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Batman Forever
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This week, Perry is joined by old friend and author Mark Bousquet and they dive into Batman Forever. And while it's not a particularly good movie, it's easily the horniest Batman movie ever made. Plus, Mark has an interesting theory that puts the entire film into a completely different lens. Doesn't necessarily make it better, but it certainly led to a really interesting discussion.
Visit Mark's website, follow him on Twitter or check out his movie reviews on Letterboxd
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Transcript
Alfred's Report and Batman's Preparations
00:00:15
Speaker
Chair. Alfred. I saw the signal, sir. All is ready.
Bruce Discusses Two-Face's Weakness
00:01:10
Speaker
Commissioner Gordon? He's at home.
00:01:14
Speaker
I sent the signal. What's wrong? Last night at the bank, I noticed something about Two-Face. His coin. It's his Achilles heel. It can be exploited. I know. You called me here for this. The bat signal is not a beeper.
The Appeal of the Batmobile
00:01:36
Speaker
Well, I wish I could say that my interest in you was purely professional. Are you trying to get under my cape, doctor?
00:01:43
Speaker
A girl can't live by psychosis alone. It's the car, right? Chicks love the car. What is it about the wrong kind of man?
Chase Meridian's Attraction to Batman
00:01:53
Speaker
In grade school, it was guys with earrings. College, motorcycles, leather jackets. Now? Black rubber. Dry firemen. Less to take off. I don't mind the work.
00:02:13
Speaker
Pity I can't see behind the mask. We all wear masks. My life's an open book. You read? I don't blend in at a family picnic. Oh, we could give it a try? I'll bring the wine.
Chase's Preferences in Men
00:02:28
Speaker
You bring your scarred psyche. Direct, aren't you? You like strong women. I've done my homework. Or do I need skin-tight vinyl and a whip?
00:02:42
Speaker
I haven't had that much luck with women. Maybe you just haven't met the right woman.
The Bat Signal as a False Alarm
00:02:54
Speaker
I saw the signal. What's going on? Nothing. False alarm. Are you sure?
00:03:13
Speaker
Women.
Introduction to Superhero Cinephiles Podcast
00:03:26
Speaker
Welcome to the superhero cinephiles podcast. I'm your host Perry Constantine, joined to get by apparently three guests we got a regular guest and we got my kids in the background so apologies for any background noise, but my guest today is a guy I've been wanting to get on the show for a long time, and that's Mark Basket Mark how you doing today.
00:03:46
Speaker
I'm doing awesome, Perry. Thanks for having me on it. I think this is my first time on Superhero. This is, yeah. Yeah. I think the last time we talked was Shin Godzilla, so always a good chat.
Mark Basket's Background and Career
00:03:57
Speaker
Looking forward to it. Yeah, over on Japan on Film Podcast, you came on to talk about that a few years back. And before we jump into today's movie, because we got a lot to say, but I did want to give you a chance to kind of tell people a little bit about yourself since this is the first time you're on the show.
00:04:15
Speaker
Yeah, thanks. I mean, we've known each other for a whole long time now, it seems like. Yeah, so right now I'm an assistant teaching professor at Syracuse University in the writing department. I've published something like 20 books, maybe, at this point. Oh, why would you have that many out?
00:04:38
Speaker
Yeah, I think like, you know, I think it's about 20. Some of them are out of print. But yeah, it's been about 20. So it's always looking to work on the next thing, you know, being a being a teacher, you know, I tend to write like mad all summer, and then edit once
Mark's Comic Book Journey
00:04:56
Speaker
the semester starts. So I think I got, I think I got four books in the tank this summer. And now it's just the editing process, getting them going and getting them out to the world. Very cool.
00:05:06
Speaker
Um, and you know, because this is the superhero cinephiles, what is your introduction to like superheroes, comic books, all that kind of stuff? Yeah. I mean, when I was like, like real little, my uncle would buy me like Spider-Man comics and it's sort of like the classic story. So many of us have like, he would buy me Spider-Man comics, like,
00:05:26
Speaker
every month or whatever. I guess it was amazing, just amazing Spider-Man in those days. And I went to Boy Scout camp one week and I came home and my parents had
00:05:38
Speaker
giving me a new bedroom. They took me out of the room. I was sharing with my brother and put me into a bedroom all by myself. But somehow in that process, they decided to throw away about a hundred Spider-Man comics. That would be from like the late seventies, early eighties. So not totally not valuable at all. And then, you know, I was sort of sort of.
00:05:58
Speaker
not a big comic book fan I guess until I got to like middle school and then me and my buddies started reading them. There was a there was a little convenience store around the corner from where I lived and they had comics and they had some some older comics that they just never got rid of so they had like a the wire rack and then they had like a box on the floor you could go through and that's sort of where like I really became like a like a superhero fan was you know
00:06:23
Speaker
mid 80s right so that era of my you know I was sort of raised on that era of Marvel Comics where it was like Roger Stern, Steve Engelhardt, Walt Simonson, Mark Grunewald, John Byrne, so Frank Miller. So you sort of came in at like one of the best areas to sort of jump into comics and then right, you
Marvel vs DC Preferences
00:06:41
Speaker
know.
00:06:41
Speaker
So you came in ever since. So you came in with with Spider-Man. What was kind of your go to and like your your heyday then? Was it was it Spider-Man was just Marvel in general or was there like one thing that you like kind of zeroed in on? Like it was always X-Men that zeroed in on when I was started.
00:06:58
Speaker
For me, it was Thor. It was Thor. I loved Thor. Those books were the most fun. I loved Simonson's approach to writing. He had this wonderful way of balancing the bombast of the artwork with a really
00:07:18
Speaker
like almost dry or neutral narration, right? Like, so he, it seemed, and so it wasn't that sort of Stanley Marvel style where you got like a lot of bombast in both the artwork and the text. Like it felt like a lot of those 80 books had a much better balance between, um,
00:07:36
Speaker
sort of like the energy, right? Like you put more, it seemed like Simon's input more energy into the art, let the art do more of the story. And so I really sort of loved that approach. And then like Roger Stern, like on Avengers, on Spider-Man, like I love, I don't think anybody from that era did like long form storytelling better than Roger Stern. Like I just, I love that. And it was, so I was mostly a Marvel guy, but I always,
00:08:04
Speaker
was checking in with Green Lantern and Batman. Those are my two DC books. Okay, cool. Yeah, back in those days, it was Stern and Claremont were probably the big two guys that were doing a lot of the long form stuff. And yeah, looking back on it now, we had Will Short on to talk about Avengers Under Siege. And Stern's writing holds up pretty well, you know,
00:08:30
Speaker
for the time it was written in, whereas Claremont's narration doesn't hold up as well, I found going back to those things. Yeah, I got a Marvel Unlimited subscription this year and like kind of going back through some of that old stuff, my intent was to sort of go back to like start at like Contest of Champions and just read sort of every big event, right? Go through the Marvel timeline, like event by event.
00:08:57
Speaker
But good God, when I got to like, like Inferno, right?
Mark's Comic Creator Influences
00:09:02
Speaker
The sort of the overwriting on so many of like the Claremont books and like the X-Men books. At the time, I was like all in on it. Oh yeah. Looking back on it, I'm like, you know, I've only got an hour. I'd like to read more than like 10 pages of a comic book, you know? Yeah. What do you think he'll say about Claremont? Does he definitely give you your money's worth of the text?
00:09:23
Speaker
Yeah, he definitely did. I do find myself when I go back and I reread those Claremont stuff. I'm just like, okay, I'm going to skip some of the, like half of these captions. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I do that as well. I also like, I mean, especially when you're a kid, right? Like, you know, I had great experiences meeting like Walt Simonson. I had great experiences meeting Luis Simonson. And so I was always really like in the day I would buy everything that they put out, right?
00:09:52
Speaker
I met Claremont when his, I think it was his first novel came out. It was a book called First Flight and I remember bought it and I stood in line and when I got up to have him sign it, you know, I had said just something like,
00:10:08
Speaker
You know, like, oh, it'd be great to see you write an X-Men novel, you know, and then you could sort of do whatever you wanted in the in the book.
Current Reading Interests of Mark
00:10:14
Speaker
And I don't even know what that comment meant, but I was just trying to say something other than to like, please sign. Right. He looked right. He didn't even like look at me. He just looked at the book and like signed his name and was like, he's like, I do whatever I want anyways. You know, just kind of like, OK, like, I guess you got the power, you know, do do what you want. Yeah.
00:10:32
Speaker
Yeah, I've never met him myself, but I've definitely heard about some of those fan into counters with him before. Yeah. But anyway, today we are talking about Batman Forever. And there's one thing I usually ask guests, and just one more thing, but what is kind of like the thing you're really kind of into at the moment? Like could be comics, could be movies, TV shows, whatever. What's kind of like the thing that is grabbing your attention right now?
00:11:02
Speaker
Um, you know, I'm reading, I'm, I'm, I'm just at the start of book two of Joe Abercrombie's, um, first law trilogy. And I absolutely love it. Like, like I have sort of a love hate relationship with like fantasy books. Um, you know, I read them a lot when I was younger and, you know, like all the forgotten realm stuff, all the Dris Deward and stuff, like crystal shard, like dragons of autumn, like,
00:11:31
Speaker
All that like, like stuff I was totally into. And then I sort of fall out with it I sort of like I hit a limit and I can't read it anymore. So I tried to get into it a couple years ago and I picked up.
00:11:46
Speaker
Patrick Rothfusses and the Name of the Wind, which is a book that like people love. And I read it and I was listening to the audio book and the setup was like amazing. It was like this. It felt like almost like a Wolverine story a little bit where you had this like this guy who was like a bartender, but he had this mysterious past. And there was like these monstrous like I think spiders like out in the like like out in the valley. And he was like, I just want to be left alone kind of thing. I was like, oh, yeah, this is a good setup.
00:12:16
Speaker
You know, like visitors are coming in and they were like, oh, monsters. And then the book was like, you know, you're like, oh, yeah, this is like action. Like, let's go. Let's fight some monsters. And then the book was like, you know, cut to our hero as a teenager. And I was like, fuck off. And I just kind of like like mentally through the book across the room. And I just I got out of it again. But then I picked up
00:12:41
Speaker
the first Joe Abercrombie book there and it was it's so good like I really am loving that right now. You know I'm back to and during the semester I have like a two and a half hour drive to work. Oh wow that's rough.
00:12:56
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I only got to do it like two, sometimes three times a week. Okay. So I listened to like a lot of audio books. And so I always try to like sort of balance off what I'm reading with what I'm listening to. So I've been listening to a bunch of like cozy mysteries because they're completely mindless and fun. Balance off with some
00:13:17
Speaker
some bigger stuff. I just read, this summer I read Bullet Train. Oh, the one that inspired the movies based on that, right? Yeah. And I love, I hate to be that guy, but I love the book and I hate the movie. Okay. Like, but the book is, and in fact, he's got other books, but I don't think they've been translated into English yet, but I really enjoyed that book. Oh, so it is a Japanese author then?
00:13:43
Speaker
Yes. OK, I have to take a look at that. Really enjoyed it. But yeah, between the first law trilogy that, you know, I've been I do my sort of once a year I read a Clive Kussler book to remind myself to remind myself how not to write a 500 page book. So, yeah, that's sort of what that's sort of what I've been into and like
00:14:12
Speaker
You know, I always try to, I mean, you know, cause you know, we follow each other on letterbox. I always, I always try to vary up my movies, right? I always try to like watch something really good, watch a B movie, watch something serious, watch a documentary. So just kind of bouncing around, but um,
00:14:29
Speaker
Yeah, that's sort of what I'm into right now. Speaking of documentaries, that's actually not very, very different from the usual fare over
Ken Burns Documentary Discussion
00:14:37
Speaker
here. But I just finished watching last night the U.S. and the Holocaust, the new Ken Burns documentary. Yep. Oh, God, that was that was intense going through that. And that's six hours long. But I finished watching the last episode last night right before I went to bed.
00:14:53
Speaker
Oh, excellent. Yeah, I've got it recorded so I'm just looking for six hours to watch it to watch it. I mean it's nice it's split up in three episodes but still like it's two hour episodes at a time it's so it's a lot to take in but it's if.
00:15:08
Speaker
If anyone hasn't seen it yet, I know by the time this recording comes out, it'll have been out for a while, but definitely find it on the PBS app or whatever. It's definitely worth a watch. Even stuff like I thought I knew a lot about this time period and everything happening around the US at the same time, but there's still a lot of stuff that I didn't know that this documentary brought to light. Excellent.
00:15:34
Speaker
But anyway, today, and we're gonna be switching gears talking about something very different, and that's Batman Forever.
Revisiting Batman Forever
00:15:41
Speaker
Now, I remember seeing this in the theater when I was like, God, probably like nine or 10 or something like that at the time. And I think I was a little bit older than that. I think I may have been like 11 or 12, actually. I think I was like in sixth grade. But I remember loving this movie as a kid.
00:16:03
Speaker
and like watching it so much that I, you know, on VHS, we bought it like right away and just like rewatching this movie endlessly. I had all the toys, all that stuff. And at the time it was my favorite Batman movie. And now watching it again, first time I had rewatched it was several years back. And now, and I've seen it a few times in the past like 10 years or so. And it's definitely my least favorite Batman movie now, I think.
00:16:28
Speaker
Yeah, that's interesting because I sort of like I was 90 when it came out 95 95. I was yeah, so I was like 22 at the time. So I was like probably yeah, just graduating college like it must come up the summer I graduated college. And I hated it. I absolutely hated it. And I was still like, you know, I got a bunch of like the they were I remember they had a
00:16:55
Speaker
They were selling like little like glasses at McDonald's you could get. They were almost like weird like coffee cup things. I got some of those. I mean, I bought the soundtrack, but I hated it. I absolutely hated it, but it was sort of like at the time,
00:17:12
Speaker
Like in 95, like the kids won't believe this, but there was a time where like you didn't get 42 new superhero movies every year, right?
The Scarcity of Superhero Movies
00:17:20
Speaker
And it really was, there was sort of like this mindset at the time. Like if you didn't go see it in the movies, like you might not get another superhero movie, right? Like it always felt like every superhero movie was like,
00:17:33
Speaker
Like there was always like these rumors about other superhero movies being in production. And if a new movie came out and tanked, it was like, was that gonna like nuke the rest of them? So it's like, you had to go see it. And that's, you know, why, when you were asked like, what did I want, which movie did I want to talk about? The reason I wanted to talk about this one was because I probably haven't seen it in like 20 years. And, you know, what I remember at the time was I hated how corny it was. It felt like a,
00:18:01
Speaker
you know, like a newer version of like the Batman TV show, right? Which at the time, like when I was a kid, I hated the Batman TV show. Like I did not like it at all. You know, you would watch it on occasion, but I, you know, I never really like enjoyed it. You know, and like 95, I was, you know, if I was like in my twenties then,
00:18:21
Speaker
Like that was, you know, that's sort of that age where like everything is like a referendum on everything. You want to be, make sure you were listening to the right music and like reading the right books and watching the right movies. And I definitely wanted my Batman to be more serious than what they were given there. And like I said, I haven't watched it in 20 years and, and I've come to really love the, the 1966 Batman show. Like, and so I was kind of curious to see.
00:18:46
Speaker
if my tastes on this movie would change. I think a lot of us of like the Generation X, Zennial, early millennial generation, I think all of us have
Campiness in Batman Films
00:18:57
Speaker
that kind of love-hate relationship with the 66 Batman, because, especially if we were comic fans going in, because the overvailing
00:19:07
Speaker
image in pop culture, in society in general of comic books was Batman 66. Like every single time there was a newspaper article with about comic books, the headline always started like Biff bangs up or something. And it's like, oh, God, can you be any lazier? Yeah. And even like, I mean, you know, I watched growing up like a lot of the
00:19:31
Speaker
you know the reruns of like the the spider-man cartoon from that era and you know like watching that show now is painful but at the time it was like if it felt like a more grown-up superhero story right i mean it's not like not that it was like mature literature or anything but like that cartoon was not like it it wasn't as hokey right it wasn't as campy
00:19:54
Speaker
And so I sort of, I gravitated towards that, like sort of right from the start. And so yeah, it was total love hate. I've come to really like appreciate and genuinely love those early Batman, the early Batman shows. And I love, you know, I would honestly say like the Batman 66 movie is no worse than like my third favorite Batman movie. Like I genuinely love it now.
00:20:20
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's a totally fun movie. And once you just kind of like buy into the campiness aspect of it, it's it's a lot. And I think that's kind of why I've come around on Batman and Robin, because it's more than any other of
Jim Carrey's Performance in Batman Forever
00:20:33
Speaker
the movies. It's totally like a big budget adaptation of the 66.
00:20:38
Speaker
Yeah, I haven't I haven't seen that either since it came out. And I like I mean, I remember back in the day, I was sort of like like when Batman Forever came out, I was like, well, this is the worst Batman movie we'll ever see. And then Batman and Robin came out and I was like, I was wrong. So I am going to sometime in the next week, I plan on watching Batman and Robin and seeing if my tastes have changed on that as well. If you put.
00:21:03
Speaker
Batman Forever, Batman and Robin and Batman V Superman in front of me and you told me I had to pick one. I would pick Batman and Robin without hesitation. Yeah. It would either be Forever or Batman and Robin. Like, I never want to watch Batman V Superman. No. Again. I mean, it's not a good movie. Batman and Robin is not by any means a good movie, but it's fun. It's a lot more fun than you'll have with Batman Forever or Batman V Superman, I think. Yep.
00:21:34
Speaker
Now, we're watching this movie last night. One of the things that jumped out to me right away, aside from the fact, and the stuff I already knew going into it, like Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones are both basically playing, are both basically riffing on Cesar Romero's Joker.
00:21:51
Speaker
and very badly too. And also Chris O'Donnell looks way too fucking old to behave Bruce Wayne Ward. It's like he comes in, he's like, oh, thanks for taking him in. He's like, otherwise he has nowhere to go. And I'm like, guy's like 40 years old, come on.
00:22:10
Speaker
Yeah. Like, yeah. Yeah. And yeah, that felt very forced. Like, I mean, I appreciate it. I mean, it being like the mid nineties, I appreciate that they didn't make him like an extreme athlete or something. Try to like update the.
00:22:23
Speaker
the character, like I kept expecting him to like roll in on like a skateboard, but it's like, yeah, he, he comes to Wayne Manor on his own motorcycle, right? Like, yeah, he's, he's not, he's, he's, he doesn't need to be put into foster care. I know. And Bruce even says, you know, how about, you know, Dick Grayson College? So he's college age. He's obviously an adult. I'm like, I don't understand why he has to go to social services.
00:22:49
Speaker
Yeah, I didn't I didn't I didn't get that either. I didn't I didn't understand that either. But but the one thing that really jumped out of me and and I never and I can't believe I never noticed this before, even watching this as
Sexual Themes in Batman Forever
00:23:01
Speaker
an adult. But my God, this is the horniest fucking Batman movie ever made. Yeah, yeah, it's like.
00:23:10
Speaker
Yeah, it is like, it might be, I mean, I would be, I would be curious if it is more or less horny than the Batman porn parodies that have been made because this movie. This movie is like, it's like.
00:23:26
Speaker
From the from the opening scene, right? When Batman lands on the roof, Nicole Kidman's character there before that, we got him dressing up in and we're getting like the shots and the crotch shots and everything. It definitely it definitely tells you what's coming like right right from the beginning, right? Like
00:23:46
Speaker
I mean, I mean, she basically says to him on the roof, like, let's go, let's go right here. You know, like, she's like, yeah, she's, she's, she's down to fuck right from the second. He touches down on that roof, but she spread. She's like, her tongue is almost out of her mouth. Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, it is like, like watching it now. I like, I put it on this morning. Uh, like I got up, I got up this morning. I didn't.
00:24:12
Speaker
intend to watch it like at six 30 in the morning, but like I was up. And so I was like, Oh, I'll watch it now. I got, I got time. And I put it on and I was just sort of like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a second. Let me rewind. And then I was like, Nope, Nope. I was like, did I fall asleep? Did I wake up like an hour into the movie? It's like, no, this is like her first scene. And she's just like, hi Batman. Let's fuck, you know, like right here.
00:24:38
Speaker
I don't, I don't care. Like just don't take the suit off, but like, let's go at it. Right. It's just, yeah, it is, it is, it is such a horny movie. Like it, it really is. The thing that really amazes me is one of the big complaints that all these parent groups had about Batman Returns was that it was so horny.
00:24:55
Speaker
Right. It was all this. There's so much sexual innuendo. And then this one was fine. It was beloved by families everywhere. Like, you know, I saw it like, you know, what, three times in the theater or something with parental supervision of some kind, like with an aunt or uncle or with my parents and watched it with my dad. You know, I don't even know how many times on VHS. And I'm just like,
00:25:16
Speaker
How did how was everyone OK with that? How was everyone so worked up over Batman returns that everyone was fine with Batman forever, which is just like, my God, a gentle breeze and everyone in this movie is about is going to have an orgasm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Like I think I think some of it is is.
Comparing Directors: Burton vs Schumacher
00:25:39
Speaker
Part of it is I think is like with Batman Returns, right? It's so dark, right? That sort of like
00:25:46
Speaker
I think people end up interpreting like the dark aspect of everything. Where in Batman Forever, so much of it is played for like a laugh or played with like a funny line or played with like a knowing wink that maybe it doesn't register like at the same amount but like I could not believe watching it just how like even like even when like
00:26:07
Speaker
Like when Bruce and Chase like kiss, like at the end of the movie, like the camera cuts to like Alfred in the background, just like giving them like a smirk, like, yeah, go. It's like, yeah, everybody in this movie is horny. Except for maybe like Dick Grayson, right? Like everybody else. I think probably Alfred is the least horny. Because Dick Grayson is horny for killing Two-Face. Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. Definitely.
00:26:32
Speaker
And I had posted this on Twitter about how this is the horniest Batman movie. And someone commented saying like, you know what? The weird thing is it's not even the one with the Prince soundtrack. The one with the Prince soundtrack is the least horny Batman movie. Well, I think, you know, and like, you know, I think that's just the difference between Burton and Schumacher, right? Like, I think with Burton,
00:26:56
Speaker
especially like in this era of Tim Burton movies, he's always like, let's sort of take normal things and find out how we can sort of delve into the weird cracks, right? And sort of show the weirdness in everybody. And so whether that's family relations or sex, right? It's sort of like, let's sort of, you know, I feel like the Burton movies feel like he's trying to make a movie
Dream Logic in Batman Forever
00:27:24
Speaker
for like people who feel like they've been overlooked, right? Like he's gonna make these things like acceptable. And so he's interested in sort of, you know, I don't get a sense with like the Burton movies that he's interested in sex as much as he's interested in like showing the sort of like the psychology that goes into it, right? Like, you know, whereas with Schumacher, the Schumacher movie,
00:27:49
Speaker
in Batman Forever at least, he's just horny, you know what I mean? It's just like, like, I'm not gonna, like, with the Burton movies, it's almost, there's almost like this sense of like, hey, you don't have to be embarrassed by this, right? Like, and we're gonna show people that you don't have to be embarrassed by this. Where the Schumacher, it's like, hey everybody, let's put on weird costumes and fuck, right? Like, Schumacher famously said that he had had
00:28:12
Speaker
He estimated he'd had about like 20,000 sexual partners. And rewatching this movie, I believe it. I believe it. Yeah, absolutely. You know, and that.
00:28:25
Speaker
That's like, I mean, I had not, I had not heard that before, but that's, that makes sense. Like given sort of my like view of these movies where it's like with, with the Burton movies, it feels like sex is like this, like there's a, there's a distance from it, right? There's like a, like it's, it's, whereas with the Schumacher movies, it's like, you know, if you had told me that they, that they healed cut and then they all did a bowl of cocaine and fucked for like the next two hours.
00:28:50
Speaker
I wouldn't have been surprised. Right. Well, I mean, when you look at the Batman Returns, it's you've got Catwoman and the penguin are like the horniest ones in that movie. And they're the they're the outsiders. They're the weird ones. Nobody else in society is in that movie is really like that. Everybody is pitching a tent in this movie. Yeah. And I think I think it's like I mean, it really shows sort of like, you know, the value of like like experience, not that you need
00:29:17
Speaker
have sex with 20,000 partners to make a Batman movie. But I mean, I just think like Schumacher doesn't have any this is a movie that doesn't feel like it has any hang ups. Oh, no, definitely not. Right. Like, like in terms of like the filming of it, like the the vision for it, like there's no hang ups for it. There's no hang ups with it. And like, so
00:29:37
Speaker
But I guess like to get back to your earlier question now, like it's just sort of popped into my mind. Like why were fans OK with Batman Returns and or the opposite rather. Right. There was there was
Controversial Bat Suit Design
00:29:50
Speaker
this sort of member. There was like this big freak out because he put nipples on the bat suit. Right. It was that. Yeah. That was like the biggest thing that the fans got worked up about, which is so weird. And in retrospect, because that is the least horny aspect of this movie.
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah, it's yeah, it's just it's and that's sort of where like with Batman Forever, like. Do I do I like Batman Forever? No, I hate it. It's a terrible movie, but I do like like I oddly respect the movie, you know, so it's one of those movies where like when I watch it just like in a vacuum, I'm like, this is terrible. But then when I think about it, I'm like, well, there's actually kind of a lot going on here that's kind of like makes me sort of like it.
00:30:34
Speaker
from like the outside, right? And so I was just thinking of like, like, how can I like contextualize that? And it just, it's sort of like the flip reaction I had of like, watching the Shazam movie for a few years ago, where when I just watched the Shazam movie, I'm like, this is a pretty good movie. Yeah. And then when I sort of like think about it, like in the context of other superhero movies and what's going on and like,
00:30:58
Speaker
you know, what the movie kind of represents, like I kind of hate it, you know, like I can't, like I can't imagine I'm ever going to watch the same again. Like, like the second time I watched it, it just irritate, like it just irritated me. Right. But I could see that. I could see that. If I just watched it in a vacuum, I was like, I would be like, this is pretty good. And so like, it's sort of the flip of Batman forever. Like when I was watching it this morning,
Val Kilmer's Bruce Wayne
00:31:20
Speaker
you know, if I wasn't gonna talk about it with you tonight, I definitely would have had the fast forward button out or I would have like found something else to do with my life. But then, you know, like the more I thought about it, the more it's like, you know, there's actually like, there's at least a lot here to talk about. And I think like when I watched like Shazam, I don't feel like there's anything to talk about. There's nothing about that movie that sort of gets me excited, gets me thinking, gets me, you know, whereas with this one, there's
00:31:44
Speaker
You know, there's a ton of stuff here to talk about. So, yeah, you had a you had a really interesting thing you post on on letterbox about it. And I want to let you go off on that in a minute, because like my whole thing was which just kind of blew me away because reading your your your whole thing, your review on letterbox this morning, I'm just like, wow, he's put a lot. My whole thought is just like, man, this Batman is 40. Yeah, you know, I just so my my basic take was sort of like
00:32:12
Speaker
Like, how do you get through this movie? Like, when I was watching it, I was like, I can't fast forward because, you know, I want to do my do my homework. I want to be prepared.
00:32:22
Speaker
You know, usually like when, when we talked about Shin Godzilla, I mean, I think I watched the movie two or three times and I was watching it as we were talking about it. It's like, I want to be prepared. I want to have good comments. When I was watching this this morning, I was like, there's no way I'm going to watch this a second time. And it was like, how do I sort of like, like get through this movie? And sort of the only way I can do it is, you know, what I had said on letterbox was like,
00:32:44
Speaker
like this isn't a this isn't a movie like this isn't actually a batman story this is like the michael key in batman having a fever dream right where it's just because it feels like like batman is the most boring character in this movie oh yeah yeah you know and it's like it feels i mean it feels to me like sort of
00:33:08
Speaker
like somebody trying to figure out their life. And that's why I said, like, I just, I pretend it's a Michael Keaton fever dream. Like we're going to get to the end of the movie, you're going to get to the end of the credits and the post credits is going to be like Michael Keaton, like waking up out of bed and like Michelle Pfeiffer is in the shower or something, right? Like they're going to pull the Dallas, you know, reboot on you. And so it just, it feels, because to me it feels like, like, it feels like a very sort of,
00:33:37
Speaker
If you say that this is a movie from the perspective of Bruce Wayne or Batman, it feels like a movie about a guy who just
00:33:46
Speaker
Like he's very conflicted about himself and he's very conflicted about his place in the world. But he's also kind of young and mature enough or immature enough that like everybody is horny for him. Like Chase Meridian wants to fuck Batman. Edward Nigma wants to fuck Bruce Wayne, right?
00:34:07
Speaker
Two-Face, which I think the funniest part about this movie to me is that they keep calling him Harvey Two-Face. Yeah, I thought that was so weird even as a kid. Like Harvey Two-Face like wants to kill him, right? Which is sort of, I mean, I know they give you a little bit about why that is, but it just sort of feels kind of random and just you're supposed to take it on credit. And then like the Robin character is like,
00:34:33
Speaker
I sort of saw that as like, if we look at that as like the Michael Keaton character sort of reassessing like his life, like have I made mistakes?
Chase Meridian's Role and Ethics
00:34:40
Speaker
And then you get this kid who comes along with sort of the same situation. And it's like your chance to like, let this kid not make the same mistakes that you've made, so.
00:34:50
Speaker
Well, even the fact that it's, you know, it's Val Kilmer in this too. Like when, when I'd read that, I had also thought I'm like, well, that even, even Val Kilmer being in this instead of Michael Keaton does work for that. Cause it's like, this is like how he pictures himself, right? And it's like the image of the, of the, of the handsome playboy, but really he's, you know, kind of insecure and buffoonish. And I thought like, cause like, you know,
00:35:13
Speaker
When you look at him, like Val Kilmer, he looks the part of the international playboy, right? He looks that totally more than anyone else. I think even Bob Kane even said that Val Kilmer was the closest to how he imagined Bruce Wayne looking. And yeah, you definitely see that. But when you see like the way he interacts with Chase, like he's not playboyish at all. No, no. Like Val Kilmer is, at least in this era of Batman,
00:35:42
Speaker
Val Kilmer is the only one who looks like he could actually kick your ass, right? Like, I mean, he looks like, like, oh, maybe I don't want to piss this guy off. But his character is so flat. And of course, like, you know, I think the scene that always gets me to, like, roll my eyes and groan, of course, is like the infamous smile, right? Like, when he goes to when he goes to Chase, you know, she says, come by my place at midnight. He shows up as Batman. And she tells him, like, she's chosen, essentially says, you know, I've chosen Bruce over you.
00:36:11
Speaker
And he turns around and he walks out of the darkness and into the light and he gets that goofy smile on his face. It just feels like this is a guy who like hasn't had many like relationships, right? Yeah, you know, and I mean, even him saying like like telling Alfred about
00:36:28
Speaker
about Chase that like, this is the first time I've been in love, right? It's sort of like, oh, did the last two movies, we're not doing that? That jumped out to me too. I'm like, and especially cause they, and it'd be one thing if you looked at this as a, as a reboot, which it, in a way it is, but they've referenced Batman returns in it, right? Cause he, cause he says there's that, there's that scene when she says, do I need skin tied vinyl and a whip to get your attention? Absolutely. Absolutely. Right. And it's,
00:36:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's so it's sort of it's sort of like like weird, but I did want to add right sort of the moment that got me thinking about maybe this is just like a fever because at first I was like maybe this is just like like a teenage kid in therapy, right? This is like a like a like a dream of like Bruce Wayne is like a 17 year old. There are two moments in the film that sort of like put that idea in my head. The first is Too Faced at one point calls him
00:37:21
Speaker
like my boy or something, right? And like Val Kilmer is a grown ass man, but he refers to him as like my boy. And then later in the movie when Val Kilmer wakes up after he's been like knocked out,
00:37:36
Speaker
Alfred calls him young man. And like Bruce says, like, oh, you haven't called me that in a long time. And so I was kind of like, oh, that's it. I'll just think of this movie as a Michael Keaton fever dream and it will sort of get me through it because it is like that, that sort of, one of the things that fascinates me about this movie is I think this is like the, like the only one maybe where he seems much more comfortable
00:38:04
Speaker
like being Bruce Wayne and Bruce Wayne seems much more competent than Batman in this one, right? Where it's just like, you know, even like the opening scene when he's putting on all the armor and he's getting all the weapons and stuff, right? I mean, there's that sense that he has to like put on all of these like accoutrements to go out and do his business.
Bruce Wayne's Dual Image
00:38:25
Speaker
Whereas with most Batman, especially the later ones, it's just, you feel like they can just go out, right? There's not like that emphasis on
00:38:32
Speaker
on the armor necessarily right but this guy feel like the way the fact that this movie starts with him putting on armor right I don't think it I don't think is is a mistake um but then when when Bruce goes and does his his his scene where he meets Edward Nigma for the first time right and
00:38:52
Speaker
he's very confident there, like in the Ed Begley character is trying to sort of dismiss Edward Nigma and Bruce is like, kind of like, no, I want to listen to him. And then even when he hears the plans and he's kind of horrified by it, he's like, give me your schematics, right? Let's do a write up of it. And then when, when Nigma is like, no, I need to know right now, he's like, well, then the answer is no, right? So there's this like,
00:39:15
Speaker
real confidence with him as Bruce that doesn't always come through. Quite often in the Batman movies, Bruce always feels like an accessory, right? It's sort of childish. Sometimes I look at the Bruce scenes as like, these are the scenes that they have to put in the script because the actor wants to see their face on camera.
00:39:35
Speaker
Like, one of the things I liked about Batman Returns I thought did really well was they kind of they did a really good job of separating that public persona of Bruce Wayne and like the real Bruce Wayne because there's my favorite scene in that movie is at least my favorite Bruce Wayne scene is when he goes to meet with Shrek.
00:39:52
Speaker
And Shrek has this attitude of like, I'm the big business guy, I'm gonna bully this billionaire into doing whatever I want. And then Bruce comes in and he's just like laying it all out there. And he's like, I'm actually a lot smarter than you think I am. Yep, yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
00:40:10
Speaker
But yeah, that whole idea of like this being like this fever dream, even the whole thing with him and Chase falling in love, right? I mean, he's, because Chase Meridian is like the most unethical psychiatrist ever. She's obsessed with Batman. She's obsessed with this clearly psychologically damaged guy. And then she's meeting Bruce Wayne and like after their first session, she's going out on dates with him. I'm like, somebody's got to call some certifying body here.
00:40:39
Speaker
Well, and I think that sort of like that kind of like that sort of like interior film logic is, you know, sort of plays into this idea that it's a fever dream because it's like, like, when you're young and immature, and maybe not so good with women, or like, you know, you haven't had a lot of relationships, if you have like an immature like, like, what is like a teenage boy, or maybe like a little bit older, like,
00:41:05
Speaker
you know, what is he going to be attracted to, right? And so it's like this idea that this incredibly, like he knows it can't just be like sort of, uh, you know, like a, like a caricature of a woman, right? It's not like a, like a playboy thing, but it's like, here's this super intelligent woman who just wants to fuck your brains out. Right. And it's like, you know, that's kind of how like a little kid or not a little kid, maybe, but like,
00:41:30
Speaker
Maybe how like a teenager looks at a world. Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, somebody who hasn't been through some like ups and downs and real relationships and knows people on like an intimate level. And it's you know, and it's sort of like because, you know, Chase just I mean, she throws it out there like in almost every scene she throws it out there. I mean, she calls him up to the roof of police headquarters in her fucking lingerie.
00:41:55
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. Right. And then and then like the flip of that is, you know, the the Riddler, like in his cubicle, his cubicle looks like a teenager's like bedroom wall, right? He's taken all these pictures of Bruce from like Tiger Beat and has it like, you know, tacked up around his cubicle, like, like he's as into Bruce Wayne as Chase is into Batman, right? And so it's like,
00:42:20
Speaker
And so that just like, you know, I can imagine if you try to put yourself in like Bruce's shoes, right?
Gotham's Surreal Set Design
00:42:26
Speaker
Like, like when you're, when you're young, when you're trying to figure out what you want to do, you've got all this money, you want to make an impact on the world, you have anger issues, right? You want to make sure nobody else goes through what you go through, you know, but yet then you can probably do more good as Bruce Wayne, right? I mean, that's always sort of like the,
00:42:48
Speaker
you know, to me, like the Bruce Batman divide is like Batman can do more good on sort of like a one-to-one level, but Bruce could do more good on like a city level, right? And I think the dream logic really works for that because you see him doing a lot as Bruce Wayne, like the charity thing, the, when, you know, after, you know, Stickley dies and he says, you know, I want his family to have full benefits. He's like, well, the suicide is not covered by the insurance plan. He's like, yeah, I know, but give him full benefits anyway.
00:43:18
Speaker
Yep. Absolutely. Absolutely. And so it's, it feels like a movie where somebody's trying to like, you know, figure out who they are. Of course, then like the movie is also so dumb. It's not, it's not, it doesn't feel like somebody's actually trying to figure it out. Like it, it feels like a, like a hyper version of that, right? Or like a 3AM version of that. Yeah. You know, sort of like your, you know, your mind unspools a little, right? And sort of like the,
00:43:46
Speaker
the darker aspects maybe come out, the self-doubt maybe comes out, the face, the masks come off at that time of night. Yeah, I think that's why the dream logic makes so much more sense because this movie logically, even within the world of the story, nothing really makes sense. He gets these two cards and just right away,
00:44:08
Speaker
she's like oh he's clearly obsessed with you and he's you know he's homicidal obsessed with you and she like she gives this diagnosis just based on these two cards and it's like and it's like this is clearly only in the movie because we know this has to happen right oh this well and you know like i said in my review like like i want to i want to write
00:44:32
Speaker
a story, I want to write the comic version or a short story version of like the people who had to build this like massive secret headquarters in like three days or something, right? It's like, like all of a sudden, like the Riddler has this massive facility out on this island, right? With booby traps and like concert synchronized lighting, like, like none of it actually looks real. And like, and that's, you know, like when we talk about like, like I kind of hate it, but I kind of also like adore in some ways.
00:45:01
Speaker
The sets in this movie are like, gorgeous. I mean, this is a gorgeous movie to just watch. Like, say what you want about the costumes, but the costumes look like they belong together, right? Like, the costumes are, they're fantastic costumes. They're outlandish, but they're fantastic costumes.
00:45:18
Speaker
And like the whole world just, it doesn't feel real. It doesn't feel like he's actually in Gotham, right? Even with like, with Jim Carrey's evolution as the Riddler, it really plays into that, like, you know, descending into the, cause he starts off wearing like the, the green suit, loose fitting. And then it just, it involves until by the end, he's in this skin tight white sequin leotard. Yeah. Yeah. And, and it,
00:45:44
Speaker
Like the way Gotham is lit too, like with the Burton movies, Gotham feels like a fake place, but like a real fake place. Like it feels like it's like Narnia or Middle Earth or something, right? It doesn't necessarily feel like it's a real city. It feels like it's a, you know, like a, like a, like a
00:46:04
Speaker
fantasy version of like a real city right but it feels real like even if like in its fakeness it still feels real it feels like that city has a pulse right this movie just feels like a set like i don't get a sense of like the actual people like in this movie like at all right even like like the crowd shots and stuff it just it's like everything feels like the only things included here are the things that like
00:46:28
Speaker
matter to Bruce, right? And I think that there's one thing that really jumped out of me when he's when Chase uses the bat signal and he's driving to police headquarters where there's this one shot of the Batmobile driving at like ground level and then the camera pans up and the Batmobile is driving across this weird bridge that goes between buildings or something. I mean, you want the clearest example that this is not a real city. That's the shot right there that does it.
00:46:51
Speaker
Yeah, and there's there's even like there's very few shots in the daytime in this but but one of them is when Bruce pulls up with his Jag. I think it's the first time he meets like him. He goes to see chase as Bruce right for the therapy session or whatever it is. And like he pulls his Jag up, and it's the middle of the day in Gotham City.
00:47:10
Speaker
And there's like no other cars around, right. And it's always a convenience of the movies that there's always a parking spot like right out in front of whatever building like your character has to go go in. But like this there's like nothing else right he could have he could have picked 400 parking spots, you know.
00:47:28
Speaker
There's also that weird time jump when he sees the bat signal, right? He's talking to NIGBA at Wayne Enterprises, then he sees the bat signal, and it's like middle of the day or something, like it's dusk, right? And then he goes to visit Chase, and all of a sudden, it's like the middle of the goddamn night. I'm like, why is Commissioner Gordon going to bed at like 5 o'clock in the afternoon?
00:47:46
Speaker
Yeah, well, and even like Commissioner Gordon, right? Like I love Pat Hingle as like an actor, but like this version, particularly like the Batman Forever version of Pat Hingle, he's like this kind of congenial, like it feels like he should be solving like a cozy mystery. I know. You know, like an island in Maine, right? Not that he's like police commissioner of like the biggest police force in the country.
00:48:11
Speaker
Although this is the most involved police commissioner ever, right? Like even like a potential suicide, he's going to investigate. I'm starting to think that Jim Gordon is like the only cop in the city because he's doing, he's getting involved in all these evil things. Yeah. Well, like, you know, you can't help, or at least I can't help. Sometimes when you watch a movie and it's like,
00:48:35
Speaker
I don't care how big the movie is. I don't care how big the budget is. You're always looking to like, there's always corners that are cut somewhere, right?
Increased Action in Batman Forever
00:48:43
Speaker
And with this movie, it's like, did they spend so much on the salaries of all these stars that it was like, they got no money for like background characters. So it's just like, it's, you know, the stars really are like involved here. There's no like these extra characters that feel like they've been included to like make the world feel bigger, right? Whereas like,
00:49:05
Speaker
Like when you watch like the Robert Pattinson Batman movie, that feels like it's this congested city and he's almost being like consumed by the city. There's so many people in it. There's so many things going on.
00:49:19
Speaker
and this it builds into that idea of this is like fever dream it's it's like the non-important characters just just aren't there and when we do get the crowd shots they're they're oddly like celebratory of batman right or it's just like you know he shows up at like the auction and people are like hey it's batman cool you know it's like you're being shot at you know like i don't know maybe run or something so
00:49:42
Speaker
One of the things I will say that I liked that this movie attempted that the Burton movies didn't do because in Batman Returns, Batman's only on screen for like 20 minutes in the whole movie. But there is a lot of Batman in this movie actually, far more than I remember.
00:49:58
Speaker
Yeah, well, it's a horny movie, right? And I guess if you're going to make a horny movie, you want people in their costumes and not walking around in like a three-piece suit, I guess. Although it does. So that's one of the interesting things, like there's so much more Batman in this movie and this Batman is a lot more.
00:50:15
Speaker
There's a lot more action in this movie than in the Burton films. That scene when he goes to the bank to stop them, I'm like, wow, this Batman's actually fighting. He barely did that in the last two movies. Yeah. I think it plays into this idea that it's a more visceral Batman experience here.
00:50:36
Speaker
you know that sort of like that thin line between like violence and sex right where it's like you know because because Batman is sort of the most you know non-sexual character in the movie like he doesn't walk around like like
00:50:50
Speaker
know, like he's horny like everybody else. I mean, he's certainly interested in Chase, right? But it's what gets him excited is when Chase picks Bruce over Batman, right? So it's like, he's looking for like, like more of a connection. But he's got to do something with all that energy and sort of like, it comes out in like violence, right? And it's the same thing with like, you know, two face like two facing Batman are sort of like the
00:51:14
Speaker
you know, the violence partners in the film. Right. Something else, too, that jumped out at me is because one of the things that annoyed me about this movie for so long is when he's talking a dick and he's giving him the whole speech about not killing.
Bruce's Emotional Journey
00:51:29
Speaker
And I'm like, I'm like, wait a minute, you killed like, you know,
00:51:31
Speaker
a hundred people in the last two movies, if you're the same guy. But now watching it last night, it makes a whole lot more sense, especially in light of that dream thing, right? And it's, if you look at this, like almost like a post-traumatic response to the events of Batman Returns, and that's why he's having this fever dream, it makes so much more sense because it's like, well, yeah, he's killed all these people and it didn't really do much in the long run. And so now he's saddled with all this guilt. The love of his life has
00:52:01
Speaker
twice has walked out on him, right? Vicki Vale left him off screen and then, you know, Selena.
00:52:08
Speaker
fakes her death and then runs off on her own. And he knows she's still alive. That scene at the end hints that he knows that she's still alive somewhere out there. So he's got this fear of abandonment. And so then he's, and that speech to Dick makes so much more sense in that light where he's saying like, you know, so you go out to kill Harvey, but your pain doesn't die with him. It grows. And then you go out to find another another. And that makes sense because he killed the Joker and then in Batman returns, he's going on a fucking murder spree.
00:52:37
Speaker
And it makes so much more sense. And now he wants, and then this woman who is, in Batman terms, a normal person, who wants, who is totally DTF. And it totally, everything makes so much more sense that way. And it's sort of like, because it presents, it presents Chase as sort of like,
00:53:02
Speaker
like uncomplicated, right? It's like, you don't have to figure things out. It's like, she's gonna tell you exactly how she feels. And then what he gets tripped up on is like, he just can't commit to like,
00:53:16
Speaker
like letting Batman sort of have the lead, right? He wants, like for him, like the Kilmer Batman definitely feels like this is a guy who puts on a costume, right? That this is not like two like warring minds that Batman and Bruce are like different people. It feels like he's putting on a costume and he wants, and you know, if he's got PTSD after the last two movies, right? If he's struggling with
00:53:41
Speaker
sort of what's gone on in those last two movies if he's struggling with like abandonment and potentially his failings as like a superhero that you know uh jace is sort of like you know uncomplicated to batman but he wants her to like want bruce right like he wants bruce to matter and then this feels like a film where really
00:54:04
Speaker
They want, like he wants Bruce to matter, right? He doesn't want to get lost in all of this. And so in some ways it's like, I know I'm in the minority, but.
00:54:16
Speaker
I love, I'm going to jump tracks here. I love the clown scene in Octoplacy, right? When James Bond is dressed as a clown and he's completely ineffective at getting, and I know that drives most people like nuts. Yeah. I'm one of them. Yeah. Most people are. And like, and like,
00:54:37
Speaker
But for me, like I love that scene because the Bond movies give so much lip service to like, he's becoming this, you know, I mean way before it gets said in the Dalton era that he's sort of this anachronistic dinosaur, right? That he's getting too old to do this, that the world is changing underneath him. And like, that's the scene where they like let it happen, like on screen, right? They show that like the world is changing. He can't just stop it and people aren't listening to him. And so I sort of love,
00:55:07
Speaker
like the vulnerability of that moment. And it's sort of the same thing here. I love that they let Bruce be a little bit vulnerable in this film and that they actually show it, right? They don't just give lip service to it. Now,
00:55:24
Speaker
Is it annoying as hell when like, when like Chase is like, you know, essentially he said, like he shows up as Batman. Chase is like, I'm no longer DTF. I like. Even when he's naked and draping a sheep. And he's like, that makes him smile, right? Cause he'd rather have love than lust. Um, but then he goes home and he starts like shutting off the back cave. First of all, in ways, this movie doesn't make any sense.
Bruce's Identity Crisis
00:55:51
Speaker
not only building the Riddler's lair in like three days or whatever, like the way Batman decides to not be Batman anymore is he's got a remote control and he can walk around the Batcave and just turn off, turn off the Batmobile, turn off the computers, turn off the, like
00:56:09
Speaker
turn off the lights all with like one remote control, right? Like, Oh, okay. I guess, but like, get a harmony one. I mean, come on. That drives me. That drives me nuts. Like that, like she chooses Bruce. And so then he goes like, okay, I can't be Batman anymore. I'm just going to give it all up. Right. It's like, and that feeds into this idea that like,
00:56:33
Speaker
You know, the person, if this is a dream, if this is somebody who's like trying to work out their own issues, right? You sort of have to take it to these like extreme swings, right? Where it's like, maybe I will just give it up. Like you have to at least like sort of run through that possibility. And so if, if you're somebody who is like, okay, I don't know what I want to do. I'm going to have this fantasy, this fever dream about like, I'm going to give up being Batman and I'm going to just be Bruce.
00:57:02
Speaker
Well, you know, and Robin is there going like, essentially like, no, you can't give up like the violence, right? You can't give that up. Right. And what does he do? Like, he's like, well.
00:57:13
Speaker
Chase is coming over for dinner, right? And then they immediately get attacked again, right? And so it's like, you have to like in your brain, like if you're like, okay, I'm gonna tease out this possibility. Like let's see what happens if I just be Bruce. And immediately violence comes like knocking on your door. Literally, literally comes knocking on the door. And you know that in the logic of this movie, that whole sequence makes no sense. Like first off, he's being,
00:57:42
Speaker
manipulative as hell with Chase, right? Where he's like, he's like, I'm going to go to you as bad. You've been wanting Batman this whole time and he's been pushing you off. So I'm going to go to you with Batman. I'm going to come on to you hard. So in hopes that you're going to turn me away so that then I'm going to say like, oh, I understand you found someone else. And then I'm going to tell you, by the way, I've actually Bruce Wade and then
00:58:04
Speaker
you decide, okay, Chase wants me, so I'm done being Batman. Nevermind the fact that there are two super criminals who are still out there and I haven't dealt with them because they just try to blow me the fuck up and I failed, but they're still out there, right? They're still running around. And you know, their intentions are like, like not good. Yeah. Even if, even if you're willing to say like, okay, well Two-Face is really doing all this because he wants to come after me. So like,
00:58:33
Speaker
I can handle that one-to-one. You've got Edward Nigma trying to like brainwash like the entire city, you know, and he's like, I'm just gonna hang out here with Chase, you know? Like we're gonna be in love, you know, and not do anything about that. And so- I can understand it if you did like in Batman and Robin where Mr. Freeze gets arrested, he gets put in Arkham Asylum. Okay, so now I can understand why you'd think it's okay to a good time to quit. That would make sense. But in this movie, it doesn't make sense.
00:59:00
Speaker
It also annoyed me when Spider-Man 2 did that when Peter's powers are flaring in and out and he just doesn't care about the fact that Doc Ock is still out there. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Like, well, and it's always, you know, the, you know, our late great friend, Derek Ferguson, we used to say all the time, like,
00:59:19
Speaker
I don't want to watch a movie. I don't want to watch a superhero movie about somebody who doesn't want to be a superhero. Right. Right. Like I'm not I'm not interested in that like at all. And so when you sort of get to that moment of the film now, luckily, because this film is like, you know, on speed, they think, you know, it's like once one scene.
00:59:38
Speaker
his retirement lasts all of one scene, right? And then he's right back into the world. And I will say that sequence. I totally agree with you about Bruce's manipulation of Chase there. But that does give me my absolute favorite scene of the movie, I think, which is the Riddler and Two-Face
Riddler and Two-Face's Break-in
00:59:57
Speaker
breaking into Wayne Manor by waiting for the trick-or-treat kids to leave because they could get the gate open. So when the gate opens to let the kids leave, they sneak inside with their army of henchmen. That's probably the smartest part of the whole movie. I was also trying to figure out where did they get the masks.
01:00:20
Speaker
because they came up with this plan when they saw some like part of me is one of my oh fuck what did they do to those kids well but but that's you know it's dream logic like this movie exists on like on dream logic well even like with with dick leaving because remember he says that because you know when he shuts down the back cave and dicks like he's like you can't stop me i'm gonna go after toothpaste then he
01:00:41
Speaker
You get that scene of him, he takes the costume, he takes his bike, he's leaving Wayne Manor. After Bruce wakes up, Alfred says, Master Dick has run away. And they go down to the bat cave. He's like, there's one bat suit left. And all of a sudden, here comes Dick walking down the steps in a Robin costume. And I'm like, what did this happen? I thought he ran away. Well, even like Alfred is like, I did some alterations. It's like, those are pretty serious alterations.
01:01:08
Speaker
especially because the costume was just a cloth thing like 10 minutes earlier yeah well like you know if if uh if like like robin's uh like acrobat uniform got like damaged and alfred had to like alter like
01:01:25
Speaker
Robin's dad's uniform, right? Like, like tuck it in a little, like, you know, make the arms a little short or whatever. You could see him doing that in like, you know, in an hour. But this is like a completely new costume. Like, yeah, as they love to tell you, hard rubber outfits. I can't imagine hard rubber is an easy fabric to negotiate. Yeah. I'm wondering, do they have, do they have, do they learn how to vulcanize rubber so quick? Do they have like,
01:01:52
Speaker
Do they have a machine out back like with a mold? And then if so, they're not the same body type. Like how much can you do with this? But it's just dream logic. The movie is going to give you whatever it needs in that moment. It will just provide, right? It will just provide
Robin's Costume and Role
01:02:10
Speaker
it for you.
01:02:10
Speaker
And I gotta say, as a kid, I loved the idea of Robin. So as a kid, I thought it was so cool that we're finally gonna see Robin in a Batman movie. And I'll give them credit. I do like what they did with the uniform. I liked they were true to the comic book, but they still made it fit in this world. And I liked that they didn't compromise on it, which really annoyed me when they did
01:02:34
Speaker
Batman and Robin, where they basically gave him the Nightwing outfit instead. But I loved what they did. It was so comics accurate. Like this is up until Titans. This one, you know, not a whole lot of stiff competition, but this is the best Robin had looked on screen.
01:02:48
Speaker
Yeah, and absolutely. And so when he but it's like this guy's got no training and you're taking him out to fight these two criminals and right away, it's like as if telling you why you shouldn't have a partner, he gets kidnapped the second he gets out there and he's just completely useless. He is. Well, and that's like, you know, there are moments in this film that I genuinely love. And one of them is when he steals the Batmobile and like he opens
01:03:17
Speaker
He opens the canopy and you know, everybody comes over to the battle and be like, oh, Batman's here. Batman's here. And he opens the canopy and he stands up and people are like, who the fuck are you? He's like, I'm Batman. And then like, you're a kid. He's like, I forgot my suit at home. And they're just like not buying it like at all. Right. Like that. I think they do a good job showing there because he's able to sort of handle himself like sort of one on one on the fights. Right. Right.
01:03:43
Speaker
There is like a whole world of difference between like taking a few classes versus like somebody who's got who's been spent all this year, all these years, all this experience training, you know, to be a superhero. Right. Well, I think and that also plays into the whole dream logic thing you're talking about, because the fact that, like you said, he's this
01:04:02
Speaker
idealized version of Batman, this guy who has a chance to do things differently. But at the same time, and again, this is like the Batman part of Bruce like edging itself back in like he doesn't know what to do. He needs Batman there to show him the ropes. So it's that Batman side pulling Bruce back into it. Well, it's also it's also
01:04:21
Speaker
Like we're saying everybody in the movie is like horny for Batman. Like everybody in this film like exists so Batman can figure out like a side of himself, right? And the Robin part is...
01:04:35
Speaker
Like as much as, you know, Bruce maybe has like this self-loathing about like what he's done and like the mistakes he's made, you know, and at first he's very adamant, like, you know, you can't, you can't kill two face.
Chase as Bruce's Ideal Woman
01:04:46
Speaker
I'm not going to help you do this. Like, yeah, like it just, it leads to like darker and darker sort of like mental periods. It's also like Robin goes out and gets in trouble and then Batman has to save them. Right. So there's still like this.
01:04:58
Speaker
you know like Robin still needs him and so it's still feeding the ego of like of you know like Bruce trying to figure out who he is and I will say I think for me sort of like like like the climax of the movie which is a dangerous word to say given how horny this movie is but like for me sort of like the like the sort of the narrative climax of this movie
01:05:21
Speaker
It's not any of the punching or kicking. It's when Bruce tells Dick, like, essentially says, like, I'm not going to stop you from killing Two-Face. Like, you have to make that decision on your own, right? It's like this acceptance of, like, you really do have to make your own way, right? And you have to make your own choice in what you do and then live with those consequences. And so it's a way for him to sort of, like,
01:05:46
Speaker
you know, like give up that control, right? Well, also I think, and going back to something,
01:05:53
Speaker
When you're talking about the chase thing and how she's very uncomplicated, very clear on what she wants, you know, she wants to fuck Batman, she wants to fuck Bruce Wayne. But not only that, but the fact that she's a psychiatrist, right? Not only is she gorgeous as hell, not only does she want to fuck you every which way possible as Batman and as Bruce Wayne, but she could also tell you everything that's fucked up about you.
01:06:17
Speaker
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Like, like she is the like sort of this idealized woman for him, right? Like, like, you know, and that sort of adds to this, this idea of this being like a fever dream or like a therapy session. Like she is on the one hand, smart enough to like fix you. Yeah, right. Like she can figure out all of your sort of mental problems, which, you know, maybe you're not willing to sort of like discuss openly, but like, you know,
01:06:44
Speaker
in a fever dream or in therapy or in the darkest part of the night, you know, when you let these, these fears out, she can fix you, but also she wants to fuck your brains out nonstop. Right. So it's like, you know, that's what he needs. He needs somebody who can fix him and then fuck him and then fix him and then fuck him. And then fix, you know, it's exactly. Yeah. She's like this, like the perfect woman for this, this version of the character.
01:07:07
Speaker
And something else that noticed that I notice here is that everything around Batman is just so horny. And it explains why. And again, this goes to the fever dream logic. It explains why Vel Kilmer looks so dumbfounded as Batman a lot of the time because he's looking around. He's like, this is some is a lot hornier here than I remember. And it's like I think I'm starting to feel a little horny now myself. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It is it is like really amazing to me how sort of vanilla
01:07:36
Speaker
his character is like just how sort of like blend and in some ways like like I really admire the film for that because it's like without.
01:07:45
Speaker
like pushing it on you, like just, you know, it leaves it up to you to figure it out. But like, clearly this is a guy going through like a lot of stuff, right? And even in the context of the movie, like he will slowly admit that like as the film goes on, right? He sort of, he becomes more comfortable talking to Chase about that stuff, if not with anybody else. But the movie doesn't sort of like shove it down your throat at first, right? It sort of like lets you sort of realize slowly
01:08:14
Speaker
that this is sort of a different, different take on the character. Um, but that being said, like bland as hell, but yet he's like totally bland. And yet he still tries to get off like sort of the cheesy one liners and stuff too. Like he still has these moments where it's like, you know, especially with chase, like, you know, I can make a pun too, or, Hey, I can do witty banter. And it's like, well, you're not very good at witty banter. It's, you know, it's, it's, it's sort of like, uh, like, um,
01:08:43
Speaker
can get away with it because he's got the Batman costume on right and he's got like this woman who just wants him and so whatever he says is going to be funny in that moment. See that's another thing is that the humor in this movie is because I know a lot of people bag on the MCU for for forced humor but I think this movie is it's so much worse in this movie because they just yeah it feels so
Forced Humor in Batman Forever
01:09:04
Speaker
There's at least an attempt in a lot of the MCU films. Some push it too far, but there's an attempt for the humor to feel more organic, more natural to the characters. It does not feel natural at all in this movie. Like when he, you know, when she's coming on to him and he's trying to say like, you know, the bat signal is not a toy and all this. And then he.
01:09:23
Speaker
and then he's making quips about how it's the card, right? Chicks dig the car or I'll get drive through and all. It's just like, it's very clear right from the start. It feels like those are studio notes, right? We need a quip here. Yeah. And I will say for a movie that I didn't...
01:09:40
Speaker
I didn't like at the time. When I was watching this movie, there was nothing that surprised me. There was no scene where it was like, oh, yeah, that happened. I have this film seared into my brain, so I must have watched it enough between 95 and 2000 or something.
01:09:59
Speaker
You know, the fact that like sort of what I forgot was sort of like where these scenes happen in relation to each other. And the fact that the film starts with like a McDonald's commercial, right? Like all the drive through. It's just like, oh, God. Because I remember that being it was part of McDonald's ads, I remember at the time. And I'm just like, I thought it was just done because remember, like they did with the first Batman movie, they did a Pepsi, they did a Diet Coke ad.
01:10:22
Speaker
And it, I remember it was, it, they had it before the movie on the VHS copy where it's, you know, Alfred's on the phone to the store and, and it, it cuts away to Bruce, to Batman and the Batmobile. He's like, he's like, we ran out of, we're on our last Diet Coke and you know, a gentleman is coming to pick some, pick some up and he, he, you'll recognize his car. And then it just like, but it was just a commercial made for the commercial. It wasn't part of the movie. Yeah. This is a commercial that was included in the opening credits.
01:10:51
Speaker
So two things on that. The first is just to jump back for a second in terms of the humor. This isn't a superhero movie. This isn't a Batman. This is a fetish movie. This is a camp movie. You know what I mean? It's a camp movie where people are wearing the costumes from the Batman film that was filmed in the studio before this.
01:11:15
Speaker
It's like, it's a movie that exists for those jokes and those one-liners, right? So it's like, you know, like, of course it feels forced, like, because that's sort of how this world like operates. And again, it's that sort of like dream logic of the film, right? Where like, there are serious things happening. There are people dying. And yet, Bruce does, you know, it's just like, well, the bigger issue is Chase chose me over Batman. Yeah. You know, not like all these people dying.
01:11:42
Speaker
uh you know this the second thing is like in terms of like the commercialism of this film like you know we haven't talked about it a lot but like this like the production of this movie was like a complete disaster and like especially like they did not set out to make
01:12:00
Speaker
a good Batman movie. Like they set out to try to make a cultural phenomenon, right? Like they were like, we got to, like, this is clearly for like the MTV group. Like we need to have commercial tie-ins. We definitely want to sell a lot of toys. And so if, you know, you feel that studio influence on this movie, like, like you were just saying, like, it was like, no, the studio says we want to do a McDonald's ad. So you have to say this line. Like, I wonder if Kilmer knew when he was doing it or if they,
01:12:28
Speaker
I think that's probably one of the reasons why him and Schumacher had so many problems on set. I mean, Valcomer was also famously difficult to work with in this time period as well. So that obviously plays into it. But Schumacher, I feel really bad for Schumacher because he
01:12:43
Speaker
Unlike Burton, he's actually a Batman fan and like he wanted to do like year one.
Potential Serious Batman Movie by Schumacher
01:12:48
Speaker
He wanted to do a serious Batman movie. And you look at some of his serious films like, you know, A Time to Kill or Number 23 or Phone Booth or anything like that. Like he's got the serious chops.
01:13:00
Speaker
Yep, we had rest in peace to make a serious Batman movie that would have been true to the source material probably kept the kind of because one of the things that really kind of annoys me about a lot of the Batman movies is there's there's this kind of belief that it either has to be
01:13:16
Speaker
super realistic or it has to be like almost campy, right? There's like no middle ground there. And it's like, and one of the things I, one of the few things I liked about Snyder is that he did put, he did focus, he's like, well, this is this, you know, bizarre fantasy world. And we can lean into that.
01:13:35
Speaker
without being, but everyone else, it's like, as much as I love the Batman, one of the things that annoys me about it is we're back to the whole idea of Batman has to be in the real world. He has to be grounded. And I feel like Schumacher, if he had been allowed to do what he wanted to do, I think he could have given us that Batman movie that has that right mix of the grounded nor stuff mixed with the kind of fantastical stuff.
01:14:00
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like Schumacher, like I really do feel like as I've listened to him over the years talk about his experience with these movies, like I feel like you could give him like a Steve Engelhardt, Marshall Rogers, Denny O'Neill era of Batman, right? Like that sort of like 80s Batman comic book. And you could get like when Batman was sort of at his most like normalized, right? Where he wasn't like before
01:14:31
Speaker
like the influence of like Miller's Dark Knight really like took hold on the character where he was still functioning as like a guy who could like he wasn't like totally battered down by his like psychosis, right? Like it wasn't like how dark can I make my costume, right? How dark can I make my world?
01:14:51
Speaker
I mean, he was in like a blue and gray costume for most of that time, right? And they were grown up stories, they were mature stories, but he was also more sort of like comfortable with who he was. And I do feel like if they had just let Schumacher make the movie he wanted to make, I think we probably would have got an amazing movie. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know.
01:15:09
Speaker
Grant Morrison famously called the Denny O'Neill, Neil Adams, Batman, the hairy chested love God. And when you think about it, like Joel Schumacher is the perfect director to handle that kind of Batman. Because when you
Director's Cuts and Narrative Cohesion
01:15:20
Speaker
because when you when you look at his other movies, right? Like when you especially the movies like that that are more singular, right? It's something like like something like falling down. Right. Yes.
01:15:33
Speaker
It's like, yeah, like, like you could take like, he gets sort of like, like, I feel like the film treats sort of like mental anxiety as like this, just like effect, right? Right. Whereas like,
01:15:49
Speaker
when you watch something like falling down, it's like he treats like sort of mental anxiety as like an actual thing that needs to be explored, right? That's actually what he was even with when the studio said, no, you can't make a year one, you have to do a sequel to Batman Returns and has to be lighter and all that. He's still intended to try and delve more into the psychological stuff on it because there is Akiva Goldsman said, there is an extended cut of this movie that has not been released to the public.
01:16:16
Speaker
that is much darker and much more true to what Schumacher wanted to do and much more true to the whole idea of Batman forever. Because otherwise, in the context of just this movie that we get, that title makes no sense at all. But it makes a whole lot more sense in the extended cut apparently. Yeah, I mean, I would love to see it. I mean, I know like we're not supposed to want extended cuts now in a post Zack Snyder universe, but like I would love to see it because I mean, I do think
01:16:45
Speaker
You know, when I hear that films are like different, and I mean, I will say for like Zack Snyder's Justice League, it is a different movie than the movie that got released, right? And a lot, and to a very large extent, it's a different movie. It's definitely a more cohesive movie. And when I, you know, seen things like, like a kingdom of heaven, like the Ridley Scott movie, the director's cut of that makes that a much better movie than what we got in the theater. Or the director's cut of Daredevil.
01:17:14
Speaker
Yeah. That's the next place I was going. The director's cut of Daredevil. I love the director's cut of Daredevil. Like that's a, to me, that's just, that's a fantastic movie. The one that we got in the theater, not so much. Right. And so it's like.
01:17:29
Speaker
I mean, I know there's there's probably no chance we'd ever see it. I would I would love to see it. You know, like I would. I mean, you never know, because we did get eventually like 20, 30 years later, the Richard Donner cut of Superman 2. And apparently from what Goldman said, like the movie is basically finished. Like he's seen like a finished cut of it. So it exists somewhere in the Warner Brothers vault.
01:17:50
Speaker
Yeah. It's just a matter of Warner Brothers. They made a $90 million Batgirl movie that we're never going to get to see because they'd rather take it as like a tax write off. I know.
01:18:01
Speaker
I can't imagine them for a while investing in. I know that's getting finished. I mean, if anybody at War Brothers is listening to this and you've got access, I think people will reward you if you leak it out on the internet. Yeah, absolutely. I'm definitely in favor of some disgruntled or heroic employee somehow getting that out to us. I would definitely love to see it.
01:18:24
Speaker
I mean, Joel Schumacher is, I mean, he is, he's a real director. You know what I mean? Like, he is a legitimate real director. He has actual skill. And, you know,
Jim Carrey's Acting Transition
01:18:35
Speaker
at this, in this time, he, you know, he was like, he was a studio go-to guy, right? Like when you, when you look at his movies, I mean, he did, right? Like two John Grisha movies, right? In Time to Kill, The Client, like,
01:18:49
Speaker
you know, flatliners like he did flatliners. I completely forgot about that. You know, flatliners like I mean, he did he did Lost Boys Lost Boys. Yeah. You know, so he did St. Elmo's Fire. Right. Like, you know, he can he's got like like legitimately good films on his on his resume. Right. He is like he is a competent guy. And he also does. He can also do a lot of different things like he's he can disappear into these movies and give you a movie that is very much
01:19:18
Speaker
that it was like someone like Tim Burton, you go to Tim Burton because you want the Tim Burton movie. Right. He can't hide his directorial style. He can't hide like those. You watch a Tim Burton movie, you don't see the credits, you know it's a Tim Burton movie. Right. And like I think like like with with with Tim Burton, right? Like when you look at like the history of Hollywood and the history of who's popular in movies,
01:19:43
Speaker
action stars tend to stay popular longer than comedians, right, like comedians have a much more limited shelf life because at some point it's like like Will Ferrell can go to like the funniest guy in the world to like
01:19:56
Speaker
we've heard all this. We've done this five, six times now. We don't need it anymore. You have to be in the mood for a Tim Burton movie to watch a Tim Burton movie. The same way you have to be in the mood for a Will Ferrell movie to watch a Will Ferrell movie, whereas Schumacher
01:20:15
Speaker
He's a pro, right? He's a pro is pro. He can disappear in the movie. He can give you like, what do you want, right? Like, I feel like that's probably one of the reasons why the studios, especially in this time period, trusted him so much. You know, they're like, Joel, we want a legal thriller.
01:20:30
Speaker
got it right he's not going to turn a legal thriller into a Joel Schumacher movie he's going to like make that the best legal thriller he can do. Well also to the point about the comedians that made me think of Jim Carrey because I think this is the movie really when everybody got sick of Jim Carrey's shtick because after this he kind of backed away from that a little bit like he did liar liar after this and then
01:20:51
Speaker
Me and myself and Irene. Ace was after this. Oh, OK, OK. But yeah, this was definitely kind of like I think a turning point for a lot of people were like, OK, we're kind of done with this version of Jim Carrey. And he and then eventually he had kind of reinvented himself into someone more serious.
01:21:09
Speaker
and that kind of gave his career more longevity, which thank God he did. But that's
Val Kilmer's Untapped Potential
01:21:14
Speaker
another thing that really annoys me is watching him as the Riddler in this movie, because you watch him in something like number 23, which is a movie I have a lot of problems with, but his performance is really, if you had that kind of performance as the Riddler, he could do a really good job as a creepy Riddler, but it's just like, they wanted to do the Jim Carrey thing here.
01:21:36
Speaker
Yeah, they wanted the Zany, right? I mean, they wanted like the mask, the Ace Ventura, Jim Carrey. And so like you do it because I'm sure it was a massive paycheck and I'm sure he's still getting huge residuals from this movie, right? Marlon Wayne is still getting residuals for not playing Robin. So yeah, I'm sure Jim Carrey is still getting them too. But yeah, it was like I'm looking at like his filmography right now and it was like after Batman Forever,
01:22:02
Speaker
He did Ace Ventura two, but then that was also in 95, but then the following year he did the cable guy. And then the following year he did liar, liar. And then the following year he was onto the Truman show. Right. And then the year after that, it was man on the moon. So like, yeah, he, there was, you know, like growth from him and, you know, like, I mean, we were, we were talking about, you know, as problematic as like Tommy Lee Jones and.
01:22:28
Speaker
uh, Val Kilmer were on set. Like Schumacher has said nothing but good things to say about like Jim Carrey, right? And I feel like he still worked with, he worked with Jim Carrey afterwards. So like they, he did number 23 with number 23. Yeah. Um, and I think like, like Carrie is like, he's another, he's like a professional, right? And so they're like, what do you want from me? I'm going to give you that, right? Yeah. This is a job. This is what I'm going to do. And then.
01:22:52
Speaker
Like, come to work, know your lines, put your performance in, and like, not tell your co-stars you hate them. I mean, even, well, Jim Carrey, even to this day, like, I was scanning through, like, interviews, and he was asked about, like, Tommy Lee Jones, like, yeah, Tommy Lee Jones hated me on the set, but I never had a problem with him. And he's like, I still don't have a problem with him, you know? I still think he's a great actor. I still think he's a good guy. And, like, he's still, like, very much in that professional mode, like, you know, and this is, what, 20 years later, 20, 30 years later now we're talking about this. Yup.
01:23:21
Speaker
Yeah. Also, I feel really bad for Val Kilmer, too, because you look at Val Kilmer and he could have made a really good Batman. I think probably more than any other actor who had played Batman, he was the one who got the least chance to really kind of
01:23:37
Speaker
put his stamp on the character. Because George Clooney, for him, it was basically just a job as well. But I think with Val Kilmer, he was really into the idea of playing Batman. He really wanted this role. And even Ben Affleck, he had some chance to put his stamp on the role. He's
01:23:56
Speaker
Apparently going to be back in flash and Aquaman too. So he's going to have more opportunities, but Kilmer never really got that other chance to really put his stamp on this role. I think that's that's a shame because I think he could have really knocked out of the park if he had been given the right material. Well,
Reevaluating Batman Forever's Tone
01:24:11
Speaker
I think he is somebody like if they were actually trying to make movies at this time instead of just making like a hit. Right. Like this feels like like the I mean, this movie like emotionally
01:24:26
Speaker
know, could compare to something like Batman Begins, where it's like, when you get to the end of Batman Begins, it's like, oh, now we can have a Batman movie, right? Like, he's figured out sort of who he is, we can have like a legitimate Batman movie now, whereas Kilmer never got that opportunity. Like, he finally at the end, figures out sort of who he is, and then it's like, well,
01:24:44
Speaker
You're out and Clooney's in for the next one. Yeah. All right. Well, I think that's that's all to be said about Batman forever. It's you gave me a lot of things to really think about now with going back and relooking at this movie because like my my impression going into this.
01:25:00
Speaker
going into watching the movie last night I was like oh god this is the movie this is the Batman movie I like the least and it's just like it's it's inconsistent it's you got Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones both trying to outdo each other's scenery eating you've got Chris O'Donnell as like the worst possible Dick Grayson he's like he's an excellent 40 year old
01:25:20
Speaker
He's almost like the worst person. He's definitely the worst person in the movie. Right. Like he's almost the worst person in any movie, you know, like. Well, and the thing that kills me is they could have had Leonardo DiCaprio because he was the second he was the runner up. And they and what they did was they went up to a bunch of 12 year old kids and they showed him a picture of Chris O'Donnell. They showed him a picture of Leonardo DiCaprio. And they're like, who would win in a fight? And they said Chris O'Donnell. And then that's why they cast him.
01:25:45
Speaker
And it's like we could have gotten Leonardo DiCaprio at his like babyface prime playing Robin. It would have been awesome. Yeah. But again, they weren't they weren't interested in like they clearly weren't they were interested in stars. Exactly. Actors. Right. They weren't trying to make a movie. They were trying to make an experience. And DiCaprio wasn't a star at that point. So, yeah. Right. Yeah. But you know what? But then when I was watching it last night, I was just amazed and bowled over it, just like how horny this movie
01:26:13
Speaker
Oh, yeah. And I even did a poll on Twitter asking like, OK, so this one's obviously the horniest one. I'm like, the one with the Prince soundtrack is the least horny. But which is hornier, Batman Returns or Batman and Robin? And overwhelmingly, 69 percent said Batman Returns, 31 percent said Batman and Robin is hornier, which is kind of what I expected. But
01:26:36
Speaker
But Jesus Christ, I was not prepared for how horny this movie was. And then no, I was that that is the one thing that surprised me, like, just just how, you know, I'm sure when I watched it, like, you know, like I said, I haven't seen it in 20 years, I'm sure, like, missed a lot of sort of like the subtext of it.
01:26:53
Speaker
But like now it was just, it was, and then I'm kind of like, how could you miss it? It is right there from the beginning, you know? But I mean, I think, you know, and I think that is like, you get, you end up getting focused on sort of like the wrong things and it's, you know, or like a very surface view of the movie is, you know, it's bat nipples and it's butt shots and it's, you know, it's chase. It's Nicole Kidman, right? Yeah. But then like,
01:27:17
Speaker
Okay. We'll like open up your, your eyes a little bit, open up your ears a little bit. Like, like, look what else is going on. It's just, it's a horny movie from start to finish. And you know, like I said,
01:27:28
Speaker
One of the reasons why I give that I don't like, like I think you rated it a one and a half and I rated it. I think so. Yeah. So it's not like I'm, this isn't like I'm trying to reclaim this movie. This isn't a movie where I'm like, no, actually we've all been wrong. This is a fantastic movie. Yeah. This is not an under, under, understood master. No, there, there are films like that. Like I will go to the wall for like speed racer. I will, I will argue with anyone that that is a fantastic, phenomenal,
01:27:54
Speaker
better than any of the Matrix movies is is Speed Racer, right? Oh, absolutely. This is this is still terrible. Right. But it's I sort of it's it's so like it's so committed to what it is. Right. And it is so like gorgeous to look at. And it is it is.
01:28:16
Speaker
Like nobody talks about the soundtrack. I think the soundtrack is phenomenal. I remember when it came out, the soundtrack was huge. It was like this massive seller at the time. Well, and I mean, like like even just the score, right? Like it feels like this was the film where they said like, oh, we had Prince.
01:28:33
Speaker
So let's just get a bunch of more people, write songs, right? We'll get you two, because you two is like a chameleon act, right? Where it's like, they get, what do you want us to, what do you want us to be, right? Like whatever the trend is, they can go there and they had the seal, the seal song, Kiss from a Rose. Yeah. Yep. But like, like Elliot Goldsmith's like score is
01:28:53
Speaker
It doesn't get talked about. And I certainly like, I mean, I had the Danny Elfman score. I have the Hans Zimmer scores from like the later movies. Like I've never owned this, but like watching this, like there are moments in the movie where I'm like, like the movie is not just the music rather. It's not just background stuff here. It's actually adding to the film.
01:29:09
Speaker
a really good like in a film where everything is in your face the music is sort of subtly like brilliant in this and like the set design even though the set design is very like bright and in your face like when you actually look at like like the logic of the set design it is like it's very subtly done it is in some ways it's the most sort of like like comic book version of the city right I love how quite often when they show Gotham
01:29:38
Speaker
like every building sort of has its own color, right? Or like the buildings up front are like in green and like the next level they're in yellow and the next level they're in like blue or purple or something. And so it has a very, you know, a very like staged aspect to it. And that, again, that goes back to this idea that this isn't a city, this is a set. And it wants you to think of it as a set, right? The same way that like,
01:30:03
Speaker
like Kubrick and The Shining purposely does all that sort of like dissonance, like spatial dissonance, right? This film is, I think the set is part of the key in like, you know, at least appreciating the good aspects of their, or what they're trying.
01:30:21
Speaker
Well, I mean, the whole dream theory you came up with really puts this movie into a new light for me. Like I can look at Batman and Robin and I can appreciate it more because I'm like, okay, this is a big budget. This is not a sequel to the other movies. This is a big budget version of Batman 66. And it's more entertaining that way. Your dream theory doesn't necessarily make this movie watchable, but it makes it slightly more tolerable than it otherwise would be.
01:30:45
Speaker
Yeah. And like, it doesn't even necessarily make it more watchable for me. It's sort of like, sort of how I survived. Like I don't, so this is one of those movies where like I would love to like,
01:31:00
Speaker
Like this is where I miss having like an actual site where I reviewed movies, right? Or like, I guarantee you, like, you know, if, if Derek was still alive and like the Ferguson theater was up and running, like I would have posted my thoughts on Facebook and he would have been like, give me a full review. Right. And I would have, I could write 5,000 words on this movie the same way. Like I don't like the Phantom Menace. I wrote 5,000 words of my Phantom Menace review. I don't know why that's so hard to say now.
01:31:29
Speaker
episode one review, right? It was like 5,000 words, you know, and then I like write it and I'm like, oh God, that's like, you know, that's like a quarter of a short story. Maybe I should have just spent my time there, but it's like, there's so much I think going on in this film. There is. There's a lot to unpack here, I think. Yeah.
01:31:44
Speaker
So I really, I'm glad we picked this movie and I'm very thankful that you gave me the opportunity to come on. Thanks so much for coming on. If we can find the time, we gotta find the time to have you back on again. Absolutely. But until then, why don't you tell people where they can find you?
01:32:01
Speaker
So you can go to VMarkbasket.com that has my like all my writing stuff. I'm not on Facebook anymore. I'm on Twitter though so people can find me there and really like on like I do I really am thankful like that I found Letterboxd right even if you know sometimes like Letterboxd is like hanging out with all your crankiest film fans like I do sort of like love
01:32:27
Speaker
love the idea of it, and that's where people can go to see my thoughts on movies. Yeah, I mean, I basically just use it for logging movies and stuff like that, but I have been enjoying seeing your reviews when they pop up on there. So definitely go check those out. But Mark, yeah, thanks so much for coming on again. This is so much fun. You gave me a lot more stuff than I expected to think about with Batman Forever. So thank you for that.
01:32:50
Speaker
Well, thank you. You're very welcome. And thanks. I'm glad we chose this instead of films that I actually like. Yeah, I think we got a very interesting discussion because this is one of those. This was the last of the Burton films that we haven't covered yet. And it's been one that I've been wanting to go back and revisit to to kind of take another look at and see how opinions have changed over it. And they haven't. I still think it's bad. But it's but it's it's generated a lot. I've found a lot more things to talk about than I ever expected.
01:33:20
Speaker
Oh, good. Yeah. And I had a great time talking about it with you. So thank you. All right. That does it for this episode of Superhero Cinephiles. Superherocinephiles.com is the website, SuperCinemapod on Twitter and Instagram. And remember, if you join us on Patreon, you get these episodes a week in advance and you also get the Superhero Cinephiles Book Club companion podcast. All of that for as little as a dollar a month. Thanks so much for listening and we will talk to you next time.
01:33:46
Speaker
If you
Podcast Wrap-Up and Promotions
01:33:47
Speaker
enjoy the Superhero Cinephiles, then you'll also love my companion podcast, the Superhero Cinephiles Book Club. All my Patreon subscribers get access to this exclusive podcast where I review superhero comics and graphic novels. Not sure what comics you want to read next or what you should dive into? I've got you covered on that. I'll be doing reviews, recommendations, and also talking to you about useful entry points.
01:34:07
Speaker
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01:34:50
Speaker
Thank you for listening and as always good night. Good evening. God bless.