PG-13, 126m, 1989

Starring: Michael Keaton (Bruce Wayne/Batman), Jack Nicholson (Jack Napier/Joker), Kim Basinger (Vicki Vale), Michael Gough (Alfred Pennyworth), Pat Hingle (Commissioner Gordon), Robert Wuhl (Alexander Knox), Tracey Walter (Bob the Goon), Billy Dee Williams (Harvey Dent) and Jack Palance (Carl Grissom). Directed by Tim Burton. Produced by Peter Guber and John Peters. Screenplay by Sam Hamm and Warren Skaaren. Music by Danny Elfman. Based on the Batman characters created by Bob Kane.

            Batman marks the second theatrical feature film starring the dark knight. The first was Batman: The Motion Picture, released in 1966 and based on the 1960s Batman television show. Following the critical and box office disappointments of Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, Howard the Duck, and Supergirl, superhero films faced an uncertain future. Superman and Superman II had been highly successful both critically and commercially, but since then superhero films had not been viewed as seriously viable commercial properties. A Batman film had been in the works for several years, but this version of the film would have been similar to the campy 1960s show in terms of style. In the mid to late 80s, Batman received a massive image change with the publication of darker and grittier graphic novels such as Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s “The Killing Joke” in 1988 and Frank Miller’s “The Dark Knight Rises” in 1986. Initially hired following the success of Peewee’s Big Adventure, director Tim Burton was not a comic book fan, and after getting to know the character he decided he wanted to make a serious Batman film. The film was greenlit following the success of Beetlejuice, and Burton set to work to create a Batman film that had a darker and more serious tone.

            The film opens with a scene that almost mirrors the birth of Batman. A couple (Garrick Hagon and Liza Ross) and their son (Adrian Meyers) are mugged at gunpoint by two goons (Christopher Fairbank and George Roth), who quickly make off with their stolen loot. Atop a rooftop, the two men discuss the recent appearance of a masked vigilante, known only as the Batman (Michael Keaton). Batman arrives and makes short work of the pair. As the police are carting away the pair, reporter Alexander Knox (Robert Wuhl) arrives on the scene in order to dig up any news on the mysterious Batman. Receiving none, Knox returns back to his office, where he finds photojournalist Vicki Vale (Kim Basinger), who has a keen interest in capturing Batman on film. The pair attend a fundraiser hosted by billionaire Bruce Wayne, who is secretly Batman. Meanwhile, mob boss Carl Grissom (Jack Palance) sends his second-in-command Jack Napier (Jack Nicholson) to Axis Chemicals to destroy incriminating evidence. Unbeknownst to Napier, the task is a trap set up by Grissom, for retribution for Napier sleeping with Grissom’s wife, Alicia (Jerry Hall). During the raid at Axis Chemicals, Napier is accidentally knocked into a vat of acid, turning him into the pale-skinned, green-haired Joker. Joker kills Grissom and takes over as mob boss, where he quickly rises to the top of Gotham’s crime syndicate. To sow chaos Joker laces Gotham’s hygiene products with the drug “Smylex”, which causes the victim to literally die from laughter. Now it’s up to Batman to stop the Joker before he can turn the entire populace of Gotham into a mob of rictus grinned corpses.

            One of the aspects I always look forward to in a Tim Burton film is the film’s aesthetic. Tim Burton got his start in animation working on films like The Fox and the Hound, The Black Cauldron, and Ralph Bakshi’s The Lord of the Rings. His animation background helps give his film a visual flair in which the film’s aesthetic becomes a character of its own. Burton’s dark and gothic imagery gives the city of Gotham a unique look that compliments the film’s darker tone. The Gotham City of the Batman tv show looks like your run-of-the-mill city, which while it stays true to the show’s campiness, it fails to leave an indelible impact as a memorable location. Burton’s Gotham has an aesthetic that just oozes with great gothic imagery that harkens back to the films of the German Expressionism era such as Metropolis, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and M, as well as the films of the noir genre such as The Big Combo and The Third Man. The film’s general look was also inspired by Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, with its towering metropolitan look with intentionally clashing architectural styles that reflect the city’s criminal turmoil.

            When the casting for this film was announced, many fans of the Batman comics felt that Michael Keaton was a poor choice to portray the caped crusader. This is largely because Keaton was known for more comedic and romantic roles, whereas the character of Batman called for a more stoic and serious performance. As Batman, Keaton is very intimidating, but I’m not a fan of this Batman’s fighting style. His fighting style generally lacks any real weight that one would expect from the Caped Crusader. Batman does not possess any superpowers, so to compensate for this he uses a combination of martial arts, brute strength, a keen intellect, and an awesome array of gadgets to take on more super-powered foes. There’s nothing adheringly awful about Keaton’s Batman fighting style, but it doesn’t quite match up to how I envision Batman in action. Maybe I’ve just been spoiled on the fight scenes of the Nolan trilogy, but I found the fighting scenes to be a little lackluster. That being said, Keaton does manage to pull off a convincing Batman performance. As the Dark Knight, Keaton possesses a certain physical prowess, that translates into a budding young superhero, who’s just starting to find his feet. As Bruce Wayne, Keaton can give a believable performance as a man, who grew up in immense wealth, but whose psychological torture led him to taking on the mantle of Batman. However, my problem with Bruce Wayne stems from the writing of the character. As the audience, we learn very little about the man behind the mask, and this makes it a bit difficult to root for him. One aspect that I’ve always admired Batman for is that he recognizes there’s only so much he can do as Batman. As Bruce Wayne, he can attempt to fix Gotham’s problems at the source. Throughout the film, Bruce Wayne does very little to help the city of Gotham, and as Batman, he does very little to bring any of the major criminals of Gotham to justice, save for the Joker, who actually does more to take out the major criminals of Gotham than Batman does. Kim Basinger as photojournalist Vicki Vale, does a decent job, but the romance between her and Bruce Wayne feels so awkward and forced. This romantic subplot actually leads to one of the clumsiest moments of the film. After dating, for a very short time, Vicki Vale is led down to the Batcave, by Bruce’s closest and most trusted ally, Alfred. As if this moment isn’t odd enough as is, neither Bruce nor Vicki Vale shows any real reaction to seeing each other in the Batcave. This should have been a huge revolution, but instead, the film just glosses over the moment, treating it like a moment of unimportance. At the very least Bruce should have had some choice words for Alfred’s careless neglect of Bruce’s secrecy. This scene could have worked had Bruce and Vicki been dating for years by the events of the film, and if Vicki had proven herself trustworthy, I’d have bought it, but as is, I’m a bit surprised that Bruce didn’t dismiss Alfred from Wayne Manor. The film’s standout performance clearly goes to Jack Nicholson as the Joker, who almost perfectly threads the needle of being a comedically threatening villain. However, Nicholson’s standout performance does serve as a bit of a determent to the film, as it completely overshadows Keaton’s performance as Batman. This is a problem many films fall prey to, and this may not bother some people, but to me, a protagonist needs to be just as interesting as the antagonist.  I saw this because the relationship between Batman and Joker has always been interesting. With Joker, you have a guy who has a carnival mask of a clown that hides the horror that lurks beneath. On the other side of the coin, you’ve got Batman, who dresses as a nightmarish bat to inspire fear in his enemies. Joker represents the randomness of crime, which pairs perfectly with Batman, who lost his parents due to a random act of crime. In the comics, Joker never really had a real origin story until Alan Moore’s “The Killing Joke”. Like in the film, Joker falls into a vat of acid, after Batman accidentally knocks him over. I actually prefer the film’s depiction of Joker’s origin, because in “The Killing Joke”, the Joker was just a regular guy, who went crazy after the events of that day. In the film, Joker is a terrible person even before he fell into the acid. Falling into the acid just made his outward appearance reflect the monster that resides within.

            While not the best superhero film, it can’t be denied how influential Batman was for superhero films as the films that followed Batman like Blade, X-Men, and even Spider-Man had a darker a gritter tone than the superhero films that came before Batman. Because of the success of Batman, superhero films were allowed to have brooding and more vulnerable characters, without camp or irony. In one film, director Tim Burton was able to separate the name Batman from the Adam West interpretation and helped lay the groundwork for the modern superhero film that we know today.