The past Batman movies

[Red X Unmasked]

What do you think of the past Batman movies? I know a lot of people disliked them, and I understand why, but there were SOME things good about some of them. What do you think was the best of them? What could've made them better? Who do you think was the best Batman?

I enjoyed the first and second Batman films, but I enjoyed the second one best. What killed the first one IMO was the fact they made the Joker the same guy that killed Brucey's parents. Jack was great as the Joker, though, and so was Keaton to Bats. When I watch movies based on cartoons or comics, I expect (and want) the main characters to look just like their cartoon/comic counterpart, and Keaton did it for me.
I also liked how Gotham seemed like a real place, unlike in Batman Forever and Batman and Robin. They made Gotham seem very unreal to me.
one thing that I thought the first and second Batman movies lacked were the big kung fu fights. For someone that trained in dozens of different forms of Martial Arts, he did little kung fu fighting, mostly a bunch of punches and kicks, that was it.
Also, they could've had MORE Gordon in the films. There was hardly ANY interaction between Bats and Gordon, not like in the comics.
The first two were okay, and there's not much I would've changed about them.
But Forever, on the other hand, needed alot more work. First, what killed it was val Kilmer as Bats. Though he was a semi good actor as Bats, it would've been better if they made the guy to play Bruce look more like Bruce (but maybe I'm asking too much). The Riddler was a little TOO hyper in this film if you ask me, and the same thing for Two-Face. WAY TOO hyper. And I didn't like it how they gave Twoey henchmen. Does every villain need a henchmen? And if they do, they don't ALWAYS need to be just like the guy they're working for.
Robin was okay in this movie, and I thought his costume was excellent. And (yet again) they could've tried to find some way to make him look more like Dick, but still I'm asking too much.
I thought that second costume that Bats wore at the end of the movie was pretty useless if you ask me, except for the fact it came with a coin dispenser.
And I REALLY didn't like how they made Two-Face the one that killed Dick's folks, and I didn't really see the need to add a brother in their for him, but oh well.
Now for the final film. This one was the worst in my opinion. I thought Freeze was good, though, and he should've remained by himself, instead of teaming up with Ivy. I didn't really care much about what they did with Bane, cause I never really liked him like that. But Ivy was annoying in this film. One good thing about it was that they got Clooney in it, who IMO portrayed Bruce pretty well. But I was upset with what they did with Robin's costume. Why make it blacker? Does every costumed hero have to get ripped apart and given a black leather outfit in every movie? It gets pretty annoying.
Two things killed this movie for me:

1) Where Freeze decided to go for the cliched revenge-on-the-entire-world-for-making-my-the-way-I-am-though-it-is-my-fault-for-the-way-I-am-but-won't-realize-that-until-the-hero-shows-me-the-error-of-my-ways plan. I liked his costume though.

and

2) Why the bloody hell was Batgirl made into Alfred's neice (at least I think it was)? I've been wondering that for the longest. Was it because Gordon hardly got any time on the movie to introduce his daughter or something? I never understood why this was done, and this was one of the reasons that killed the movie for me.

This may sound like a rant, but it's not. What are your thoughts?

[TimTwoFace]

The only movie I didn't like of the four recent Bat-movies was the last one. There were some good parts in it - you had to search REALLY hard to find them - but for the most part, the movie didn't even take itself seriously, so I didn't either. The only aspect of the movie that seemed to have any respectability at all was the subplot with Alfred dying - but that was usually ruined every time his "niece", Barbara, entered the scene.

Though I'd say none of the Bat-movies are PERFECT, I do like the first three a whole lot for varying reasons, and would give them all "A" ratings. Yes, even BATMAN FOREVER was a good movie. Unlike most fans out there, I didn't mind the neon - Gotham CAN have SOME colour, after all. The theme of the movie was pretty dark, too. I thought that the introduction of Robin was handled very well, and the Riddler's obsessiveness over Bruce was great, too. I didn't mind the fact that he was hyper and campy - of all the Batman villains used today, I think that the Riddler is the only one that can get away with being over-the-top campy and silly and still work. (I guess Frank Gorshin's original performance has outlasted the test of time.) The only downside was how Two-Face was handled - he was too hyper and often pushed aside in any of his scenes, later on in the movie. In all honesty, he was the main villain of the film, but never really got to do much once he hooked up with the Riddler. He should've been the cold, calculating counterpoint to the wacky Riddler in their scenes - no one can be zanier than Jim Carrey, so why Schumacher tried to make Jones match that is beyond me.

I look forward to the director's cut of the movie, whenever it comes out. This movie had the best script of all four Batman movies - the novel prooves it - I just want to see the three hour version to prove it to myself.

Burton's movies were, of course, great and generally better recieved, despite the fact Batman killed and the Penguin was such a freak. I liked those versions of the characters, though; the dark fairy tales Burton told (especially notable in BATMAN RETURNS) were excercises in terrific filmmaking.

-Tim

[Red X Unmasked]

Burton's movies were, of course, great and generally better recieved, despite the fact Batman killed and the Penguin was such a freak. I liked those versions of the characters, though; the dark fairy tales Burton told (especially notable in BATMAN RETURNS) were excercises in terrific filmmaking.

-Tim

I agree on that one. They were much darker than the other ones. Afterwards they became, IMO, too comedic and not dark enough for a Bts film. But Batman Begins looks like it'll make up for that...

[DR.MID-NITE]

Funny you posted this thread. I was watching Batman & Robin this morning and I can tell you what ruined the movies...

1-Schumacher
2-Neon, neon and more neon
3-Schumacher
4-The costumes were ridiculous. I don't mind a rubberized costume. But, by the end they were crazy. Nipples, strange designs, etc.
5-Schumacher
6-Too campy
7-What Red X said. They totally disregarded Gordon. They made him an overweight nothing.


Just look at the new preview for the new Bat movie and compare to the old movies. It looks more realistic and it really seems to take the Bats background more seriously.

[SirLemming]

The ones collaborated on by Tim Burton and Danny Elfman were, predictably enough, very good. After that it was downhill.

Val Kilmer and George Clooney were both boring and/or silly as Batman/Bruce Wayne.
Jim Carrey did pretty much what I would expect him to do given a role that has even the smallest potential for all-out doofusry.
Tommy Lee Jones was nothing as Two-Face. He just kinda stood next to The Riddler making goofy faces, giving the character absolutely no menace and no tragic element.
Arnold Schwarzenneger was a retarded choice to play Mr. Freeze. It's like the casting was done by someone who was just like "OMG SCHWARZENNEGER!" without giving any thought to how well he suited the character.
Uma Thurman wasn't noticeably horrible as Poison Ivy, and I guess her problems can be attributed to the script more than anything.

Actually, I guess I don't really blame any of these actors for what happened. The scripts and directing were totally screwed up. Batman Forever salvaged some amount of darkness and dignity, but Batman & Robin was the movie equivalent of Soddom & Gommorah, except that God couldn't manage to destroy it because He was just laughing too hard.

[Lord Dalek]

I think it's been said already. Tim Burton's two films (despite the changes to continuity) are by far the best. Batman Forever is slightly underrated and Batman & Robin.... well the less said about that one the better.

[AdamYJ]

I don't know. I think that they never really got it quite right. Things were either too dark or too light. People always talk about how great the Burton ones are, but I've never been the biggest fan of them. The first movie had pretty much no plot and making Joker the Waynes' killer was very lame in my mind. Then they made Penguin into a deformed circus freak and Catwoman into this half-immortal crazy *****. Burton's were too dark, or maybe dark in the wrong way. Batman has always been dark but more in a "pulp fiction, film noir" kind of way, not in a "dark, demented fairy-tale" kind of way.

Then there are the Schumacher ones. I agree that by the end of Batman and Robin, things had gotten too silly. The villians' characters and plots became too goofy. The heroes became a little too well known to the public. And Gotham just became brighter and brighter even at night. However, these movies did manage to introduce Robin, who I think is essential to the Bat-mythos (though I prefer Tim Drake to Dick Grayson). They also used villians that had not previously appeared on the '60s tv show (a big plus. We almost got Egghead, Bookworm and King Tut in the movies). My favorite of the Batman movies is probably Batman Forever just because of the way they dealt with the themes of obsession and revenge. It brought back a part of Batman's morality that was missing from the earliest two movies. If you were actually to take a lesson from the first Batman movie about that subject, it would probably be that revenge is good. I disagree. Revenge is very much not good.

Now, I try not to be a purist about much of anything, but the various Batman movies just don't really strike the right cord with me.

[Michael24]

OF the live-action movies, BATMAN is my favorite. I thought it was a perfect movie. BATMAN RETURNS was good as well, but one villain would have been enough. BATMAN FOREVER, I liked maybe 50% of it. Val Kilmer was better than I expected, but Jim Carrey was miscast as The Riddler, and Two-Face was turned into too much of an over-the-top character. BATMAN AND ROBIN just plain sucked. I thought Clooney was terrible, Alicia Silvestone should never act (or try to) again, and Schwarzenegger was badly miscast. Don't get me wrong, I love Ah-nold (one of my favs), but I didn't like him in this movie. Granted, it fit with the overall over-the-topness of the movie in general, but I was just pissed because I guess I was hoping for Mr. Freeze to be like he was in the cartoon.

Personally, though, I think BATMAN: MASK OF THE PHANTASM was the best of them all, though. I also think Kevin Conroy is the best Batman ever, period.

[Shaggy&Daphne]

Batman Forever was a half decent film only because Tim Burton stayed on board as producer of that film. He deserves all the credit for any amount of good that came out of this dreck. Scenes like the one where Bruce Wayne is talking to Dr. Chase Meridian and he notices the ink blot on the wall in her office, which he percieves to be a bat were influenced by Burton. All of the good elements of this film that made it at least watchable were due to Tim Burtons involvement.

[Shaggy&Daphne]

OF the live-action movies, BATMAN is my favorite. I thought it was a perfect movie. BATMAN RETURNS was good as well, but one villain would have been enough. BATMAN FOREVER, I liked maybe 50% of it. Val Kilmer was better than I expected, but Jim Carrey was miscast as The Riddler, and Two-Face was turned into too much of an over-the-top character. BATMAN AND ROBIN just plain sucked. I thought Clooney was terrible, Alicia Silvestone should never act (or try to) again, and Schwarzenegger was badly miscast. Don't get me wrong, I love Ah-nold (one of my favs), but I didn't like him in this movie. Granted, it fit with the overall over-the-topness of the movie in general, but I was just pissed because I guess I was hoping for Mr. Freeze to be like he was in the cartoon.

Personally, though, I think BATMAN: MASK OF THE PHANTASM was the best of them all, though. I also think Kevin Conroy is the best Batman ever, period.

You are absolutly right! Batman is a perfect movie! Everything was just so thoroughly thought out and carefully put together, and Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out.

[AdamYJ]

You are absolutly right! Batman is a perfect movie! Everything was just so thoroughly thought out and carefully put together, and Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out.

I will have to very much disagree with you on that. I don't like Batman much at all. The plot of that movie seemed to take a back seat to spectacle.

[The Penguin]

2) Why the bloody hell was Batgirl made into Alfred's neice (at least I think it was)? I've been wondering that for the longest. Was it because Gordon hardly got any time on the movie to introduce his daughter or something? I never understood why this was done, and this was one of the reasons that killed the movie for me.

The stupid reason they gave is that Pat Hingle's Gordon was too old to have a 20-year-old daughter. When the film was released Hingle was 73, but if you ask me he didn't look much older than 60 with his brown hair and taking that into account it is not unheard of for a 40-year-old to have a newborn daughter. If you ask me it was just a random excuse to make the "Bat Family" more of a family.

[Michael24]

Batman Forever was a half decent film only because Tim Burton stayed on board as producer of that film. He deserves all the credit for any amount of good that came out of this dreck.

You're right. When you take just a general look at the film, it's easy to forget that Burton was involved. haha!!

[The Penguin]

Everything was just so thoroughly thought out and carefully put together, and Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out.

It seems to me that coordination with the writers would have been difficult seeing as how Burton threw out the script WB had, had his girlfriend write a treatment of it and then brought in Sam Hamm to do it in 1986. Hamm worked on it and then stopped because of the writers' strike. After that, Burton had Warren Skarran, one of the Beetlejuice writers, finish it. And then the apparently holy and sacred duo of Burton & Keaton wrote stuff on the fly.

[Rurouni Kenshin]

I thought the one the joker and the riddler was very good, but the Mr.Freeze one was terrible.

[Shaggy&Daphne]

It seems to me that coordination with the writers would have been difficult seeing as how Burton threw out the script WB had, had his girlfriend write a treatment of it and then brought in Sam Hamm to do it in 1986. Hamm worked on it and then stopped because of the writers' strike. After that, Burton had Warren Skarran, one of the Beetlejuice writers, finish it. And then the apparently holy and sacred duo of Burton & Keaton wrote stuff on the fly.

The original draft was written in 1980 by Tom Mankiewicz. I actually read the original script and thank God that it wasn't used, because it was lousy. When Burton was put in charge as director he was unsatisfied by the Mankiewicz script, and so he threw it out. Burton then, along with his girlfriend Julie Hickson wrote their own 30-page treatment of the project. This treatment was approved by both the producers and the studio. Then in 1986 Burton met Sam Hamm and gave him the job of writing a screen play of Burton and Hickson's treatment. However the writing process stretched too long and due to the writers strick Hamm could no longer continue to right drafts for the script. So he got Warren Skarran a co-writer for Beetlejuice to continue writing. After that Director Tim Burton and Micheal Keaton did alot of rewriting during production. They did not just right stuff on the fly.

[The Penguin]

The original draft was written in 1980 by Tom Mankiewicz. I actually read the original script and thank God that it wasn't used, because it was lousy. When Burton was put in charge as director he was unsatisfied by the Mankiewicz script, and so he threw it out. Burton then, along with his girlfriend Julie Hickson wrote their own 30-page treatment of the project. This treatment was approved by both the producers and the studio. Then in 1986 Burton met Sam Hamm and gave him the job of writing a screen play of Burton and Hickson's treatment. However the writing process stretched too long and due to the writers strick Hamm could no longer continue to right drafts for the script. So he got Warren Skarran a co-writer for Beetlejuice to continue writing. After that Director Tim Burton and Micheal Keaton did alot of rewriting during production. They did not just right stuff on the fly.

So your response to defend "...Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out." is to more or less copy and paste the info that I paraphrased and then nit-pick at one phrase I used?

Throwing out a script, using two different writers and then rewriting stuff with your star does not denote having "...everything strategized and mapped out." Just because you love the movie doesn't mean you can make stuff up about it.

[Shaggy&Daphne]

So your response to defend "...Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out." is to copy and paste the info that I paraphrased and then nit-pick at one phrase I used?

Throwing out a script, using two different writers and then rewriting stuff with your star does not denote having "...everything strategized and mapped out." Just because you love the movie doesn't mean you can make stuff up about it.

I wasn't making anything up about it. I was just taking what you said and added a bit more detail to it. And I wasn't saying that using two different writers and then rewriting stuff with your star denotes having everything strategized and mapped out. I was just trying to correct you on what you said about Burton and Keaton making stuff up on the fly. That was you making stuff up about them. You can see just by watching the film that everything was strategized and mapped out. It's because of this that I love the film so much.

[The Penguin]

I wasn't making anything up about it. I was just taking what you said and added a bit more detail to it. And I wasn't saying that using two different writers and then rewriting stuff with your star denotes having everything strategized and mapped out. I was just trying to correct you on what you said about Burton and Keaton making stuff up on the fly. That was you making stuff up about it. You can see just by watching the film that everything was strategized and mapped out. It's because of this that I love the film so much.

Actually it was just a poor choice of words. The background of the number of people involved in the writing process does not say "...Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out." I'm not saying the movie is poorly written mind you, but it's not as if Burton worked closely with one screen writer to "map everything out" and then the movie was filmed.

[Shaggy&Daphne]

Actually it was just a poor choice of words. The background of the number of people involved in the writing process does not say "...Burton and the screen righters had everything strategized and mapped out." I'm not saying the movie is poorly written mind you, but it's not as if Burton worked closely with one screen writer to "map everything out" and then the movie was filmed.

You don't need alot of people involved to have a thoroughly planned out screen play. In fact, having a large number of people involved in the writing process just results in a cluttered mess of a script, not to mention plot holes large enough to drive a car through. Burton is the one who had a strategized and mapped out vision of exactly what he wanted and how he wanted to tell the story.