A so-so adaptation of one of the best Batman comics (spoilers)
The best Batman comics are the ones in Frank Miller’s ‘Batman: Year One’ continuity, set during Bruce Wayne’s early days as a crime-fighter in Gotham as he encounters baddies like Catwoman, Hugo Strange and The Mad Monk for the first time. By setting stories like ‘The Man Who Laughs’, ‘The Monster Men’, ‘Prey’, and ‘Terror’ so early in the character’s history, it allows writers to revert an 82-year old popular culture icon back down to his core essentials.
Arguably the most notable of these comics were written by Jeph Loeb and illustrated by artist Tim Sale, who collaborated on ‘The Long Halloween’, ‘Haunted Knight’, ‘Dark Victory’ and ‘Catwoman: When in Rome’. A huge influence on Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dark Knight’ trilogy, these stories formed a sprawling noir saga - a massive murder mystery for the trio of Batman, District Attorney Harvey Dent and Commissioner Gordon to solve, while a gang war rages, ala. ‘The Godfather’, between the old school gangster families of Gotham and an emerging breed of flamboyant criminal - supervillains (“killer crocs and moths and sewer zombies”).
There’s an enormous amount of material to draw from and it’s a two-part film, so it’s surprising that ‘The Long Halloween: Part One’ is padded out with so much extraneous new stuff. There’s some additional drama between characters like Harvey Dent and his wife Gilda, as well as crime boss Carmine Falcone and his nerdy heir Alberto, but it’s mostly longer action scenes and corny contemporary dialogue (Joker gets the most wince-inducing lines, like “Spoiler alert: it sucks!”). It reminded me a lot of Bruce Timm’s misguided approach to ‘The Killing Joke’. It also doesn’t help that the film replaces the interior monologues (or “noir narration”) of the comic with swathes of exposition.
What grates the most is the aesthetic of ‘The Long Halloween: Part One’. Tim Sale has a distinctly atmospheric, loose artistic style. Of all the great Batman artists, nobody draws the cape as spectacularly as he does. Sale accomplishes so much with so few lines and massive amounts of black - the moods he creates with such simple linework is astounding. Unfortunately, ‘The Long Halloween: Part One’ doesn’t imitate or homage the style of the artist, which is something that DC and Warner Animation formerly tried to do with these animated films (see: ‘Batman: The Dark Knight Returns’, ‘Superman vs. The Elite’). Instead, it just looks like a duller ‘The Venture Brothers’, with flat, inexpressive characters outlined in thick, black lines.
Director Chris Palmer and writer Tim Sheridan have done some good work together, most recently on ‘Superman: Man of Tomorrow’. It’s a shame that the first part of their take on one of the most beloved Batman stories of all time has stumbled out of the gate in such lacklustre shape. I can’t say I’m too crazy to check out ‘The Long Halloween: Part Two’.
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