Dehydrator
11-22-2001, 11:31 AM
Let me make one thing clear: I don't know anything about Batman besides the movies and some odd audio-tapes. So maybe I just don't get it.
Sometimes it hurts to rewatch a sentimental favorite of mine, because I realize that it has no right to be a sentimental favorite. BATMAN RETURNS was the first movie I ever saw in a theater and I remembered it being the coolest thing that I had ever seen for the next two weeks. But now that I saw it on TV, almost 10 years later, I can't say this movie blows me out of my seat.
This movie could define the phrase "hit and miss". I don't remember any other movie that hits and misses as much as this one does. Everytime something cool happened someone would fuck it up with awful dialogue, painful story-telling or giant plastic ducks. I was hoping the movie would get better with time but no, everytime it hits big it misses just as big. For the whole movie.
Here goes the plot: Batman must battle evil Penguin ( he's half Danny De vito and half penguin ) who is up to no good. Catwoman shows up too, but she really can't deceide which side she's on. Shit gets ugly when Penguin becomes the mayor of Gotham City.
Considering the acting talents it wastes, this movie should be a winner. I like Micheal Keaton, I love Danny De Vito and Christopher Walken is here too. But fuck, are some roles ever badly written!
Catwoman's slipping between Hysteria, Horneyness and Despair annoyed the shit out of me. Michelle Pfeiffer does what she can with the character but she's plagued by bad lines and no real purpose in the movie at all, other than, as I said, to confuse the plot. In the End, her actions don't mean shit anyway.
I always loved the villans in the Batman series ( I even loved Mr. Freeze!):
Danny De Vito is a brilliant actor for me. I dig nearly every movie the guy ever made. But here, he's an all out villan, not a sympathic asshole as in most of his movies, he's supposed to scare you. How can you get scared by someone riding a giant plastic-duck? In the german version he actually says at one point ( in a lament about his non-loving parents ) : "I was their firstborn. But they threaded me like I was their second-born!" I don't know if that's a poor translation job but WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SUPPOSED TO MEAN? Oh, I forgot, people often flush their second-born down the sever. Silly me to forget. But Penguin does have his good moments though. His backstory ( I refer to the newspaper articles about children disappearing when the circus comes to town) is grim and bizzare, he has all the right in the world to be pissed off by everything. But he falters often. His romantic intentions with catwoman are painful to watch and listen to. I also bought his transformation from freak to mayor and back to freak. Maybe he really tried to do something good...but in the end he of course doesn't. Hit and miss.
Christopher Walken does okay as Max Schreck but his character is secondary to the story. He does his typical "evil" performance but since the character he's playing isn't all out evil, it doesn't work for me as good as in, say TRUE ROMANCE or SLEEPY HOLLOW. Walken is at his best when he can play true psychos, Max Schreck is a boring, money-greedy sellout. I couldn't wait for him to die. Especially after he gives Catwoman to the World.
Batman himself is played by Micheal Keaton again, he's doing the same job he did in BATMAN. He ain't all that special but I say I like him more in the role than Clooney. Hmm, I really don't know what else to say about him. Could it be that the superhero aspect in this movie is far less fascinating than the villans ( sometimes ) are?
But the coolest Character in a Batman movie ever has to be Alfred. Give him more screen time you Bastards, he helped me getting over the crappy dialogue of the villans! Yeah, Alfred kicks ass, like it or not.
The movie is directed by Tim Burton and I like Tim Burton. Gotham looks gorgorous covered in Snow. Dirceting wise, I think that this is Burton's best work, next to SLEEPY HOLLOW. So all's fine in that department.
As I said, it's hit and miss like no other movie I know to me. Perhaps the BATMAN fanatics will see this different. I'm not saying that this movie is bad but sometimes it just falls prey to it's own sillyness. That's a point I always make about the BATMAN movies, maybe I just have no idea what these movies are supposed to be. I guess it comes down to this: If you want to see a Penguin mutant riding a giant plastic duck, go and see this movie!
5/10
Sometimes it hurts to rewatch a sentimental favorite of mine, because I realize that it has no right to be a sentimental favorite. BATMAN RETURNS was the first movie I ever saw in a theater and I remembered it being the coolest thing that I had ever seen for the next two weeks. But now that I saw it on TV, almost 10 years later, I can't say this movie blows me out of my seat.
This movie could define the phrase "hit and miss". I don't remember any other movie that hits and misses as much as this one does. Everytime something cool happened someone would fuck it up with awful dialogue, painful story-telling or giant plastic ducks. I was hoping the movie would get better with time but no, everytime it hits big it misses just as big. For the whole movie.
Here goes the plot: Batman must battle evil Penguin ( he's half Danny De vito and half penguin ) who is up to no good. Catwoman shows up too, but she really can't deceide which side she's on. Shit gets ugly when Penguin becomes the mayor of Gotham City.
Considering the acting talents it wastes, this movie should be a winner. I like Micheal Keaton, I love Danny De Vito and Christopher Walken is here too. But fuck, are some roles ever badly written!
Catwoman's slipping between Hysteria, Horneyness and Despair annoyed the shit out of me. Michelle Pfeiffer does what she can with the character but she's plagued by bad lines and no real purpose in the movie at all, other than, as I said, to confuse the plot. In the End, her actions don't mean shit anyway.
I always loved the villans in the Batman series ( I even loved Mr. Freeze!):
Danny De Vito is a brilliant actor for me. I dig nearly every movie the guy ever made. But here, he's an all out villan, not a sympathic asshole as in most of his movies, he's supposed to scare you. How can you get scared by someone riding a giant plastic-duck? In the german version he actually says at one point ( in a lament about his non-loving parents ) : "I was their firstborn. But they threaded me like I was their second-born!" I don't know if that's a poor translation job but WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SUPPOSED TO MEAN? Oh, I forgot, people often flush their second-born down the sever. Silly me to forget. But Penguin does have his good moments though. His backstory ( I refer to the newspaper articles about children disappearing when the circus comes to town) is grim and bizzare, he has all the right in the world to be pissed off by everything. But he falters often. His romantic intentions with catwoman are painful to watch and listen to. I also bought his transformation from freak to mayor and back to freak. Maybe he really tried to do something good...but in the end he of course doesn't. Hit and miss.
Christopher Walken does okay as Max Schreck but his character is secondary to the story. He does his typical "evil" performance but since the character he's playing isn't all out evil, it doesn't work for me as good as in, say TRUE ROMANCE or SLEEPY HOLLOW. Walken is at his best when he can play true psychos, Max Schreck is a boring, money-greedy sellout. I couldn't wait for him to die. Especially after he gives Catwoman to the World.
Batman himself is played by Micheal Keaton again, he's doing the same job he did in BATMAN. He ain't all that special but I say I like him more in the role than Clooney. Hmm, I really don't know what else to say about him. Could it be that the superhero aspect in this movie is far less fascinating than the villans ( sometimes ) are?
But the coolest Character in a Batman movie ever has to be Alfred. Give him more screen time you Bastards, he helped me getting over the crappy dialogue of the villans! Yeah, Alfred kicks ass, like it or not.
The movie is directed by Tim Burton and I like Tim Burton. Gotham looks gorgorous covered in Snow. Dirceting wise, I think that this is Burton's best work, next to SLEEPY HOLLOW. So all's fine in that department.
As I said, it's hit and miss like no other movie I know to me. Perhaps the BATMAN fanatics will see this different. I'm not saying that this movie is bad but sometimes it just falls prey to it's own sillyness. That's a point I always make about the BATMAN movies, maybe I just have no idea what these movies are supposed to be. I guess it comes down to this: If you want to see a Penguin mutant riding a giant plastic duck, go and see this movie!
5/10