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In retrospect, Batman(1989) is really baadd

I could sign a petition saying that "in retrospect, Batman 1989 is really goofy" but not that it's bad. It's a fun movie, a little serious, but mostly wacky. As a spectacle it works.

I like Batman Forever too, think it's just about as good as Batman 1989, except that it's missing Jack Nicholson.

The Nolan movies on the other hand are a whole other animal. Sort of like Batman 1989 minus the tongue-in-cheek. The Dark Knight is the best Batman film, I think.
 
Actually, I think Billy Dee Williams would have been in the third Batman movie if Burton directed it. Apparently he originally signed on to play Harvey Dent in the hopes that he would play Two-Face in a future installment. I also heard that if Tim Burton had helmed the third movie, he would have only used Two-Face as the villain (no Riddler), in which case, I imagine the version we got would have been better than the one in "Batman Forever" (even though I liked "Batman Forever" better than the first two Burton movies in some ways).
 
Who knows? It would have been logical to use Billy Dee Williams again, but it's possible Warner would have insisted on a bigger star for the villain, no matter what Burton intended.
 
I believe Williams' contract actually had to be bought out in order for Jones to be hired, as it contained language stipulating that he was to play Two-Face if the character were to be used in a future film.
 
I thought Billy Dee Williams signed a pay-or-play deal for the part in the third film. When Warner Bros. re-cast the role, he was paid anyway. The posted article seems to conform to that memory, but it may be wrong.
 
Spaceman Spiff said:
All of that seems to be due to the script, which was written before Schumacher signed on as director, I believe. If that script would have been put into the hands of a different director, Forever would have been a really good Batman movie.

Heck, I think it'd be interesting to see how it would have turned out if Keaton and Burton had remained aboard. We'd have gotten different actors for the villains, and probably a much scarier Two-Face.
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I still would have liked to have seen Jones in the role. I think he could have gone either way in terms of something campy or something really, really dark.

The Rifftrax for "Batman and Robin" is hilarious by the way.
 
Timby said:
I believe Williams' contract actually had to be bought out in order for Jones to be hired, as it contained language stipulating that he was to play Two-Face if the character were to be used in a future film.
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the G-man said:
I've heard that too
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Interesting. I had wondered if they cast Tommy Lee Jones because they had simply forgotten Billy Dee Williams already had the part in an earlier film. I should have guessed that Big-Money Hollywood contracts would prevent that sort of forgetfulness.

I don't think Williams' portrayal would necessarily be better than Jones', but it might have helped the Schumacher films feel more connected to the Burton ones. I never liked the way Schumacher's movies felt like they were taking place in a separate universe.
 
If you watch "Natural Born Killers" and then "Batman Forever", you may get a sense of deja vu. Personally, I thought Jones as Two-Face was basically just playing the same crazy warden he played in "Natural Born Killers", just as Jim Carrey's The Riddler wasn't very different from his character in "The Mask".

I'm just speculating, but this suggests to me that Schumacher didn't give them much direction and basically told them to do whatever they want with the characters, so they simply redid what they'd done recently.

Aside from name value, I imagine the main reasons Tommy Lee Jones was cast were because he showed he could play a manic, villainous character in "Natural Born Killers" and had recently won an Oscar for "The Fugitive".

I don't think a lot of thought went into casting those first few Batman movies. I believe Val Kilmer was a pretty inspired choice, though. I'd never heard of him before he was cast, and I felt he played his role well.
 
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Well, I've bought PO discs of Returns and Forever and will give them a watch in order to give them a "fresh" review.

After watching Batman 1989 the other night I can sort-of see where Rama is comming from on the movie not being very good. For me it was mostly Nicholson's OTT acting as The Joker which was just way, way, to broad at times. The scene of him and the thugs at the museum was just cringe-inducing. I may think that due to the vast superiority of Ledger's Joker but the look and characterization of The Joker by Nicholson didn't age well. Keaton as Batman is alright, his Batvoice is obviously superior to Bale's, and I can accept him enough in the Batsuit even if it was so rigid he couldn't move much in it and it had the fake muscle panels, but he was decent. But I just cannot buy him as Bruce Wayne. Bruce Wayne, IMHO, should be like what John Kenndy Jr. was like a millionaire playboy bachelor constantly on People's "most handsome" lists and with women swarming around him dying to be Mrs. Wayne. Keaton's Wayne just did not seem potrayed this way in this instance Bale, Clooney and even Kilmer all fit the bill much better. (And I like how Bale's Wayne even has the facade of being the self-involved and clueless billionaire bahcelor, see: the scene when he crashes his Lamborghini into the car carrying a man The Joker is after.)

I may give B&R a rewatch just due to consistancy of watching the other old movies but everything that can be said about the movie has been said.

As I now feel:

Returns: Went way over the top with the gothic look and I am not a fan of Piffer's Catwoman (mostly in the way she acts and her costume) or Divito's Penguin (which not a single thing was done right with.)

Forever: The begining of the end. It was every bit as campy as B&R and should be maligned just as much. Kilmer was a non-entity in the movie I mean, shit, he could've been replaced with a cardboard cut-out and nothing would've really changed. Carrey's Riddler is ridiculous and over the top and just Carrey doing his Ace Ventura shtick cranked up to 150, the Robin stuff was okay but I'm not not a fan of O'Donnel's take and I think Tommy Lee Jones could've been a good Two-Face if a more serious take was done on the character but, instead, they decided to make him as campy as they could.

In short, Forever was too much like the 1960s TV series. And while I liked that series it just didn't work on the big screen as it didn't quite have the charm of series especially in the wake of the previous two movies.

Also, in hindsight, it's in the Burton movies you can pretty much see every cliche and thing that would be common place for him between then and now, in watching it today I wonder how anyone thought Burton had any potential as a great film-maker. Even considering Edward Scissorhands which suuuuuccccckeeeed.

Burton, IMHO, is just not a good film-maker and his only "good" work is, maybe, Beetlejuice because there was enough off-beatness there for it all to work, but since then. Oy.

On the front of Billy Williams playing Harvey/Two Face I honestly don't care. His presence in the first movie could easily be missed and forgotten and, honestly, I think he was done a favor not appearing in the Shumacher movie. I've not seen enough performances of him to know if he could've carried the role in another Burton Batman movie.
 
Trekker4747 said:
Also, in hindsight, it's in the Burton movies you can pretty much see every cliche and thing that would be common place for him between then and now, in watching it today I wonder how anyone thought Burton had any potential as a great film-maker. Even considering Edward Scissorhands which suuuuuccccckeeeed.

Burton, IMHO, is just not a good film-maker and his only "good" work is, maybe, Beetlejuice because there was enough off-beatness there for it all to work, but since then. Oy.
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No need to pick on Burton as a director just because of his Batman movies. I can't believe I'm defending him since I haven't enjoyed one of his movies since 2003 and I don't even like "Edward Scissorhands" and "Beetlejuice" much, but the man definitely has talent (or at least used to).

On the strength of "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure" and "Ed Wood", I could never call him a total hack (even if he hasn't made a great movie since the latter). His movies have always had a distinct look that used to be enchanting (until his 'style' became stale from overuse in recent years), and those movies proved he could be an inspired visionary with a mastery of production design and directing.

I just don't think he's been very smart choosing which scripts to direct and he gets a little fixated on certain themes and ideas that are overdone by now and need not be forced into his movies. I really hate how he brought 'daddy issues' (again) into "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".
 
Too Much Fun said:
I don't think a lot of thought went into casting those first few Batman movies. I believe Val Kilmer was a pretty inspired choice, though. I'd never heard of him before he was cast, and I felt he played his role well.
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That's interesting because Kilmer was actually a pretty big star at the time he got the Batman role, having done Top Gun, Willow, True Romance, Tombstone and, perhaps most significantly, the Doors.
 
I didn't quite know who he was either prior to him being cast in Batman Forever. I know I saw movies he was in prior to playing Bruce Wayne, but I never gave him much notice until Batman.
 
the G-man said:
That's interesting because Kilmer was actually a pretty big star at the time he got the Batman role, having done Top Gun, Willow, True Romance, Tombstone and, perhaps most significantly, the Doors.
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Yeah, but I was like, 12 at the time. :D I imagine there are quite a few people here in the same boat as myself who didn't know who he was at the time because they were too young to watch his movies.

Of the movies you mentioned, the only one I could have seen was "Willow" and that just wasn't on my radar. Actually, the only person in the movie I knew beforehand was (of course) Jim Carrey
 
Ed Wood is his masterpiece. On the subject of Batman, I still really like Burton's films, but I love Nolan's movies. As a kid, I watched the hell out of Batman Returns. I had that thing memorized. I loved the energy and fun of it, but now it doesn't make a lot of sense. Just watched it the other night and the plot is about making Penguin mayor? Weird. And the entire film is basically on one set they constantly redress. The movie has like a dozen extras. Expensive and also cheap at the same time. Still, I love the matter-of-fact way they deal with Batman as a guy in a suit. He walks around the streets and beats dudes up. They didn't spend time trying to explain things. That's one thing superhero films do too much: try to explain stuff for the real world while also apologizing for the camp and costumes.
 
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