There's A First Time For Everything... "Batman"

Batman (1989)

Rated PG-13 for language and violence       

Starring Jack Nicholson, Michael Keaton, Kim Basinger, Pat Hingle, Billy Dee Williams, Michael Gough

Directed by Tim Burton

The Story:

Bruce Wayne (Keaton) is a billionaire with a secret: he's Batman!  A hushed urban legend, he wants to help the Gotham City Police Department, including Commissioner Gordon (Hingle) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Williams).  However, Gotham is riddled with crime, and the latest crime boss suffers an accident at the hands of Batman and he becomes...The Joker (Nicholson).  With the police, reporters and photographer Vicki Vale (Basinger) on his trail, can Batman save the day without being caught or killed?

Happy 25th Anniversary to the movie, Batman.

I have never watched the film before.

Shocking, I know.  You'd think I would have been all over this one.

However, I was relatively uninspired by the selection of Michael Keaton as Bruce Wayne, and between all the snippets of music that year and clips on TV, I felt as if I'd pretty much seen everything I needed to with this film.

So, I finally sat down and watched it this weekend, and I'm reminded of a time when superhero movies generally sucked.

This film doesn't change my perception of that time, and I figure the popularity of the film came because it had been a long time since Superman: The Movie, and people wanted to like this, or any, superhero film.

Because...

It's pretty bad.

Those with rose-colored glasses who have 25 years of happy memories will disagree, and that's fine...

But wow.

A credit to Burton, he made a Gotham that looks and lives up to its place in the movie as an actual character.

However, the movie really should have probably been called The Joker, because let's face it, that's what most of the movie centered around.

Hey, if you're throwing all of your money and top-billing to the bad guy, you might as well make him shine.

Nicholson does his job, eating scenery and pulling out all the stops as The Joker.

Keaton does a fine job of portraying Wayne/Batman.  No real complaints there either.

The movie itself though, seeks too much synchronicity by making the Joker responsible for creating Batman and Batman responsible for creating The Joker.

Gag.

Vicki Vale provides nothing but eye candy and damsel in distress moments that grew old and tiresome by the 2nd or 3rd time she screamed in terror.

Then, by the third act, when Batman's billion dollar jet cannot hit The Joker even though it targets him perfectly, and the Joker is able to shoot down said jet with one bullet from the most ridiculous gun in movie history...

Yeah...

This is not the Batman you want... it's the Batman you deserved.

Ben Affleck can do better than this with his eyes closed.

Final Grade: C+

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: I went 25 years before seeing it.  I think I'm good for one lifetime.

The Bane of My Existence..."The Dark Knight Rises"

The trilogy concludes...

The Story:

8 years have passed since Batman went into seclusion.  The streets of Gotham are safe, thanks to the Dent Act.  But when trouble rolls into town in the form of sadistic mercenary Bane, all bets are off, and Bruce Wayne decides to dust off the cowl and go back into action as...

Batman!

Has it been 8 years?

I honestly don't know.

In fact, aside from knowing that I saw the 2nd film, I really don't remember much about it.

Perhaps I was still too depressed that Heath Ledger killed himself, but I really don't remember much about that film.  Other than everyone loving it.

I'm not even sure if I own it, I'll have to check my DVD case.

But anyway, back to the film...

So the cast grows with the arrival of Catwoman (Anne Hathaway) and a cop (Joseph Gordon-Levitt...again...) who both figure strongly in Batman (Christian Bale) and Commissioner Gordon's (Gary Oldman) fight to save Gotham from Bane (Tom Hardy, unrecognizable under the mask).

And much like props to Karl Urban for his willingness to be masked the whole film for Dredd, kudos to Hardy for taking a role that hides his face and muffles his voice for 98% of his entire screen time.


I was pleased with the Catwoman performance this go-round.  Never saw Pfeiffer's version, but this is a huge leap in the right direction after Berry's debacle from years back.


In fact, as an action film, this was actually a pretty good movie.

That said...

By this point in time, with the arrival of The Avengers, and Marvel stepping up their movie business with hit after hit, my kids had absolutely no desire to even watch this one.

So DC, you better step up your game if you have any chance of putting butts in the seats, at least with my family.


: )

I see how they set up for the eventual sequel/franchise reboot or whatever...


Meh.  I can handle another Bruce Wayne actor... not thrilled with what they have seemingly decided on though.


Final Grade: B

Would I Own It: I'll probably pick up a copy eventually on the cheap, but no big hurry. 

Marvel > DC.

: )