One Friday night, in April of 1990, a young boy, around five years old, sat down to watch a film. This was a film that he had been anticipating seeing for almost a year, his eagerness to see it augmented by a love for an old 1960's television series and a comic book he always had his mother buy him. When he watched this film, in the company of his aunt, he was a changed boy. That old television series would never be the same, his love of the comics would be cemented throughout his childhood and his list to Santa Claus that year would feature every piece of Batman merchandise under the sun. The film (if you hadn't guessed) was Tim Burton's Batman and to this day remains one of my favourite films of all time. Yes, Christopher Nolan's reboot is a work of genius as well, in many ways an exclusive piece of work from that director in the same way this and Batman Returns are to Burton, but, and it may be the rose tinted glasses I wear anytime I watch this film, or the fact that I was very young and the film represents a rite of passage for me, this film will always be my favourite of the Batman movies. Sure, Nolan's are more realistic, get better reviews and universally popular, but there's something about the inherent Gothic quality of Tim Burton's direction and style in this film, the psychotic humour and quirkiness of Michael Keaton's rendition of Bruce Wayne and Jack Nicholson's tendency to got over the top that he ends up pretty much higher than he really should that I really respond to. Then there is the batmobile. Yes the tumbler is good and it turns into a batpod, but let's be honest, Anton Furst's design for the Batmobile in this film is sleek and cool as hell.
The look of the film is quite simply wonderful. Gotham City is truly a wonderful looking hell hole of Gothic proportions. The art deco architecture, the smoky, noir like back alleys, Bruce Wayne's beautiful mansion and hi-tech batcave, the Notre Dame like Cathedral, Burton and production designer Anton Furst have truly made Gotham into a living, breathing and plausible city and none of it was filmed on location, instead using the whole of Pinewood Studios to create their vision of Batman's world. Yes, Nolan may have used Chicago, but Burton's Gotham has imagination, although thankfully he never allows it to become as ghastly as Joel Schumacher.
Then there is Michael Keaton. I'm not going to compare and contrast Michael's performance with Christian because actually I think there are many similarities, but focusing on Michael Keaton he brings a lot to the plate as Bruce/Batman, a lot more than many of his critics claimed at the time. What I love the most about him is how much of an emotional mess his Bruce Wayne is, incapable of claiming his love to Vicki, his inability to tell her he is Batman and his constant need to push her away makes this version of Batman a very complex individual, but one that is layered with some beautiful humour and a possible psychotic undercurrent ("You wanna get nuts? Come on, let's get nuts"). If a brooding nut job is going to dress up as a bat, I can really guess it's this one. Sure you can tell when he is or is not wearing the suit in the action sequences, but he has where it counts and his is a performance you can never forget. Just look at that haunted look as he remembers the reason he became Batman.
As for Jack Nicholson. Well, people still talk about him to do this day and it says something about how memorable a performance it is when nearly twenty years later it's still viable enough for comparisons to Heath's rendition in The Dark Knight. Heath's maybe the anarchist, but Jack's is a cackling killer, a psychopath with a grin who may not have the relevancy of the current incarnation, but is just as dangerous, mainly because Jack's Joker is funny when he is at his most psychotic. This adds up to a nice comparison with Keaton's Batman as the two characters through fate and destiny become the architects to each other's origin tale, a lovely storytelling stroke that Burton mines for all its worth.
I suppose its wrong to compare the movie to The Dark Knight as both are vastly different films set in extremely different universes (I feel really bad now, I really love The Dark Knight), and I guess my love for this film is offset by, as mentioned earlier, nostalgia, but I love this film, I just love it for the dark look, the gadgets, the action sequences, the effects and the Batmobile. My God is that the greatest car to appear in a film, or what? I guess you could say my love of films really started here.
The look of the film is quite simply wonderful. Gotham City is truly a wonderful looking hell hole of Gothic proportions. The art deco architecture, the smoky, noir like back alleys, Bruce Wayne's beautiful mansion and hi-tech batcave, the Notre Dame like Cathedral, Burton and production designer Anton Furst have truly made Gotham into a living, breathing and plausible city and none of it was filmed on location, instead using the whole of Pinewood Studios to create their vision of Batman's world. Yes, Nolan may have used Chicago, but Burton's Gotham has imagination, although thankfully he never allows it to become as ghastly as Joel Schumacher.
Then there is Michael Keaton. I'm not going to compare and contrast Michael's performance with Christian because actually I think there are many similarities, but focusing on Michael Keaton he brings a lot to the plate as Bruce/Batman, a lot more than many of his critics claimed at the time. What I love the most about him is how much of an emotional mess his Bruce Wayne is, incapable of claiming his love to Vicki, his inability to tell her he is Batman and his constant need to push her away makes this version of Batman a very complex individual, but one that is layered with some beautiful humour and a possible psychotic undercurrent ("You wanna get nuts? Come on, let's get nuts"). If a brooding nut job is going to dress up as a bat, I can really guess it's this one. Sure you can tell when he is or is not wearing the suit in the action sequences, but he has where it counts and his is a performance you can never forget. Just look at that haunted look as he remembers the reason he became Batman.
As for Jack Nicholson. Well, people still talk about him to do this day and it says something about how memorable a performance it is when nearly twenty years later it's still viable enough for comparisons to Heath's rendition in The Dark Knight. Heath's maybe the anarchist, but Jack's is a cackling killer, a psychopath with a grin who may not have the relevancy of the current incarnation, but is just as dangerous, mainly because Jack's Joker is funny when he is at his most psychotic. This adds up to a nice comparison with Keaton's Batman as the two characters through fate and destiny become the architects to each other's origin tale, a lovely storytelling stroke that Burton mines for all its worth.
I suppose its wrong to compare the movie to The Dark Knight as both are vastly different films set in extremely different universes (I feel really bad now, I really love The Dark Knight), and I guess my love for this film is offset by, as mentioned earlier, nostalgia, but I love this film, I just love it for the dark look, the gadgets, the action sequences, the effects and the Batmobile. My God is that the greatest car to appear in a film, or what? I guess you could say my love of films really started here.