Batman Begins Rate Katie Holmes' Performance in BB

Micromind

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I have made this thread to settle the question about how good (or bad) Katie Holmes was in Batman Begins.

I have heard many posters here that they hate her performance but personally speaking, I don't find it that bad, it is average.

Just imagine some other actress (say Scarlett Johansson, who has worked with Bale in The Prestige) as Rachel Dawes, would that have been a better performance ?
 
For example, this is how many think, a post from the "Next Spider-Man" thread -

This makes little sense to be honest, first the script mostly just has dialogue yes a good story and good lines help elevate a performance, but on the reverse terrible actors can ruin the dialogue, there are many many cases of actors being terrible in good movies, off the top of my head Katie Holmes in BB and Halle Berry in the X-men films immediately spring to mind.

You can also have great acting performances in terrible films, every actor nearly always brings apart of themselves into there character and so if that actor is charismatic and likeable then there character will be sometimes even if they are surrounded by garbage.

http://forums.superherohype.com/showpost.php?p=30906543&postcount=515
 
Katie Holmes was fine. She wasn't great but she was alright. She did her job. Of course i would have preferred Rachel McAdams, Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Emily Blunt. Any of those. Especially Amy after seeing her in Bale's audition and her chemistry with him in American Hustle/The Fighter. But she's Lois now and i wouldn't want anyone else in that role right now.

Katie did her job as Bruce's friend and Maggie did her job as somebody who was disconnected from Bruce yet in a relationship with Harvey. Romantically speaking, i dont think either of them needed to have a strong chemistry with Christian because as you watch the movies more you realize that Bruce was clinging onto something that was never there in the first place.
 
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Kate Holmes did fine in the role of the token two-dimensional walking plot device. And her version was a lot less arrogantly judgmental than the other Rachel Dawes.
 
Katie did her job as Bruce's friend and Maggie did her job as somebody who was disconnected from Bruce yet in a relationship with Harvey. Romantically speaking, i dont think either of them needed to have a strong chemistry with Christian because as you watch the movies more you realize that Bruce was clinging onto something that was never there in the first place.

This.

But Maggie was stronger in the role. I like Empire's assessment of the two;

http://www.empireonline.com/features/recast-movie-characters/5.asp
 
It's really not Katie Holmes' acting that's so bad, so much as it is just how glaring it is that she's...well, Katie Holmes and she feels out of her league with the other high-caliber actors in the cast. I think she gave it an honest effort though.

Maggie was decent. I don't quite get why people say her version was more judgmental. Rachel is judging, condescending, even slapping Bruce all through Batman Begins. She was written that way from the start. My theory is a lot of fanboys couldn't stand that she actually rejects Bruce in TDK, and her girl next door looks in BB don't hurt either.

At the end of the day, the character is nothing to write home about, but nothing too horrible either. Just kinda there, though serving an important function in the plot. Maggie's performance in the death scene was very good though. You can say the character was *insert derogatory term here*, but for a fundamentally good character to meet such a brutal and sudden end makes her a pretty tragic character in the trilogy regardless.
 
She's a bit judgy in BB but she has the advantage of being right a lot of the time. In TDK she totally misjudges everything to the point of being snippy to Alfred instead of shutting up and letting him explain the situation.
 
She definitely has the advantage of being right in the first act of BB, but not so much after that- she just doesn't see the whole picture because she doesn't know what Bruce is really up to. And then apologizes at the end for it.

I'll grant you, Mag-Rachel is definitely wrong in more cases. Unfortunately she doesn't get the chance to apologize to Alfred for misjudging Bruce's decision. Or did she though...they kind of played right into the Joker's hands there which led to her death...bit of a catch 22 there. :hmm
 
The character isn't great in either film, but Gyllenhaal at least made her likeable. Holmes, on the other hand, has me cringing every moment she's on screen.
 
I think that Katie Holmes fit the kind of character they wanted to show in BB, Maggie Gyllenhaal would have looked out of place in BB, similarly, Katie Holmes would have looked out of depth (in terms of her acting ) to portray the character of Rachel Dawes as written in TDK.

Neither could have worked if we (hypothetically) swap places of the two actresses in BB and TDK.
 
I think that she was perfectly fine, and certainly not as bad as a lot of people make her out to be (although I do think that Maggie was better overall). The problem with Katie Holmes in BB is the same problem that Orlando Bloom had in Kingdom of Heaven. Both are ok actors who were surrounded by world-class actors. And they were both giving decent performances in movies where their co-stars were giving great performances. So in both cases, they weren't BAD per se, but they definitely were the weak links of the cast.

Bloom had to act alongside Jeremy Irons, Liam Neeson, Edward Norton, Eva Green, David Thewlis, etc. And Katie had to act alongside Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman, Liam Neeson, etc. Compared to those performers, neither quite measures up.
 
Katie Holmes did just fine. She was directed well and played her role in the story quite well. In fact, compared to Maggie (IMO) she was a shining beacon of wonderfulness. I've rarely encounter a less sympathetic character than Maggie's Rachel.
 
Holmes was bad. Like Razzie bad. Nolan must have been having an off day when he thought she was the best choice for his lead woman. Gyllenhaal ran rings around her in every way.
 
I'm watching BB now and Katie Holmes is so much more likable than Maggie. I felt that Bale and Maggie had no chemistry and I never believed they were childhood friends.
 
I thought she did a good job and I preferred her to Maggie Gyllenhaal.
 

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