The Batman Movies Part III: The Schumacher films

After Batman Returns, Warner Bros. was looking for a more family-friendly Batman films. They heard that Burton was making a second sequel, with Robin Williams or someone else as The Riddler, and possibly Two-Face or Scarecrow as a second villain. But when they heard the film would maintain the dark tone of the previous film, Burton and Keaton were booted off the project. Joel Schumacher, director of great movies like St. Elmo's Fire and The Lost Boys, was next up for director. He and a writing crew came up with this next movie, which Tim Burton served as a co-producer on.

Batman Forever:
This film is definitely not my favorite Batman film, or the worst. It's somewhere in between. It's somewhat like the simplistic, clean, and silly comics of the 40's and early 50's. The plot follows Batman trying to stop a former employee Edward Nygma, now the Riddler, from controlling Gotham citizen's minds through TV waves, and to stop his new nemesis, Two-Face, a former friend, who has teamed up with the Riddler to become more powerful. He also deals with the trauma of his parents death, a new love interest, and choosing between his lover or his duty to protect the city. He also must deal with orphan Dick Grayson, who wants to become his ward and assistant. This movie has very little to do with the Burton films, with only a passing mention of Catwoman, so I don't really consider it a sequel, it's like a separate film series. The cast is okay. Val Kilmer is a good actor, but he's droll and boring as the stoic Bruce Wayne and the bland Batman. Nicole Kidman is good as complicated psychologist and lover Chase Meridian. Chris O'Donnell is okay as Dick Grayson, who becomes Robin at the end of the film. He's pretty cool, but, Jesus, he looks about 25. Does he really need an adult guardian? Jim Carrey is good as The Riddler, and the studio obviously chose him because WB owns New Line Cinema, and he made their films Dumb and Dumber, The Mask, and Ace Ventura giant hits. He is just one of those actors who doesn't play a character, he's just goofing off, being himself. He's not the Riddler, he's just Jim Carrey dressed as the Riddler. He's funny, but just not my first choice. I'd want  someone who fits the role, and a Riddler more similar to the cartoon, an intelligent killer with very challenging riddles and quick wit. Tommy Lee Jones, what the hell was he thinking? He's a respected actor, and he hams up his Two-Face way too much. He over-acts more than the 60's show, and they really push the "split personality" thing with his hideout and costume being literally cut in half, and being zany and exaggerated, with half of them being normal, and the other half being purple, spiked, and striped. Pat Hingle and Michael Gough are just background characters now, and are the only returning cast members from the Burton films. Drew Barrymore and Debbie Mazar plays Two-Face's girlfriends Sugar and Spice, two very different sisters, one is a sweet but still technically evil woman in white clothing, the other is a dominatrix who loves being bad. They are really not significant to the plot whatsoever. The action in the film is little, and over-exaggerated. It's fun, but after you watch it you realize how stupid it was, like the Batmobile driving up the wall. Speaking of the Batmobile, what the hell? The Burton design was sleek and stylish, being menacing and cool, this looks like a fucking cartoon character's car. The costumes are odd, like Two-Face's half-n-half suit, the Riddler's flashy pajamas, and Batman's nipples on his suit. Robin's costume is actually pretty cool, and seems more cool and stylish than the one in the comics and cartoon, gone is the yellow cape and the bright red and green tights, now the cape is black and the suit a very faded reddish-green. The special effects and sets are off-the-wall and too over-the-top. The sets and city are bright, colorful, and strange, gone is the dark and eerie atmosphere, replaced by bright eye candy. The music is pretty good, not the iconic music from the original, more of a bland heroic tune, but still pretty good. Overall, if you are looking for a Batman movie that's still appropriate for younger kids, see Batman Forever. 3/5 stars.

Batman and Robin:
This is just a terrible movie, one of the worst films ever made. The plot follows Batman dealing with Mr. Freeze, the new villain in town who just wants to revive his cryogenically frozen wife, and freeze everyone, Robin's whiny and bitchy attitude, the plant-obsessed seductress Poison Ivy, the return of Alfred's niece Barbara (who was Gordon's daughter in the comics), and Alfred dying. This presents one of the problems: too many pointless sub-plots that only serve to pad the run-time. The cast is pretty bad. George Clooney is a great actor, so why he chose the role of the bland, wise-cracking, family-friendly Batman puzzles me. He is ashamed of this film. Chris O'Donnell went from cool teen sidekick to a dumb, whiny, bitchy man child. This movie soiled his career. Alicia Silverstone has the personality of a brick, and is bland and boring as Barbara Pennyworth, who becomes Batgirl at the climax. Arnold Schwarzenegger is a terrible Mr. Freeze, nowhere near as good as the empathetic villain from the cartoon and comics. He has way too many ice puns (Freeze in hell, cool party, you're not sending me to the cooler, let's kick some ice, hell freezes over, what killed the dinosaurs?: the ice age, etc.) This movie killed his already dying career. Uma Thurman is bland and terrible as Poison Ivy, from Pulp Fiction to this, what a sad transition. She is just heinous, and this nearly destroyed her career. Pat Hingle and Michael Gough are, again, pointless. Some random stuntman named Rob Swenson plays Bane, reduced from a super-intelligent and super-strong mastermind to a mindless big drone for Ivy to use as a henchman. Elle Macpherson plays Julie Madison, Batman's first girlfriend form the comics. She's just as bland and stupid here as she was there. John Glover plays mad scientist Jason Woodrue, who tries to kill Ivy. Schumacher actually only learned about the Bane character through his 7-year-old godson, showing how much he knew about the character. The sets and costumes are insanely weird, with bat-asses and nipples on the dynamic duo's costumes, bright flashy vehicles and buildings, and over-the-top special effects. The action is too silly and goofy to be considered thrilling. This film is more reminiscent of the 60's show than any comic book. Schumacher later apologized for this film. They almost did a sequel, Batman Triumphant, with Howard Stern as the Scarecrow and possibly Madonna as the Joker's daughter, Harley Quinn (his girlfriend in the cartoon and comics), but this film got so much negative feedback, that it was canned. All other scripts until the Nolan films were almost accepted, but were canned. The series was out of fresh or new ideas, and it was time to put Batman to rest, like the Superman films, but where the Nolan films resurrected Batman, the other Superman film killed it so it had to be rebooted again. So this film was so bad, it nearly killed the Batman franchise. I don't blame Schumacher, every series runs out of fresh stuff eventually, especially when trying to be family-friendly and not dark at all. Unless you're a masochist or are really curious, or like laughing at bad movies, don't watch Batman and Robin, it's not worth it. 1/5 stars.

Next, we see the Nolan films, and the most anticipated movie of the year: The Dark Knight Rises.

 (Images: Google)