Batman & Robin (1997)

STRENGTH. COURAGE. HONOUR. AND LOYALTY.

I know, I know, I’m horrendously late with this one. Believe me, I never thought it would happen on Batman Week. Still, you don’t want to hear me go on about why I’m late… you, for whatever reason, want to read my thoughts on the fourth film of the original run of Batman films that started in 1989 with Tim Burton’s Batman and ended in 1997 with Joel Schumacher’s Batman & Robin, which has gone on to become one of the most reviled films ever made. Well, you’ve all waited long enough; let’s get to it.

Batman (George Clooney) and his partner Robin (Chris O’Donnell) work together to stop the new bad guy of Gotham: Mr. Freeze (Arnold Schwarzenegger), a sub-zero scientist stealing the city’s diamonds. Tensions appear between the duo, made worse when another villain comes into town, Poison Ivy (Uma Thurman). When the two evildoers join forces, it takes the crime-fighting pair to breaking point.

It’s a bit difficult to find things to say about a film like Batman & Robin. Not because there’s nothing to say about it, be it good or bad, but really just because so many people have already gone to town on it. You go to the IMDb page for this film and you will see a slew of one- and two-star reviews and comments that so thoroughly tear it a new one that it seems unnecessary to go over the same ground. Those that defend it often do so in a manner that’s half apologetic. Even Joel Schumacher himself went on record apologising for the film, and George Clooney said that this was the film that officially killed the Batman franchise. This would seem like a pretty solid statement considering that any and all plans for further Batman films and projects were instantly halted and cancelled due to the critical battering this film took. You have to admit, rarely has a film had such a negative impact as this one. Films cancelled, careers stunted, the Bat-signal decommissioned for almost a full decade… that’s a lot of hate. But is it all justified? Is this truly worthy of the vicious tirades and outbursts it receives?

Well, yes, kind of. However, let’s have a proper look at it and measure the damage of what’s said to be one of the worst films to make almost twice its budget back in box office returns.

Primary writer of Batman Forever, Akiva Goldsman, returned to scripting duties on this film, conceiving of story (alongside Schumacher), character arc and dialogue. Goldsman is such an interesting case study as a figure in Hollywood, but particularly a writer. Most of Goldman’s work as a writer since his beginnings back with 1994's The Client have been as someone who works primarily on adaptations of other works, such as A Time to Kill, Practical Magic, I, Robot, I Am Legend, The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons, as well one foray into adapting a classic TV series, Lost in Space. You may look on these and think to yourself that this guy does nothing but write scripts for awful, but financially successful films. In that case, you’d be wrong, since he actually won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for his work on A Beautiful Mind, which won quite a few other awards, like Best Film and Best Director. So clearly the man has something in him that can produce good work. However, looking at his track history, as writer or producer, specifically on comic book films (Batman Forever, Batman & Robin, Constantine, Jonah Hex), it’s almost all downhill. I mention these things purely to make the point that, for my view, Akiva Goldsman simply doesn’t really get comic book films, though I’m sure he has tried to educate himself in the ways of medium. It could be that he continues to hold on to some worn out notions of stylisation, character, or simply the commonly held belief that comics are for kids and idiots, so any hackneyed storyline is acceptable. This, coupled with his clear orders from producers, director and studio big-wigs to make things more kid-friendly and cartoony, means that Goldsman has produced a script that is an unholy concoction of flat characters, truly grating dialogue, and a story so simple and dull that you would struggle to care less about it.

The tentative steps of trust, partnership and what it means to be part of a team that were addressed in Batman Forever between the two crime-fighters returns again in Batman & Robin, but just feels so much more forced. It’s been over a year since Dick Grayson partnered up with Bruce Wayne to kick Gotham’s criminals in the collective nuts, but they still seem to have a problem with trust, partnership and what it means to be part of a team. Robin wants his share of the glory, but Batman thinks he isn’t good enough yet. Honestly, this whole storyline just makes Robin come off like a petulant child, which sort of worked for the frustrated emotional arc in the last film, but here is very off-putting. And the introduction of Batgirl is just clichéd and lazy. Here, she is Alfred’s niece (rather than Commissioner Gordon’s daughter) who shows up, says something about computers, rides a bike and becomes the latest addition to the team… that’s it. She does have other stuff about wanting to take her dear uncle away from his life as a servant, which is supposed to open things up to be a consideration of family, but it’s completely hollow. Effectively her entire drive becomes ‘I’m taking my uncle away from this life of servitude’ ‘But he’s family’ ‘Well, then so am I’. She doesn’t really earn a spot on the team so much as force her way in through some sort of vague sense of nepotism.

Poison Ivy’s storyline is one born of environmental mania, with Dr. Pamela Isley trying splice the genes of plants and venomous animals to create plants that can fight back against their human predators. However, she is killed by the other mad scientist in her South American laboratory, who is busy creating a chemically-enhanced super soldier called Bane, who is to be auctioned off to the standard line-up of crazies bent on world domination. Three things: 1) The mad scientist creating a super solider bit is so trite that it’s painful; 2) It utterly destroys the character of Bane, turning the super strong and super smart monster of the comics into a walking blunt instrument; and 3) The bit about Dr. Isley being murdered by a co-worker only to be resurrected by the thing she loved in life, thus turning her into a villain defined that thing, is a near carbon copy of Catwoman’s origin in Batman Returns. When Ivy comes to Gotham, she starts using pheromone dust to drive men wild and turn Batman and Robin against each other, but it all seems so unnecessary. Her ultimate goal is make plants rise up against humanity, which she plans to do with a special flower/snake hybrid she created, but then why bother with anything else? She’s already made the plant, and has shown that she can grow things almost instantly and with a minimum of fuss, so getting near Bruce Wayne, messing with the crime-fighting duo, and teaming up with Mr. Freeze is completely pointless. She could have gone to a local park, planted whatever she wanted and had a floral army almost immediately. By showing up and aligning herself with the bad guy, she put herself in the firing line. She’s just thrown in to further aggravate the Batman/Robin conflict. She is almost nothing but plot hole.

The one interesting arc for the film comes from Mr. Freeze, who was a former Olympian turned Nobel prize-winning biochemist. When his wife contracts a deadly disease, he puts all of his effort into finding a cure, but an accident turns him into someone who can only live in sub zero temperatures. He then becomes a villain, but only to fund his own research to cure his wife. This is actually really good stuff, because it’s got heart and tragedy, as well as the moral questions of doing bad for a good cause. However, much like the Poison Ivy origin, it’s also got nothing to do with Akiva Goldsman. This arc was created for a 1992 episode of Batman: The Animated Series called Heart of Ice, which won an Emmy for writing and is remembered as one of the best, if not the best, episodes of the series. It was so good that the comics took this origin on board and has served as the basis for the character ever since. What Goldsman did with this story was utterly destroy it. Partly because it’s supposed to be cartoony and partly because Schwarzenegger was cast, Freeze is a virtual non-stop pun machine (a “machine pun”, if you will) and completely ridiculous. He hangs out in an abandoned ice cream factory, wears huge bunny slippers and forces his freezing minions to sing cartoon songs for him. The small moments of pathos are ruined by crass jokes as soon as they begin to go in the vague direction of genuine emotion. For example, when a lackey interrupts Freeze watching old home movies of his wife, he freezes him solid and says “I hate it when people talk during the movie.”... Christ. Not only does Goldsman insist on utilising every story cliché, every tired plot device, every achingly bad pun going, but he also crushes any scene that tries to break away from this.

And the dialogue… dear sweet zombie Jesus, the dialogue is abysmal. Almost no one is immune from the clunky, awkward, unfunny words being forced upon them. Only Alfred manages to get away from this, but only because he’s British and dying.

You know what? I think I’ve harped on about Goldsman long enough.

Joel Schumacher takes the overblown approach he used in Batman Forever and manages to outdo himself in Batman & Robin. Supposedly before every shot, he called out to his cast “Remember, this is a cartoon!” This is an easy indication as to how he saw these films. As I said in the Batman Forever review, these were his orders from the studio. He was told to make a film like this, but even this was too much. Aside from helping Goldsman come up with the storyline for the film, he has turned the world of Gotham into a campy, colour-blitzed playground for people to jump around. Every character seems to come with their own signature colour, so the instant they show up, the whole lighting scheme in the room changes. In fact, the visuals match the script perfectly, holding the same subtlety and delicacy as using twenty sticks of dynamite of wash a dinner plate. He also compounds his bizarre addition of nipples to the costume designs by adding abs and asses. His casting choices are just as foolish.

Put simply, George Clooney is not a good Batman or Bruce Wayne, simply because he never stops being George Clooney. Bruce Wayne’s charm is actually just Clooney. Batman’s intimidation factor is non-existent because he’s just Clooney. It’s a wholly unconvincing show from someone I’ve seen do some great work before and since. Chris O’Donnell is just a whiny little annoyance. Alicia Silverstone follows Clooney’s turn and shows up onset as herself in a costume. The worst stuff comes from the villainous sector. Arnold Schwarzenegger is as bad as he always is, so there’s little surprise there. The thing that makes it more painful is that his was the most interesting character with the most potential. I’m not sure I really blame Arnold for this, though. He does show signs that he’s trying, but this is just something that's beyond his capabilities as an actor. Uma Thurman doesn’t really get the same consideration. Though not exactly one of the most revered actresses, she can pull off a decent turn when she wants to. The character of Poison Ivy is weak, and the direction was bad, but Thurman is hardly blameless for the twitchy and over-the-top show she puts on.

There are many people that will tell you Batman Forever is the film that truly ended the original Batman franchise, and that Batman & Robin was merely the final nail. Frankly, this is kind of true. Whilst I will hold that Batman & Robin is the worse film of the two, it was Batman Forever that helped pave the way for this one. If Batman Forever had been a flop, Warner Bros. may have changed their tactics again and tried to recapture the darker tone of the first two films, which they at least knew would get them a consistent audience, even if it wasn't as big as they wanted.

I’ll say again that Schumacher apologised for this film, saying that all he wanted to do was entertain. I understand this, as I think we all can. Nor do I really blame him entirely for Batman & Robin, or the demise of the original franchise, mainly because so many other people are equally responsible. Akiva Goldsman, Warner Bros., Tim Burton, the cast, the production crew, everyone who had their hand in making these films that pandered and patronised the audience at every turn. But most of all, the cinema-going public is responsible for this film, and I include myself in this. Only a few complained about the first two films being too dark, but we all had a part in allowing the change to happen. When Batman Forever dropped, we should have called it quits then and there. But we didn’t, the film became a massive success and made the filmmakers think that this is what we wanted as an audience. The most powerful people in the film industry are, and have always been, the audience. We let these things happen, by letting the crass commercialism and juvenile story-telling dictate where the series went.

We should all very ashamed of ourselves.

Batman Forever (1995)

COURAGE NOW... TRUTH ALWAYS...

Eager to keep the success of the Batman films going, Warner Bros. began the process of developing a third title. However, with the third film, there was a massive shake-up in how the films were made. Tim Burton was replaced as director by Joel Schumacher, though he did stay on as producer; Michael Keaton left the lead role, which was filled by Val Kilmer; the writing team was completely changed; new villains were brought in; and the whole tone and look of the franchise was shifted to something much different to the previous two. The reaction to the film was… mixed, with a bit more emphasis on dislike. As you’d expect, I’ll look at how these changes came to be before I talk about what the result was.

Batman (Val Kilmer) has his hands full fighting the criminal escapades of Harvey ‘Two-Face’ Dent (Tommy Lee Jones), former Gotham D.A. who blames the hero for the disfigurement that split his face and personality. Meanwhile, Edward Nygma (Jim Carrey), an inventor at Wayne Enterprises obsessed with Bruce Wayne, snaps after having his work shut down and begins leaving riddles his former boss. Both Two-Face and The Riddler team up to kill Batman and ruin Bruce Wayne. Added to this are the attentions of psychologist with a thing for Batman, Dr. Chase Meridian (Nicole Kidman), and Dick Grayson (Chris O’Donnell), an acrobat Bruce Wayne takes in after his parents are killed by Two-Face, but who discovers his secret.

Beyond the concerns of many critics and fans that didn’t like the first two films, there was a particular group whose complaints were heard: Parents. Obviously not all parents, but specifically those who objected the darkness of the previous films, saying that they were unable to take their children to see such films. Warner Bros., who generally believed the darkness of Batman Returns to be the reason it under-performed, took their comments on board because this was a firm chance for them to respond directly to audience opinion and make the film more marketable, opening the films up to a younger audience and with an eye on more lucrative and widespread opportunities in the toy market. The decision for these changes to take effect was handed down from on high, which then caused a major reshuffle in the production line-up. As you may have read in the last review, Burton was hesitant about doing even a second film, and was a bit more so for a third time out. What effectively sealed his leaving the director’s chair was the mandate to lighten things up, make them more colourful, more approachable for a younger audience. Although he has done some work, before and since, that had a campy feel to it, he was unwilling to make these changes to the world he had established and vacated the position, although he stayed with the project as a producer. To fill the role, Warner Bros. hired Joel Schumacher, whose most recent films (Falling Down and The Client) had done well, and who agreed to drastically shift the overall tone and feel of the project.

When Schumacher came on board, he brought with him Akiva Goldsman, the primary writer of his most recent adapted work The Client. Goldsman teamed with Lee Batchler and Janet Scott-Batchler, who had been brought on earlier to develop a story. Originally, when Burton was still considered the director of the project, the Riddler was the only villain in the film, but when Schumacher came on board, he chose to add Two-Face to the mix. It was also decided to finally introduce Robin to the films. When Tim Burton stepped back, Danny Elfman also did not return, in favour of Elliot Goldenthal. Director of photography duties were also handed to Stephen Goldblatt.

The casting also had a major shake. When Michael Keaton learned that such major changes were to be made to the new film, he decided to leave the project completely (though there were rumours that he asked for a major pay raise, and was turned down). This led to the casting of Val Kilmer, still riding the plaudits from his work as Doc Holliday in Tombstone. In fact, most of the roles were filled by people who were very hot property at the time, like Chris O’Donnell, Nicole Kidman, Jim Carrey, and Tommy Lee Jones, who had also worked on The Client with Schumacher.

Well, those were the most significant changes to the production. How did they fare?

There’s a word that comes up in Batman Forever at least three times, used by a different character each time. A word that is never used in either Batman or Batman Returns. A word that goes a long way to explaining a lot about the approach to this project as opposed to the other two. The word is “Superhero”. With that word, there comes a world of implication, of imagery, an expectation of a particular sensibility that can only be described as “comic booky”. The visualisation, the styling, the manner of how the characters act and relate is all drawn from this one word and everything that runs through it. What’s even more strange is that it seems like the word has been introduced into the series’ vocabulary not just to take advantage of audience expectations, but also to mock and satirise it. When Grayson claims to be Batman and tries to save a girl from a gang, she says to him, “Doesn’t Batman ever kiss the girl?” They kiss, the music swells in a rather insincere manner and then the fight continues. They’ve purposely acknowledged the whole superhero thing just so they can make fun of it, and that just leaves a bad taste behind.

The story has returned to a campy, over the top manner that the TV series adopted in the 1960s and that the previous films actively tried to distance themselves from. The primary narrative drive comes from the Riddler building a giant “box” through which he can steal people’s thoughts, memories and ideas. Right away, this is a million miles away from the more realistic concerns of the Joker, who just wanted to kill people, and the Penguin, who wanted to steal an election and rise to power. And whilst we’re talking about this, over how long a period does this film take place? It would take a very long time for Edward Nygma to build his company, manufacture products, have them in every household, build his giant island complete with death-traps… Seriously, there’s only one mention as to what time of year one particular scene occurs (Halloween), but even that’s just a trite plot device to get the Riddler and Two-Face into Wayne Manor. The part of teaming the Riddler and Two-Face to kill Batman itself is really just an excuse for destructive action scenes. Then there’s Bruce Wayne’s remarkably unsubtle psychological breaks, which have him randomly spouting lines about his parents being murdered right in front of him and how he promised it would never happen to anyone again and how he wanted to strike fear into the hearts of blah blah blah blah blah… good lord. Then there’s the convenient arrival in town of a hot psychologist with an interest in Batman. The actual introduction of Dick Grayson is probably the plotline most competently handled, although the manner in which he finds out Bruce Wayne’s secret and becomes Robin is hamfisted nonsense.

There’s also a use of the most ridiculous pop psychology. Psychological terms like “neuroses” and “scarred psyche” and “alternate personality” are dropped in every now and then to make it seem like it all makes sense, explaining the careful construction of each character’s motivation, but it’s all just surface. A moment like when Wayne sees a bat in a Rorschach test is played to have way more significance than it actually does. Even then, this notion of split identity, with Two-Face and Batman and Chase and that little sleep doll thing, was territory already covered by Batman Returns, and much better.

The characters themselves have simply become caricatures. Batman is still brooding, but he’s no longer the darkly introspective type. He has suddenly developed a desire to openly discuss his traumatic past. This immediately sets itself in opposition to the character of the first two films. In Keaton’s Bruce Wayne/Batman, he was a fairly dark guy, but he at least owned his own trauma and used it to drive him forward. Here, he seems to be just looking for an excuse to tell someone about it. He’s also been given more one-liners to make it more fun for the youngsters (“Can I persuade you to take a sandwich with you, sir?” “I’ll get drive-thru.”). Really, who is this guy? As it is, Val Kilmer does his job perfectly adequately, but that’s part of the problem. He portrays Bruce Wayne as written, but nothing more. He delivers the one-liners well, gets the humour and holds a nice charm, but he’s always much more convincing as Bruce Wayne than Batman, mainly because he’s never really a threatening presence, which is what Batman is meant to be.

For someone who is meant to be the living embodiment of split personality, Two-Face doesn’t have one personality, let alone two. He’s meant to be driven by revenge, but controlled by the whims of chance, hence the constant flipping of a coin, however this is just adopted as an affect rather than a compulsion. There’s a moment where he sits on a couch, flipping the coin to see if he will shoot Bruce Wayne or not. He flips; it lands on the good side. Annoyed by this, he continues to do it until he gets the bad side, where he then promptly pulls out his gun and shoots… this isn’t Two-Face. When the Riddler tells him that he has a “serious impulse control problem”, this is a clear indication that the writers have fundamentally misunderstood the character. Two-Face has supreme impulse control - the coin always makes the decision; he just acts on what it tells him, regardless of what happens. And Tommy Lee Jones is quite bad, spending the whole movie over-acting to the point of aneurysm, desperately chasing Jack Nicholson’s show in Batman. For such a usually bankable actor, this is a far cry from what we know he can do.

The Riddler is also one that has been rather misrepresented. He begins the film in a manner that’s rather appropriate: highly intelligent, massive ego, huge inferiority complex. However, things change as the film continues. Part of the Riddler’s personality was always that he believed he was smarter than everyone else and sought to prove it over and over again, hence all the puzzles. For his plan to revolve around making himself more intelligent by stealing other people’s minds is ridiculously over the top and somewhat contrary to his regular modus operandi. What’s even stranger is how he decides on his Riddler persona. When he first uses his machine on his supervisor and discovers its brain-enhancing power, he yells at him “Riddle me this!”… okay, fair enough. After this, he leaves two separate riddles for Bruce Wayne, each in envelopes adorned with a question mark… once again, okay. However, it’s only after this that he decides on both his costume and name. Why wasn’t that the first thing he thought of? Why did he consider the Puzzler (dressed in crossword robes), the Gamester (dressed as a giant chess piece) and Captain Kill (dressed in army fatigues) before deciding to name himself after the very puzzle he has already used and dressing like the question mark-covered figure that sits in his apartment and workstation? It’s bizarre. Jim Carrey does at least give you something to watch without being too grating, though that line is crossed a few times.

Dick Grayson is… well, he’s okay actually. His motivation is clear, and can at least be both sympathetic and a bit of dick. He’s impulsive, brave, strong-willed, though often infuriating in his ability to not think things through… so, he’s a pretty decent portrait of a young man with vengeance on his mind. It’s rather a shame that he never has any decent moments after actually putting on the Robin costume. Seriously, go and watch it. Before he gets his new duds and cape, he’s adept and handy; afterwards, he makes a bad joke, crashes a boat, gets beaten, kidnapped and then rescued. Weird, isn’t it? Chris O’Donnell’s performance is actually pretty well suited to the brash young man, though this does mean he becomes kind of an ass to the audience.

And Dr. Chase Meridian is, well, she’s quite fickle and a bit of a tramp. Yes, she’s smart because she’s a doctor and she’s tough because she knocks hell out of punch bag in her office, but the most prominent personality trait that shines through is that she’s really quite promiscuous and indecisive. She doesn’t know if she wants Batman or Bruce Wayne, generally deciding she wants to be with the one who isn’t there. And Kidman looks very pretty… that’s about all you can say.

Joel Schumacher’s handling of the film, though no doubt in keeping with what Warner Bros. wanted (i.e. an enormous toy advert), is such a visual and aural assault that it’s difficult to think of where to start. Put in the most all-encompassing terms, it all looks like a cartoon. The colours are all neons and piercing lights, so it’s like Gotham has relocated itself to the main dance floor of a nightclub; action scenes, and some regular ones, are filled with inane stings and sound effects, like tings and squelches and boings; and the character design is ludicrous. One of the most regularly decried decisions was to put nipples on the Batsuit, and it’s a fair complaint. Schumacher said that he wanted to give the suit a more “anatomical” look, which is all well and good but makes no sense in the practicality of the film world. Imagine the conversation between Bruce and Alfred on the reality of that choice:

            Bruce: Alfred, I’ve decided I want nipples on the Batsuit.

            Alfred: What for, sir?

            Bruce: I want it to look more anatomical.

            Alfred: Well, Master Wayne, in that case, how about I put a bellybutton on it,

too?

            Bruce: Well, I…

            Alfred: And perhaps some eyebrows on the face? And some people ears?

How about a birthmark for good measure? You’re meant to be a symbol of

fear to the criminal underworld, not a freaking go-go dancer. You tossbag.

The same goes for the decision to give Robin an earring to “make him look hip.” Okay, kids may think he looks like a rebel, but all it takes is one evildoer to rip the thing off in a fight and he’ll be in trouble. Again, it’s a decision that holds little practical weight in the reality being presented. And when it’s more plausible for a street gang to go around caked in neon face paint than it is for a particular character to wear an earring, you know there’s a problem somewhere.

There are some things Schumacher did better than Burton. As I have said before, Burton was never particularly adept with action sequences, but Schumacher is. The fights and chases do look much faster and more dynamic, although the first fight sequence has an editing rhythm more suited to punching the audience than Henchman #3. However, giving it its due, compared to the previous films, this one is much more explosive and fast-paced. It’s just that everything that surrounds these scenes is pretty bad.

Really, the worst thing you could do before watching Batman Forever is watch the previous two Batman films, since it just highlights the massive gap in style and approach. By comparison, this film comes off as noisy, stupid, cheap and kind of heartless. Even when taken on its own terms, it still falls flat with absurd characterisation, a ridiculously overblown story and a general style that makes it all feel so flippant and disposable. The toys that were sold on the back of this film were more solidly made than this.