Name One Way You'd Change This Film
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shareI would make it dark and gritty.
shareSo...you wouldn't change it, then?
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MovieChat Forums > Batman (1989) Discussion > Name One Way You'd Change This Film
Make Batman face more of a challenge. He more or less has the upper hand the entire time, and there was never a moment where it seemed he was all for the can, only to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. I remember leaving the theater thinking that while it looked amazing, and the acting was great, the story lacked any tense moments, and I never felt any sense that Batman even broke a sweat whilst saving the day.
shareRight on! I always felt that the movie missed something major and was weak, but couldn't nail it the way you just did. I felt it was childish but couldn't understand why, and it is exactly because there's no real tension.
I think the dead giveway of that is: Joker shows up at her house, Bruce is there, he gets shot (for no real good reason btw) but no big deal: he has the plate to save his ass. Onto the next safe scene!
Burton is such a boring superficial filmmaker, he could vomit his christmassy family safe gloss over a holocaust extermination scene, were he to direct a movie about concentration camps.
Really? He was bleeding in the mouth after the beating the big guy gave him.
shareHe didn't sit placidly inactive throughout the film, but a punch in the mouth was about the worst he got, which isn't the spine-tingling, life-threatening, how-will-he-ever-save-the-day sort of moment I want to see my superheroes escape.
shareWant to point out Nolan's Batman didn't get that hurt either except in the third film.
Suddenly I am wanting to list all the Superhero movies where the hero gets really hurt.
1. Spider-Man 1
2. Spider-Man 3
3. Captain America The Winter Soldier
4. Amazing Spider-Man 1
5. The Dark Knight Rises
6. Daredevil 2003
7. Avengers Infinity War
That's all I could really think of. I guess you must hate most superhero movies.
Reread what I wrote. I'm not saying the hero has to get beaten to a pulp. The best superhero films are those where the hero has a difficult time, and faces a villain who is more powerful than him, and seems to have no way to win, but manages to come out on top in the end.
A great recent example is Spider-Man: Homecoming. The Vulture is a step ahead of Spider-Man the entire time, building to the point where he leaves Spider-Man trapped under a building. Spider-Man's struggle to escape, a perfect mirror of Ditko's legendary drawings, is the definition of an epic superhero moment. There are numerous other examples in countless films, and this is what Batman lacks. Batman's a step ahead of the Joker the whole way, and defeats him almost as an afterthought. There is never a moment in the entire film where one wonders "how will Batman escape?" or "How will Batman stop the Joker?"
I get what you mean. It seems most superhero movies these days don't really have that.
shareThen you don't get what I mean at all. They DO have it, at least the great ones. Batman is a little unusual in that it did not.
Look at Marvel's recent spate of films-- Ant-Man and the Wasp, Infinity War, Black Panther, Spider-Man:Homecoming-- they all had intense moments where the hero was outmatched, lost, incapable of winning, then redemptive moments where they overcame those obstacles in shocking and heroic fashion.
I feel like Ant Man and the Wasp wasn't like that but that's just me.
shareI enjoyed Ant Man and the Wasp, but I feel that Michelle Pfeiffer was really wasted in that part. She became just another boring Mary Sue character, which is not what Janet Van Dyne ever was in the comics. Michelle would have eaten up the role of Janet Van Dyne if it had been written in accordance with the character's comic-book persona, rather than just another staid nondescript super-scientist.
shareI wish Hank Pym and her were young in the MCU too. But that was not Marvel's wish.
shareBatman was hanging on a ledge at the mercy of The Joker, bloodied up after a plane crash and getting the shit beat out of him by a huge henchman...I'm not saying it was unbelievably challenging for Batman, but he did go through some troubles in the movie.
If The Joker wouldn't have been so arrogant, he would have gotten away easily.
I don't think Batman was in complete control the whole movie. Granted, you knew he wasn't going to lose, but it wasn't easy for him.
The second movie he faced more of a challenge by being framed by The Penguin and manipulated by Catwoman than any real physical issue, but I think in that film as well, it wasn't easy for him.
Needs more than one thing.
Change lead to Rutger Haur.
Change director to Paul Verhoeven.
Change writer to Marv Wolfman.
Change Batman to an intelligent detective.
I know this is unpopular, but I would change how Bruce Wayne was written/portrayed. In the movie, he comes off as absent minded, forgetful, goofy....a lot more like Clark Kent than Bruce Wayne. Bruce Wayne should be portrayed as aloof, detached, almost outside it all because he's so rich. As much as I love this movie, I cringe when I see the scene where he's going through the whole rehearsal for his confession to Vickie.
shareReplace Kim Basinger with someone more talented and likeable.
Actually do something with Billy Dee Williams as Harvey Dent. Or at least set something up for a sequel.
The all Prince soundtrack. Love Prince, but its the only thing that dates this movie.
Better special effects. Lose the stop motion and models and replace it all with CGI. It would then be perfect.
shareThe only really bad effect was the poor animation of The Joker falling from the cathedral, something they corrected using practical effects with Batman Returns a mere three years later with respect to Selina Kyle and The Ice Princess's similarly long falls.
I'm pleased that this film came out before all that tiresome and blatantly fake looking CGI.
Agreed. Joker falling was abominable, as is the overhead shot early in the film where an obviously animated bat shadow retreats into a building. Eugh.
Other than that I like the models, and can forgive some of the cruder effects.