The standing ovation at the Twin Cities IMAX on the opening night of Batman Begins was echoed across the country. This ain’t no Burton-esque phantasmagorical adventure. This ain’t no cheesy fast food marketing opportunity. Batman has indeed begun, and from now on, there’s no stopping the Dark Knight.

Gone are the patented Joel Schumacher NippleSuits, cod pieces and homosexual overtones. Prince did not write a critical song for this film, and the campy, tongue-in-cheek one-liners from overpaid, superactor villains have been banished from Gotham forever.

Director Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins is a critical step backward for the much-loved but misunderstood superhero and will prove to be a saving grace for Bruce Wayne and the cadre of villains who continue to attack the metropolis he calls home.

With a gritty, artistic flair, genius pacing and a penchant for the flashbacks that made Memento a cult favorite, Nolan, screenwriter David Goyer and star Christian Bale give Gotham the enema Jack Nicholson’s Joker hoped for in 1989.

Where’s the bat?
You won’t see Bale as Batman for the first hour. Instead, the audience is thrust into a third-world prison camp, a secret ninja training dojo, flashbacks of Bruce’s famous first encounter with bats and the death of his parents.

You’ll see Alfred earn his spot on the cast list for the first time — from the sole caretaker of a young, orphaned Bruce to providing the support for the fallen bat to never give up. You’ll see Thomas Wayne in a completely different light as he amasses his fortune while helping less-fortunate Gothamites. And you’ll see the future-Commissioner Gordon in his first encounter with the bat and the true origin of the bat signal.

To prepare my palette for bat, I spent the last week watching all four previous Batman flicks, plus 8-minute fan film Batman: Dead End at iFilm, arguably the best Batman movie made so far. This film history review set the bar high for not just a well-made Batman movie, but one that will withstand the test of time, marketing dollars, promotional toy launches and the vengeance that is a comic book geek scorn.

But Batman Begins underpromises from the beginning and oversells at the end. You get twice what you paid for. And what seals the deal is Nolan’s choice to 1.) humanize Gotham City as a modern day New York facing crime bosses and terrorist threats and 2.) include the most humanistic bad guys in the Batman villain ensemble. From Ra’s A Ghul’s martial arts prowess to Scarecrow’s drug-induced nightmarish visions, Batman isn’t faced with unrealistic, supernatural enemies.

Batman is simply a man using wit, intimidation and the world’s coolest toys to defeat the kind of evil that scarily enough, modern audiences can relate to.

Women, Car, Music
With significant elements of romantic realism — the portrayal of realistic, heroic, life-promoting values — Batman Begins gives hope to those of us sick of seeing Spiderman mouse around Mary Jane and flounder with his daily personal life. Batman does get a kiss in this movie, but you’ll find he’s not the jet-setting playboy we thought he was.

As far as the car, the Batmobile looks weird, but once you’ve seen it in action, it’s obvious it truly is the best. And a new score replaced the great-for-its-time Danny Elfman theme, with Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard taking a total departure from the stereotypical superhero soundtrack (listen to clips here). The dark, unthematic songs feature titles named after types of bats — very cool.

Overall, the finer nuances of all things comic Batman come through at every moment in Batman Begins, and Nolan’s brilliant tone and patience to tell the story lets the audience fly on Batman’s shoulder as he sails blindly into the next generation of the Batman legend.

And it doesn’t end there — Lachy Hulme (The Matrix Reloaded, M) is rumored to play The Joker in the sequel, which Nolan, Goyer and Bale have all acknowledged they’d love to film.

Batman Begins really is only the beginning? Holy Bat Revival, Batman! An enema never felt so good!

Batman Begins is in theaters nationwide on June 17, 2005.