Christian Bale gives a gruff and masculine take on the role. Pumped up with muscle and brimming with anger he really is a fearsome force, although he never loses the sly comedic element to his role and his 'under the breath' jokes for the camera are delivered with Bond-esque precision. One sequence where he clears a house full of guests is particularly entertaining.

In the 'dark' corner we have an assortment of evil characters. I think this first film was trying to set the scene and tone of the new franchise and as such went with relatively unknown enemies so the action could focus more on Bruce/Batmen. Ken Watanabe gives a noble but brief appearance as Ra's Al Ghoul, the head of the 'League of Shadows' a ninja-esque group of vigilantes who patrol the world and regulate the evils they find. They are supposedly the one's who have broken various great civilisations in the past when they have deemed them too corrupt and it seems their attention has turned on Gotham for the moment. This is the group that originally trains Bruce and this element makes the showdown more personal. Much more central to the story is Ra's right hand man 'Henri Ducard' played by Liam Neeson. He act as something of a mentor to Bruce and leads his through his training and trials, only for the two to finally fall out. There is slight friendship and respect between the two friends turned enemies and Neeson gives his now typical Qui-Gon performance (similar to 'The Phantom Menace' and 'Kingdom of Heaven'). The final main villainous role is occupied by Cilian Murphy as 'The Scarecrow' he is a secondary villain, however his primary weapon is fear which counter balances nicely to the on going plot point of Bruce trying to master his own fear in order to become Batman. Murphy gives a suitable creepy performance and his scenes as the scarecrow are the only real CGI points, which gives them more emphasis.

With all of these high points there has to be some draw backs and for me the main one is the casting of Katie Holmes as the love interest Rachel Dawes. She is supposed to be a crusading District Attorney however she looks far too young for this and her scenes with Bruce seem awkward. This is a shame as rumour has it she will be reappearing in the sequel!

DVD Info:
- Available Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
- Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1)
- MTV's Tankman Begins: a spoof
- Inner Demons comic: Explore the special features through an exclusive interactive comic book (Excellent!)
- The Journey Begins: creative concepts, story development and casting
- Shaping Mind and Body: Christian Bale's transformation into Batman
- The Tumbler: reinvention of the Batmobile
- Gotham City Rises: production design of Gotham City, the Batcave, Wayne Manor, and more
- Saving Gotham City: the development of miniatures, CGI, and effects for the monorail chase scene
- Genesis of the Bat: A look at the Dark Knight's incarnation and influences on the film (Very Excellent !!)
- Confidential files: Go beyond the movie and discover facts and story points not in the film (Very, very excellent !!!)
- Theatrical trailer
- Cape and Cowl: the new batsuit
- Path to Discovery: filming in Iceland
- Confidential files
- Character/weaponry gallery
- Photo gallery
- DVD-ROM features: Batman Begins mobile game demo & Web links
- Exclusive collectible 72-page comic book containing: Detective Comics #27 (the very first Batman story), Batman: The Man Who Falls (a classic story that inspired Batman Begins), and an excerpt from Batman: The Long Halloween (a chilling story that also inspired the film)