The Dark Knight on Film pt 3: Schumacher's Shlep

After the disappointing Return of Batman, Warner Brothers decided to switch directions. Seeing the previous film as too dark, they decided to add a dose of "fun" to the franchise. They chose none other than Joel Schumacher to do just that. Up to this point, Schumacher had made a few successful films, mainly in the drama and horror genres. In his defense, his previous works were fairly down to earth, and betrayed none of the garishness that was to become of the franchise.

Batman Forever (1995)

For his first film, Schumacher chose to stick with the two villain formula established by Returns. He also felt it was time to bring in Batman's side kick: Robin. This version of Batman is a little "cooler" and a lot flashier. It is an absolute 180 from Burton's films.

So, that'd go?



Casting: Nearly every major role has been recast for this film. Keaton bowed out with the change of directors. Val Kilmer was brought in to replace him, though he only stayed for this one. Chris O'Donnel. makes his first appearance as Robin. Tommy Lee Jones replaced Billy Dee Williams as Harvey Dent. Here, he plays his evil alter ego: Two Face. Jim Carrey portrays the Riddler, and Nicole Kidman rounds out the cast as Wayne's love interest. I have to admit that I have a lot of problems with both the characters and the casting of this film.

For starters, the characters here are flat and one dimensional. Bruce Wayne harps about repressed memories and his sympathy for Grayson's loss. The event has triggered painful emotions and shattered the wall of control he has spent his life building around his feelings. Unfortunately, Kilmer is given little room to play any of this. His dialogue is poorly written and the direction is plain boring. Scenes that could have resonated are shrugged off as filler between action sequences. Similarly, the villains' transformations are hurried and ridiculous. (I'm no expert in Batman comics, but I'm pretty sure The Riddler never stole brainwaves in the books.) Schumacher provides no compelling reasons for either man to become criminals (or where they get their money to do so). He just assumes that no one really cares (he doesn't) and just pushes through to show them in their big budget costumes.

This version of The Riddler is especially disappointing. Throughout the series, the characters have become more and more exaggerated (constantly trying to top Nicholson's performance as The Joker.) Jim Carrey's casting ensures the Riddler's outlandishness. The comedian brings nothing original to the role whatsoever. He is not even playing the Riddler; he is playing Jim Carrey in a green suit. Carrey's performance here is exactly like every other film he has ever made. Whether its Ace Ventura or Edward Nygma, all you get is Carrey jumping around, making stupid jokes, and yelling in a funny voice. This version of the character is just barely even concerned with riddles. The inclusion of the packages he leaves for Wayne seem unnecessary; almost an afterthought when the screenwriter realized what the villain did in the books.

Script: The film begins with the typical "Batman called to action" sequence that had become a staple. In this scenario, the Caped Crusader is called to deal with Tommy Lee Jones' Two Face. Face has taken hostages in a bank, which is ultimately a plot to capture and kill Batman. (This ploy also begins the next film, with Mr. Freeze doing almost exactly the same thing.) After escaping, Batman returns home and Two Face begins his next episode of terror. Meanwhile, Jim Carrey hatches a plan to steal Gotham's brainwaves, which transform him into super villain The Riddler. Bruce Wayne spends most of his time dating Nicole Kidman, who plays psychologist Chace Meridian. He takes her to the circus (because that's where most billionaires go on dates) where they witness the unfortunate death of trapeze artists at the hands of Two Face. The youngest of the clan, Dick Grayson, is adopted by Wayne, stumbles upon the Batcave, and becomes Robin. The rest of the film is filled with Jones and Carrey laughing a lot and a final showdown between them, Batman, and Robin in a rave or something.

Set Design/Cinematography: While Batman Returns may not have been my favorite of the series, I still believe it was closer to the original Burton film. It strayed over the fantastic boundary more than once, but kept everything reasonably grounded. Batman Forever took the franchise into left field; having no interest in presenting any sort of realism at all. Schumacher established a vision of Gotham that was more anime and Saturday morning cartoons than anything Burton would have created. Although it was more restrained than his next effort, Forever clearly eschews the sensibilities that made the first films so successful.

Everything here is lit in bright colors; the make up is exaggerated and too playful. I'm sure the idea behind the  design of this film was to make it look like a comic book. Everything here certainly resembles one. The problem with that idea is that cinema is a totally different form of art. Fans are attracted to Batman films to see the character brought to life in a world similar to their own. They want to see him swoop down onto criminals from buildings that are familiar. They want to see the batmobile blowing up cars that they might own. Once you stray into something as fantastic as the design of this film, everything just becomes nonsensical. "Oh, the batmobile can climb walls. Ok......"

Director: I understand why the studio went with a different director for this film. Had the franchise kept going the way it was with Burton at the helm, I'm not sure it would have succeeded any more than it did with Schumacher. Audiences were caught off guard by the look and tone of Returns, and I believe it was fair to try to change it for this one. The film was even a big success when it was released. It just hasn't stood against time so well.

I believe that Schumacher was the wrong guy to do these films for a reason: his whole perception of the character came from the television shows and the pre 1980's campy books. Just as Burton's filmmaking instincts were too much for Returns, Schumacher's vision was ill fitting of the material. I believe the studio should have found someone who was simply more interested in the characters and in keeping the style of the original.

Bottom Line: The main problem with this film is just how overblown everything is. The actor's performances are too big and grate on the audience's nerves by the end of the film. Scenes that could be played with subtly and accentuate the subtext are bludgeoned with Schumacher's inept direction.  The city of Gotham is full of strange passageways and giant Atlas statues. Even the batcave and the vehicles have been redesigned to be more flashy. Batman Forever is less a story than it is an explosion of fireworks caught on film.

Despite its flaws, the film made tons of money. The sequel was inevitably going to follow with Schumacher unfortunately at the helm. The next installment, however, would take everything that was terrible about Batman Forever and crank it to 11.

Batman & Robin (1997)

Alright, we all know that Batman & Robin sucked. Like REALLY sucked. It killed the franchise and nearly put a permanent end to Batman on film. It would be really easy to just say "shit sandwich" and go on to the next one. However, as a conscientious blogger, I feel the need to break the film down and really examine what's wrong with it. So, here we go.

Plot: This is really the only area that I can give the film a break. It does have a linear plot that follows a logic and flows from A to B. It's not a mash up of several drafts filled with fits and starts. I would even have to say that, on paper, the plot is not much more outlandish than the previous films. The follow through may be totally hammed up, but the story is not as bad as it could have been. So, it's got that going for it.

Casting: The cast of this film, on many levels, is an abomination. First of all, Clooney brings absolutely nothing to the role of Batman. He conveys none of the darkness that the hero is supposed to harbor. He just plays a typical millionaire with a boyish grin and a supermodel on his arm. Chris O'Donnell as Robin is serviceable, I suppose. Again, he is pretty generic, but the role isn't that demanding. Uma Thurman is actually pretty well cast here. Her lines and delivery are over the top, but that's more the director's fault than her's. She is super sexy here, as her character should be. Alicia Sylverstone as Batgirl probably made sense when the idea was batted around the exec's office during a casting meeting. The problem is that she just couldn't pull the role off. She notoriously gained weight during production, but she doesn't actually look fat here. She just can't really do the physical part of the role. Her fight scenes are awkward and stiff. Even her more dramatic scenes don't really work, either. I don't know if she was bored or turned off by the film, but it comes across that way. (Not that I could blame her.) The worst decision in the entire production of this film was casting the role of Mr. Freeze with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Let's face it. The guy can't act. He can run around and lift heavy shit, but he can't sell a line of dialogue to save his life. The fact that his lines are so poorly written (just a jumble of lame catchphrases) doesn't help at all, either.

Script: As I said before, the plot is structured and isn't entirely off base. The actual writing of the film, however, is dreadful. There is absolutely no character development in this film whatsoever. Sure, they thrown in a meaningless rivalry between Batman and Robin, and an unnecessary subplot involving Alfred's death bed; neither of which actually furthers the characters in any way. Batman in this film isn't the Dark Knight avenging his parent's murder. He's a playboy with a cool car who dresses like a bat and shows up in some fight scenes every few minutes. Ditto with Robin and Batgirl. Poison Ivy barely even has an agenda here and Bane is a cartoon cameo, rather than an actual person. The filmmakers did try to humanize Mr. Freeze with images of him crying ice tears for his cryogenically frozen wife. Perhaps a better director, and a better actor, could have actually made these scenes work. Once again, Schwarzenegger can't act.

Set Design/Cinematography: I was going to split these two, but their sins are similar. The original Burton film walked a very fine line between the real and comic worlds. Gotham looks like a real, albeit slightly heightened version of, crime ridden city. In this film, Gotham looks like an Escher inspired circus where buildings end in midair, streets are laid out as motorcycle race tracks, and everyone of the citizens is dressed like a freakish clown. None of the sets look remotely real here. At no point do you believe the characters are actually wherever they are supposed to be. With the stylized lighting (mostly red, purple, and blue swirls), it is painfully obvious that everything is filmed on soundstages.

The camerawork is equally hideous. Everything is filmed in either tight closeups of the actor's faces (so that you can't tell exactly what they are doing) or in wide shots that are just too wide. During the fight scenes, the camera is all over the place. It rarely captures anything clear or telling. I had no idea that there was a huge dinosaur in the middle of the museum until Freeze dropped a corny one-liner about it. With the similarities between all of the sets, and the shoddy camerawork, it's difficult to even tell where the hell anyone is half the time. The worst offense of all, however, is the broken-tripod-slanted-angle. It is one of the most annoying, over used shots, that keeps turning up in every scene. I wanted to lift the edge of my TV up every time it happened just so I could see what was going on.

Director: I have to admit, I hate Joel Schumacher as a director. The only two films of his that I like are Lost Boys and Flatliners. (Though, it's been years since I've seen Flatliners.) His films are usually visually "loud" with an outlandish style and almost no substance. (Much like Baz Lurhmann.) The problem with his Batman films is that he doesn't understand the character or the world he is set in. With this film, especially, he relies on gimmicks rather than story. He's not interested in doing anything more than showing you pretty lights and guys in tight costumes. He obviously had no idea that the elements audiences responded to in the original Burton film were the darkness of the character and the seriousness given the material.  Instead of continuing Burton's vision, he delivers a high budgeted version of the television show. He would have done just as well to have cast Adam West and Burt Ward for this film. At least the audience would have known just what they were in for.

Batman & Robin is a terrible film. There's no two ways about it. It's not even one of those "so bad, it's good" films. Maybe a few beers will get you through your initial viewing, however, you're not gonna wanna sit through it ever again. Audience backlash was so fierce with this film that Warner Bros scrapped the fifth installment. Featuring a darker script, and a return of the Joker, the film could have made up for this pile of excrement. Although it may have been an interesting experiment, I believe the film world to be better off with the Caped Crusader's hiatus.

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