And now at last, we reach the reason why for eight years Batman was thought to be gone from the movies forever. A movie that is perhaps so bad that we should be thankful. After all, they wouldn't have had to reboot the whole series by bringing us Christopher Nolan's modern masterpieces if this movie wasn't so incredibly awful. I'm talking, of course, about Batman & Robin. Whereas the rest of the early Batman movies had at least some shred of quality, this movie has none (apart from the five seconds where Mr. Freeze sheds a single tear and it freezes on his face, that was pretty good). I believe my high school English teacher said it best: "If you're four years old and you've never seen a movie before, Batman & Robin is pretty much the greatest movie ever." And with that, this is the epic finale of my unofficially titled trilogy: "Why the First Four Batman Movies Suck."
I'd like to rip on the plot of this movie, but unfortunately I can't. The reason being that I can't remember it. Because it was stupid. Really stupid. Something about Mr. Freeze wanting to freeze the whole city for reasons unknown. In addition, Batgirl joins the crew for reasons unknown. I've never been a big fan of Batgirl as a character. Because although the idea of a female Batman is certainly pretty hot (in the spirit of female Jack Bauer on the past season of 24) the character is quite superfluous. Whereas Robin is supposed to represent Batman's redemption, (because if Bruce can raise him without hatred and fear, maybe he'll end up differently than Batman did) Batgirl basically represents the fact that the comics writers wanted to bring in a female audience. And that Joel Schumacher wanted to put Alicia Silverstone in a tight-fitting Batgirl outfit, something I'm not entirely against. However, and this is sure to upset the ladies in my audience, she's not really in any kind of shape to be fighting crime. She's by no earthly means overweight, but the same goes for any number of people who aren't capable of jumping around rooftops and beating up bad guys. Not that Clooney (as much as I like him in basically every other movie he's in) looks like he could beat up anybody either. (But that's the whole point of my dismay isn't it?) And on top of not being in good enough shape to be Batgirl, she also somehow manages to save both Batman and Robin at the end of the movie. Yeah, because some schoolgirl fresh from the classroom has the skills to save the world's greatest gymnast/martial artist and his sidekick, all because she found a costume in a drawer.
Now then, let's focus on the villains in the movie (and I use that term loosely, especially in wake of my 5 favorite villains series, where the word was used to describe very in-depth and interesting characters). Poison Ivy is, without a doubt, a fairly minor villain. But she's moderately interesting in that she's an environmentalist gone crazy (before that was the cool thing to do) and that she's a temptress who is able to seduce any man she comes across (except Batman of course. Scratch that, except Batman when the story is done correctly of course). Because of this, she's supposed to be a woman who is literally so attractive that the thought process going through every guy's head should be: "I know that if I kiss her I will either die or become one of her minions, but I don't particularly care." And who do they cast to play this Helen of Troy-esque woman? Uma Thurman. And with creepy plastic eyebrows no less. Now, I think Uma is a great actress, and I don't think she's unattractive. But a woman so attractive that I'd sacrifice everything just to be around her? I think not. They probably realized this when filming and for this reason wrote in a perfume she wears that does the job for her. I can buy that I guess, but she really shouldn't need a perfume. I'm not sure who I would have cast as her back then, but today I'd say they should cast Annie Wersching (the aforementioned female Jack Bauer from this past season of 24, I watched the whole season over the weekend). And why is she teaming up with a man who wants to freeze the whole city? I'll have to check with my mom later to make sure, but I'm fairly certain that plants die when hit by a freeze-ray (or a similar, naturally-occurring phenomenon).
Which brings us to Mr. Freeze. He's another one of my favorite villains from the animated series. In fact, the first episode to feature him, "Heart of Ice," won an emmy. And rightfully so, because it's really freaking good. In 20 minutes it examines a tragic man who was trying to save his dying wife and ended up being condemned to a sub-zero environment. Michael Ansara's voice on the show is just perfect: powerful yet weary. He is frightening one moment and mournful the next. The episode not only set the standard for Batman, but in many ways, it set the standard for a whole decade of excellent animated television. And what do we get from this character who was so well-developed in a mere 20 minutes when he appears on the big screen?
"FREEEEEEEEEZE! CHILLLLLLLL OUT!"
Holy crap could they have screwed up the character any more? I'm a fan of Arnold's many action movies, much like any guy, but this was just terrible. At least they kept the storyline about his dying wife, but the delivery is just terrible. Mr. Freeze is supposed to be a character whose sorrow was so great over the loss of his wife that his physical body became as frigid as his emotional state. Which is even more interesting when considering that this is not so different from what made Batman who he is. But instead of exacting his vengeance on those who wronged him, he decides it would be just as fulfilling having ice-skating henchmen that help him rob banks as he exclaims stupid one-liners that exhaust Roget's "cold" section. The fact that the Adam West TV show was so hokey that it was cancelled in a time of hokey television should be some indication that crap like that doesn't fly with people. And once again, his villainous plan is moustache-twirling at its worst. It would've been right at home in one of Roger Moore's Bond films or perhaps, Spy Kids 4: Not Child's Play Anymore. We sadly will never see Freeze done correctly, as he's too unrealistic for the new Batman films (which I'm fine with, so maybe I'll make some of my own someday).
And now, let's rip on Clooney's Batman. Oh wait, not just yet, I forgot about Bane! Probably because he's in the movie for about 27 seconds. Bane is certainly without much of a personality or backstory in any medium he's been depicted in, but he's very formidable. In the comics, he broke Batman's back. A new Batman had to step in for a while, and there was some question as to whether the real Batman would ever be back to peak efficiency again. On the cartoon, Batman almost got himself squeezed into a piece of origami by Bane. The only way to stop him is to cut off his supply of the venom that gives him his extraordinary strength. And even though he is literally in the movie for under five minutes, (no hyperbole this time, or whatever the opposite of hyperbole is...hypobole?) that's all it takes for Joel Schumacher to screw him up. Robin and Batgirl are pinned up against the wall by Bane, and they give a wimpy kick and knock his venom off of his head. The end. Every other time we see Bane anywhere, it takes a well-placed batarang to cut that thing loose. On the cartoon, Batman had to freaking stab that thing in order to survive. But in Joel Schumacher's vision, a kick that is flirting with being a spasm is all it takes to defeat Batman's strongest foe. My rule for formidable villains is: if neither I nor my eight-year-old cousin could defeat him, he's probably formidable. Bane fails, on every level.
Right then, now let's talk about Clooney. He has basically the complete opposite of Kilmer's problem. He's Bruce Wayne all the time. As such, he does a pretty good job as Bruce Wayne (at least on face value, the character implications are wrong). But his Batman is just goofy to the point that I thought the actual villain in the movie was the Mad Hatter, who had given Batman some sort of mind-control device that made him think he was a Power Ranger. His motivation for being Batman seems to be comparable to mine, when I was four: he drives a cool car and has cool gadgets. So forget the fact that Batman is obsessed with the death of his parents, for Clooney he's just a rich playboy with a very expensive taste for adventure. In fact, in a behind-the-scenes interview Clooney said, "why would someone play Batman in a dark way? I mean, the guy is a multi-billionaire, he dates supermodels, and he drives an awesome car. Who would be sad about all of that?"
HE MISSED THE WHOLE FREAKING POINT!
Clooney's Batman apparently woke up one day in his teens and said, "you know, it really doesn't hurt so much anymore. I mean, mom and dad wouldn't let me stay up to watch Laugh-In and they made me eat brussel sprouts. I'm gonna go give Brooke Shields a call." So he plays the character like a thrill-seeking billionaire. As such, the fight scenes are ridiculously silly, with no sense of danger whatsoever. Clooney not only lacks intimidation, but deliberately tries to not be intimidating. Everything about his performance, the city, and the story is fake. It's stylized to the point of being a parody of itself. And once again, this was written by the man who brought us Constantine, a film where the cancer-ridden hero saves the day by killing himself and using the devil's ego against him, conning him into stopping the apocalypse. How is it even possible that the man who wrote that also wrote: "Hey Freeze, the heat is on!" If the rumors are true and Clooney will indeed be playing the Lone Ranger, I think that would be excellent as long as he does the exact opposite of what he did in this movie.
Well there you have it, though I would certainly love to go scene-by-scene with each Batman film, talking about what I love and what I intensely dislike, (only love for the new ones, mostly dislike for the old ones) that will have to wait for my book. But I think my point is across. The films went in a very interesting progression. Tim Burton's first got a lot of things right, but it also got a lot wrong (including all of the Prince songs). His second film actually made the villains too dark and barely had any scenes with Batman (it's also a bit long). Schumacher's first outing had some pretty good scenes with Batman reflecting on his past, and Robin is done some small bit of justice, but the villains are way too stupid. Then Schumacher's second try just tosses everything out the window. If you took Clooney's Bruce Wayne, Kilmer's Batman, Tim Burton's directing, and the screenwriter of the last two in Constantine mode, you'd have a pretty good Batman movie. But thankfully, in 2005 we no longer needed to fantasize about how to Frankenstein a good Batman film into existence, because they finally got it right. And who knows? Maybe the people behind Batman Begins wouldn't have been quite so motivated to make the movie they did without a lot of the mistakes that came beforehand. And truth be told, it's much more fun to talk about how bad something is than how great it is. So I suppose I should thank Mr. Schumacher, because he unintentionally brought me some good times through his really, really bad movie.
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