It blows away even the Burton BATMAN film (iwhich you were correct in noting was more about Joker than about Batman).
There were some conceits I could have done without...the Bat-Signal, the use of the "Batmobile" as an instrument of war, the Ra's al Ghul plot for Gotham City (though I enjoyed all the other Ra's' instances).
Its strengths were when it focused on Bruce and Bruce-as-Batman...Alfred, Bruce's guilt over his parents' deaths, Lucius Fox, the concept of becoming what you fear, that compassion is the one thing that separates Batman from his possible enemies. Some great writing in all of that. I was impressed.
But there were moments where I felt this movie was too derivative of the Burton first film: the poisoning of Gotham and the Katie-Holmes-as-just-another-Vicky-Vale angles. I groaned at those moments. Perhaps Nolan and Goyer meant for those moments to pay homage to Burton's film, but I just don't think it was necessary to make that homage (given the bad taste in the mouth that still remains from how the Batman movie series 1989-97 ended).
