Allo, allo, allo! Davie Portman here requesting all of your feedback for our latest Batman review and this time we are looking at a fan favourite (for all the wrong reasons), Joel Schumacher’s “Batman & Robin” (1997).
This superhero adventure finds Batman (George Clooney) and his partner, Robin (Chris O’Donnell), attempting to the foil the sinister schemes of a deranged set of new villains, most notably the melancholy Mr. Freeze (Arnold Schwarzenegger), who wants to make Gotham into an arctic region, and the sultry Poison Ivy (Uma Thurman), a plant-loving femme fatale. As the Dynamic Duo contends with these bad guys, a third hero, Batgirl (Alicia Silverstone), joins the ranks of the city’s crime-fighters.
Braden and I will be recording on Friday!
Davie, I think it is a bit unfair to say this is a fan favorite ‘for all the wrong reasons’. It puts undue qualifiers on how one enjoys the film. I love this film and I don’t think any of the reasons are wrong.
To me, Batman & Robin is a love letter to the Adam West Batman series. It feels like the classic series put thru a 90s neon filter and turned to 11. Uma Thurman and Arnold are delightfully over-the-top and would fit right in next to Cesar Romero’s Joker or Burgess Meredith’s Penguin. Adam West totally would have had a Bat-Credit Card in his utility belt.
I like the Nolan films as much as the next person. But his ‘reality’ based approach is not the only valid way to make a Batman film. But, I don’t think we will see another fun Batman movie like this again. Everything has to be grim-dark and super serious. That makes me sad. I want more Batman surfing down ice dinosaurs.
Oh I beg to differ
This was a tv series but it should count
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This movie is utter dog shit… in the best way possible. The costumes are terrible, the plot is completely nonsensical (how does Mr Freeze’s plan to freeze the world and Ivy’s plant supremacy plot go together in the slightest?), and the performances are, by and large, horrendous. BUT man, this movie is hilarious. And that’s not to say a single joke they make throughout the film lands, because they don’t, but it’s just so bad, it’s a fucking masterpiece. This is more entertaining then any of the previous three live action Batman films, and despite being far and away the worst movie of that bunch… it’s also far and away the best!
0/10 (but also, 10/10).
Can’t wait for Batman Begins, AKA, the best Batman movie.
I meant live action. Animation is a very different realm.
Hilariously bad, but so hilariously bad that it killed superhero movies for almost a decade
I disagree Animation is a cinema medium so it shouldn’t be discounted.
Animation not only gives us the fun Batman but gave us the greatest serious Adaptation of Batman in cinematic history.
It killed DC movies for a decade. Blade came out the following year and jumpstarted Marvel.