlight and is filled with corrupt and powerful people ... it's a shame points have to be shaved off for being unnecessarily bloated.