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Badmovies.org Forum  |  Movies  |  Good Movies  |  Batman Retuns in the best bat film ever (taken from an imdb thread) « previous next »
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Author Topic: Batman Retuns in the best bat film ever (taken from an imdb thread)  (Read 3259 times)
Doggett
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« on: November 14, 2010, 10:01:11 AM »

I took this becuase BR has awlays been my favourite film but I was never able to put into words why. This guy has, and I liked his writing so much that I'd though I'd post it here.


Quote
Although despised by the painfully literal-minded, this might be the best superhero film, or at least the only one to meaningfully challenge Richard Donner's Superman's pre-eminence. Apart from the recent Kick-Ass, it's the only one that could meaningfully be described as genuinely deconstructive, and here's why.

The first Tim Burton Batman (1989) set up the classic dichotomy of Batman vs the Joker - order vs chaos and so forth. That's fine as far as it goes, but it's not terribly interesting (and we were forced to sit through the same thing with the volume turned up recently in The Dark Knight) and kind of speaks for itself. Batman Returns fractures the character further, and (at the risk of sounding cliche) presents Batman with his greatest challenge, which is himself.

The villains in Batman Returns are distorted, funhouse reflections of divergent elements of the Batman concept. Max Schreck is a dark Bruce Wayne Unbound, an amoral aggressive capitalist who delves into the Weird without fear (and let's not overlook the name, a nod to the cultural grotesque from which Batman emerged). The Penguin is Batman's grotesque and outsider status (and this is one of about fifteen films Burton has made with an outsider as the focal character - like many artists, he frequently returns to one theme from different angles) amplified and thrown back at him, his freakishness (continually underlined in the script) unnerving friends and foes alike. The Catwoman character is Batman's kink, putting the psychoanalyst's focus on a man who dresses in black leather and beats up other men, a sexuality that has been the topic of discussion and controversy ever since the mid-50s. She's the girl infiltrating the boy's treehouse and subconsciously suggesting they need to grow up.

Whatever your opinion of the character, the Batman concept is one of the most durable and flexible in popular culture, able to slip into any number of different roles; Burton, as a non comic book reader, is ideally placed to recognise this from outside of the fan world, and seeks to stretch the concept to its breaking point. It's the Batman concept, not just the Batman character, that is under threat in this film.

The Michael Keaton Batman has been criticised for being uninteresting in comparison to his villains, but this is only true if you refuse to read the film on anything more than a surface level. If we look at the real contest that is occurring in this movie, we see that Keaton has to adopt the straight man role while his whole identity is assaulted. His understated Batman provides an excellent centre point to the chaotic forces that spiral around and off of him, and sets up several excellent scenes where his straight-backed style directly contrasts with either Penguin, Catwoman or Schreck. So one the one hand we have a film with four pillars, but it's really one overarching category split into three. It's Batman's world, eveyone else just lives in it.

Indeed, the narrative tells a story of Batman's monopolistic ownership of Gotham being threatened - Penguin runs for mayor, Schreck is a rival businessman. Catwoman even partakes in vigilante acts, and directly challenges Gotham's reliance on their hero ("Always waiting for some Batman to save you."). The villains frame Batman and manouvre him into opposition with the law while seeking to become the new status quo. This is striking because of Batman's Plutonian (rather than Dionysian, and as opposed to Superman's Apollonian) nature requiring him to be Lord of the Underworld. Suitably, Batman Returns' aesthetic gives us a dark, weird and crucially un- or sur-realistic Gotham, thankfully devoid of the whimsy that unfortunately pervades some of Burton's other films. It's somewhere between a 1940s pulp story (from whence Batman originated) and a poisoned Doctor Seuss fable.

Batman's inevitable victory is all the more glorious for all of this, though tinged with tragedy. The two films have seen Batman in a state of becoming, first by providing (albeit brutal) closure over the death of his parents by avenging them and secondly by putting his essence through the Nietzschean "whatever doesn't kill you only makes you stronger" test. But this has removed him further from what he seems to want, which is to settle down. He presumably couldn't relate to Vicky Vale, and now Selina Kyle has also seemingly rejected him. The cruel paradox of Batman is that he has to exist to fight for a world where Batman doesn't have to exist. Like a classic hard-boiled gumshoe (again, a pulp world that Batman has never fully left), he doesn't get the girl.

Burton's best film, and the best Batman film. By not adhering strictly to the source material (Zack Snyder and others take note), the film manages to be more interesting. It's amazing that it even exists, with its adult fairytale sensibilites put upon a corporate logo. One wonders what Burton had in store for us in Batman Forever before he was removed, but one is also sceptical that studio interference wouldn't have ruined it anyway.


I agree with EVERYTHING he said in that.

 Cheers

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Chainsawmidget
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« Reply #1 on: November 14, 2010, 11:35:39 AM »

I still think the first Keaton/Burton movie was much better, but both are far more enjoyable than what Nolan and Bale have given us. 
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« Reply #2 on: November 14, 2010, 03:39:34 PM »

A contributor of mine agrees that BATMAN RETURNS is the best, in fact, he thinks it's the best comic book movie ever made: BATMAN RETURNS: A SUPERHERO BURLESQUE.  I can't directly comment as I've never seen it but it does sound interesting.  I wasn't a huge fan of Burton's first Batman, though it was good enough in its way.
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« Reply #3 on: November 15, 2010, 06:44:12 PM »

I didn't like Batman Returns upon first watching.  I think it grew on my slightly in subsuquent viewings but it didn't excel to being one of my favorites.  I think a big issue I had with the Burton films is the killing off of the villains.  This also seemed to follow suit in the next films up until the latest films we've been getting lately.  I do think Keaton was the best Batman/Bruce Wayne so far.  Though I do love Adam West for camp reasons.

I quite enjoyed Batman Begins and it ranks in my top Batman film favs.  However, The Dark Knight has to be one of the worst.  Shoot me, string me up but the film simply fails on so many levels.  The Joker ironically has a line that can wrap the film up for me, "why so serious".  Part of the Batman world that makes it likeable are the villains.  Matter of fact, Batman has the strongest and most interesting villians comic book wise.  I never dug trying to squeeze these villains in a real life setting. 

I think my favorite interpretation of the Batman world exists souly in the Annimated Series. 

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Trekkie313
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« Reply #4 on: November 16, 2010, 02:18:30 AM »

Batman Returns is my favorite of the original Batman Anthology. Best Batsuit and sexiest villain IMO.
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Flick James
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« Reply #5 on: November 16, 2010, 01:32:46 PM »

I would agree with Darksider in that I wasn't impressed at first, but it sure grew on me. I don't know if I would call it my favorite, as I don't think I have one, but it's right up there, and yes, I do like it better than Tim Burton's first. The only thing about the article that I would disagree with is that it's Tim Burton's best film. I think Ed Wood and Big Fish are better films IMHO.
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JaseSF
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« Reply #6 on: November 21, 2010, 11:48:51 PM »

Personally I feel the animated Batman series and films of the 1990s are actually the best ones but I do consider Batman Returns to be the best live-action Batman film.
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Couchtr26
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« Reply #7 on: November 30, 2010, 11:17:41 PM »

I quite enjoyed Batman Begins and it ranks in my top Batman film favs.  However, The Dark Knight has to be one of the worst.  Shoot me, string me up but the film simply fails on so many levels.  The Joker ironically has a line that can wrap the film up for me, "why so serious".  Part of the Batman world that makes it likeable are the villains.  Matter of fact, Batman has the strongest and most interesting villians comic book wise.  I never dug trying to squeeze these villains in a real life setting. 

No, I have lost all faith in you Darksider.  No, bad joke.  I agree with you on Michael Keaton.  He seems to fit the role better then any that followed.  Also, it is something that doesn't seem to work in the real world.  Batman is something that exists best in the world of comics and animation.  It just seems to fit better when it is removed from reality as every character is more a caricature then a real person. 
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HappyGilmore
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« Reply #8 on: December 01, 2010, 12:02:35 AM »

Overall, I liked the first three Bat flicks, Batman, Batman Returns and Batman Forever.  Hated Batman and Robin.  Begins was so-so.  I liked Dark Knight but can see where people hated it. 

But of the flicks, I liked Forever the most.  First one I saw in the theater, and for what they were worth, I felt Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones were great as Riddler and Two-Face.  Some people didn't like the way the characters were portrayed in the film but I think ultimately it comes down to how the film was written as opposed to how the actors played them.

Batman Returns is my favorite of the original Batman Anthology. Best Batsuit and sexiest villain IMO.
Danny DeVito?  Buggedout  Ha...na, but yeah, Michelle Pheiffer is quite damned appealing. 

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« Reply #9 on: December 01, 2010, 06:30:34 PM »

This is certainly one of those films which get better on subsequent viewings. I first saw it on a theatre, and I was like 15 at the time. I remember being a bit disappointed that it was less fun than the first film, but I also admired some of its visuals (like the opening depicting the origins of the Penguin) and loved Michelle Pfeifer as Catwoman.

It wasn't until I watched it again and again on VHS that i started to understand what Tim Burton wanted to make, and that it wasn't a summer action flick. "Batman Returns", like the first "Batman" is primarily a film about its villains. Burton is fascinated by them (and I can't blame him, they're indeed fascinating) and by opposition Batman's attemps to defeat them and return Gotham City to anything resembling normality seem pitiful.

I like Christopher Nolan's Batman films, but sometimes I wish he felt the same fascination for the bizarre than Burton has. His films are the best mainstream comic book adaptations I've seen in years, but they do feel surprisingly non-comic-bookish, if you know what I mean.
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« Reply #10 on: December 07, 2010, 04:49:49 PM »

I think BR is the best of that whole series of late 80's-90's Batman movies, although my favorite Batman in the animated version from Batman TAS. I think overall it really captured the feel of Batman, at least how the comics felt to me.  However, when it's all said and done, there is one version I think we can agree is near the top of all Bat-fans' lists:

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