The Batman director Matt Reeves certainly packed the film’s cast with a fair number of European actors (Colin Farrell, Andy Serkis) but ironically enough, the UK was the place where the film drew multiple rating complaints – but maybe NOT for the reasons that a lot of fans would immediately assume.
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A new report details how The Batman was one of two films that topped the British Board of Film Classification’s (BBFC) list of films that received the most complaints in 2022. The reason? The Batman received a rating of “15” in the UK, which as the number would imply, meant that viewers under 15 years old couldn’t see it without a parent or guardian. This apparently upset quite a few teens both before and after The Batman’s release in theaters – to the point that 22 out of 84 total complaints about ratings were from that demographic, about The Batman.
In a statement about the complaints regarding The Batman, the BBFC said:
“The Batman presents a bleak vision of Gotham City in which Batman teams up with a detective to solve a series of murders. The killer subjects his victims to sadistic devices designed to terrorize them prior to their death. The tone is consistently dark, and the film depicts its world as less fantastical than previous big-screen iterations of the Batman character.”
In the US, The Batman was rated PG-13 “for strong violent and disturbing content, drug content, strong language, and some suggestive material,” meaning that viewers 13 and above could see it. Obviously, the UK and its BBFC have different standards than Hollywood and the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) do; it’s equally understandable why The Batman would be the sort of film to split the opinions of the two respective organizations.
As noted in the BBFC’s statement Reeves’ whole vision of Batman and Gotham as something closer to David Fincher’s Se7en, with Riddler being a freakish masked serial killer, is arguably much more intense than what a thirteen-year-old viewer would typically be allowed to see in a movie. Then again, opening that can of worms quickly brings up the legacy of Batman movies and examples like Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight, and whether Christopher Nolan’s gritty crime drama held any more right to a PG-13 rating than The Batman. Best not to go there…
The thing that is really wild about The Batman and its UK rating is that the only film to receive more complaints was a film about the Prophet Muhammad’s daughter, titled The Lady of Heaven, which sparked obvious controversy over its depiction and accuracy (or lack thereof) of a major religious figure.
The Batman is streaming on MAX. The Batman Part II is still in development.
