Quintessential Quadrilogies | Batman

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Today, we’ll be looking at the four Batman movies released between 1989 and 1997. Despite the drastic change in creative direction that the series took at its halfway point, not to mention the rotating cast of leading men, the films are connected. Supporting players Michael Gough and Pat Hingle, in the roles of Alfred and Commissioner Gordon respectively, suggest that the movies do in fact exist within the same universe.

The modest success of “Batman Begins” and the mega-success of “The Dark Knight” have caused fans to retroactively write off every entry in the ‘89-’97 film cycle, not just the lamentable “Batman & Robin.” With the exception of “B&R,” a film that’s notably absent from the DVD collection, I think that the remaining three Batman films each have their merits. Yes, I even like “Batman Forever.” We’ll get to that later.

Tim Burton’s 1989 “Batman” was a big damn deal during its release. In a summer crowded with highly-anticipated sequels (“Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,” “Ghostbusters II” and “Lethal Weapon 2″), “Batman” beat out all of the competition at the box office and for a time was one of the ten highest-grossing movies ever. In the film, Batman — the most chameleon-like pop culture icon — had been given a facelift and shaken off the camp trappings of the ‘60 TV series. Tim Burton reimainged him as a rubber-suited sociopath who wears a mask of sanity as a reclusive billionaire. Fan outcry over the casting of comic actor Michael Keaton immediately went out the window when the actor brought an equal amount of quirk and menace to the dual roles of Bruce Wayne and Batman. Jack Nicholson, however, walked away with the film as the sneering psychotic Joker. From Anton Furst’s art direction — sort of a low-tech “Blade Runner” aesthetic — to Danny Elfman’s booming, triumphant score, the first “Batman” is a collision of comic book fantasy and Burton’s whimsy. It was bold, different and deservedly successful. This is why it’s been aped to death over the past 20 years.

“Batman Returns,” released three years later, represents the franchise’s first misstep; in fact, each sequel is a misstep in its own right. Burton had more creative freedom on the picture and went darker and uglier. His apparent disinterest in Batman’s rogues gallery — something that’s baffling to me — caused the director to create a new villain in Christopher Walken’s Max Schreck, a silver-haired industrialist and dark reflection of Bruce Wayne. Max Schreck crowds out well-known Batman villains Penguin and Catwoman, whose dual presence in the film underserves the characters. Beginning with this film, an unfortunate pattern emerged in the Batman series with the pairing up of villains in each of the sequels. Not only does this approach limit the amount of screentime that’s afforded to the adversaries, but it uses them up twice as fast.

In lieu of the first sequel’s bleakness and convoluted story, it’s the best follow-up to the original; I know that sounds like a backhanded compliment, but still. The design of the film is marvelous. Bo Welch’s clean, hyper-stylized and monochromatic art direction feels stagebound, adding to the claustrophobia and oppressiveness. It evokes the German Expressionist films of the silent era and was appropriated by the visually brilliant animated series that launched in the fall of ‘92. Elfman tops himself with his score. Keaton’s given more to do. Danny Devito is practically unrecognizable beneath one of Stan Winston’s most beautifully grotesque makeups. Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman is a more compelling foil for Batman than Vicki Vale in the first film.

“Batman Forever” marks a radical departure from Tim Burton’s vision for the series. Burton’s listed as a producer in the credits, but it’s entirely director Joel Schumacher’s show. Let me disclose this before we go any further: I’ve seen this movie ten times in the theater. It opened when I was 15 and at the absolute peak of my own Batmania. Not only was it a Batman movie, but it starred two of my favorite actors at the time — Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones — as the villains Riddler and Two-Face. In hindsight, I recognize that the film is a piece of junk and the beginning of the end of the franchise. But upon its release, I fell squarely into the target audience for this thing and was won over by its gleefully stupid overabundance.

Micheal Keaton bowed out as the Dark Knight for movie three and was replaced by rising star Val Kilmer. Kilmer’s on-set feuding with Schumacher sounds more interesting than his performance. He simply seems bored as Bruce Wayne and Batman. But the emphasis in each film is generally on the villains, giving Kilmer frustratingly little to do, as Carrey and Jones chew on the neon-lit scenery. Again, we encounter the problem of having two central villains. Either one would’ve been enough. Together, the whole is not equal to the sum of its parts. Two-Face’s role is drastically reduced by the halfway point of the film once the Riddler explodes onto the scene. Two-Face essentially becomes a glorified henchman to the Riddler’s criminal mastermind.

Tired of going it alone, Bruce Wayne takes in the orphaned circus acrobat Dick Grayson, who ultimately joins Batman’s war on crime as his sidekick, Robin. Batman’s also given a new love interest in vampy criminal psychologist Dr. Chase Meridian. With all the new character introductions, dual identities and origin stories, not to mention the pointless retconning of Batman’s own backstory, there’s too much going on as far as the plot’s concerned. The visuals are overstuffed as well. “Batman Forever” looks like it was shot in the middle of a rave. It’s so busy, so blacklit. Schmacher wanted to distance himself from Burton’s style, but there’s so much eye-candy, you get Type-2 Diabetes from looking at it.

“Batman Forever” outgrossed “Returns” and held the highest opening weekend gross for a brief period. It was enough for Warner Bros. to fast-track a sequel, 1997’s horrid “Batman & Robin.” A deep-dive into the film’s faults could warrant an entire blog of its own. I’ll keep things high-level and briefly touch upon the more glaring problems with this shitpile.

Kilmer wisely departed from the series after only one turn as Batman and instead starred in the serviceable adaptation of “The Saint.” Chris O’Donnell returned, however, as Dick Grayson/Robin, playing sidekick to “ER” bohunk, George Clooney, as the Caped Crusader this time out. Arnold Schwarzenegger was cast as the villain, Mr. Freeze, whose endless fusillade of tin-eared, temperature-related puns makes one reconsider the actor’s body of work and why we ever bothered to like the big lug in the first place. Uma Thurman also starred as Freeze’s femme fatale, the toxic tart Poison Ivy.

Under Schumacher’s direction, the film descends even further into camp than the previous installment in a failed attempt at updating the style of the 1960s “Batman” television series. The result is a cloying and cartoonish self-parody that lacks an iota of the wit of the old TV show. Tonally, the film is all over the map, as a subplot concerns a terminally-ill Alfred, apparently dying of shame for agreeing to be in this unholy nightmare. Then later, a bulldog is frozen in place while pissing on a fire hydrant. The movie isn’t sure of what it wants to be, so it fails at a little bit of everything.

Two more characters are introduced for no reason: the hulking brute Bane and Alfred’s niece, Barbara Pennyworth, also joins the fray as Batgirl. Pitting three underdeveloped heroes against three overenthusiastic villains doesn’t ratchet up the excitement level, especially considering how dramatically inert the story is. For example, Freeze wants to, as you may have guessed, encase Gotham City is fake-looking, wobbly ice because that seems thematically appropriate for someone with his nomenclature. This would be interesting if there were some long-term ramifications, but given the time of year, it seems that the jig would be up with in a few hours once the ice melts away. Batman’s intervention here seems kind of unnecessary, since the big bad’s so-called doomsday weapon would force people to either stay indoors with the heat up or wear jackets if they go outside.

“Batman & Robin” became shorthand for the absolute nadir of superhero cinema after it underperformed at the box office. It also made studios skittish about green-lighting big-budget comic book adaptations for a period of about two seconds. The film is doubtless why Warner Bros. took a loss on the tens of millions they’d already sunk into Tim Burton’s “Superman Lives” by shutting down the project and why Bryan Singer’s first “X-Men” film looks like a made-for-TV movie. The Batman franchise was moribund for nearly eight years in the wake of “Batman & Robin.” Various directors and scripts were considered in the scramble to resurrect what had once been a cash cow for the studio. When the series was revived in ‘05 with Christopher Nolan’s “Batman Begins,” the previous film cycle was ignored entirely.

In hindsight, the ‘89-’97 Batman films are inextricably linked to my childhood, and for that, I can overlook some of the series’ flaws. But, it’s disappointing to see how the franchise cannibalized itself by becoming increasingly “toyetic” and less interested in its titular hero.

-Brad Lohan

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