Merry Christmas! Batman Returns! And how!

 

I haven’t seen Tim Burton’s follow-up to “Batman” since it came out and I am remiss that it’s taken this long, but as impressed with it as I was then, I think I’m even more so now. It’s a darker movie and/but it’s pure Burton. The macabre goes hand in hand with questions of identity, themes of fetishism and being a misfit, and Burton’s retooling and reusing the film iconography and techniques of an earlier era (or two; he ticks off Weimar era expressionism through 1930s Warner Brothers and it’s glorious).

It helps that his collaborators are all top-shelf and that they are working from a script by Daniel Waters whose “Heathers” set the template for dark comedy in the 80s. Burton’s best cinematographer, Stefan Czapsky, is back with those rich shadows and crane shots to die for. It adds up to one of those sequels that outdoes its predecessor.

The cast is, of course, legendary across the board; Keaton is back and his scene partners are nothing to sneeze at. It’s hard to understand just how dismissive people were in terms of taking the comic book genre seriously; proof is in how easily the performances here were overlooked. It’s not that Devito, Walken, and Pfeiffer were having a nice holiday and camping it up; frankly, they brought their A-games and it shows in just how compelling the characters are.

What’s even more telling is how focused Burton is on ensuring the characters actually have time to develop and relate. There’s not a moment wasted but there’s no stuffing, either. The economy with which he shot this is impressive and it’s filled out by the uneasy alliances between Walken’s Max Shreck (hello, Murnau) and Devito’s Oswald Cobblepot/Penguin. The stunner is Michelle Pfeiffer’s Selina Kyle/Catwoman who is the note for note counterpoint to Michael Keaton’s Bruce Wayne/Batman; her turn raised the bar for anyone else essaying the role (and as much as I love Hathaway’s take, even she pales compared to what Pfeiffer does here).

It’s also amazing how ruthless everyone is in this flick, even Batman. He sets one guy on fire and blows up another of Penguin’s henchman; there’s no discussion about not taking lives or “becoming the villain you fight”. However, he’s not Zack Snyder’s misanthrope, exactly, either. Keaton’s Wayne is still fraught with issues, but you see it in his gaze, his body movement out of the suit. He’s also more human size out of uniform and this adds to his relatability. But it’s in relation to Selina that the issues come to the fore.

There’s a genius to the time apportioned to the other main characters. It might be that this movie has the two best depictions of two characters’ origin stories ever. The Penguin isn’t just abandoned; he survived infanticide at the hands of his parents, Pee Wee Herman and Simone, uh, Paul Rubens and Diane Salinger. Selina is a put upon executive assistant to Shreck and subject to all the sexism one can imagine circa 1992. Her mother’s a bit of a nag and her love life is iffy (and we’re talking about Michelle Pfeiffer here). But the main point stands; she’s an intelligent woman who’s socially challenged by societal forces and a poor self-image.

The change we see in Selina Kyle is, of course, fantastic as in fantasy, but it works because she completes this triumvirate of damaged souls; like Bruce and Cobblepot, Selina is coming to terms with forces that threaten to overwhelm and chip at her identity as much as Wayne’s. Theirs are more split personalities than the Penguins, but no less damaged in significant ways. How they deal with that damage is another matter.

Danny Devito’s turn as the Penguin is unnerving. He’s not out of place with Werner Krauss’s Dr. Caligari (it does help that this iteration of the Penguin was modeled on Krauss’s characterization) and is nearly all id. When the Penguin makes himself known publicly to Gotham, Shreck goes to bat (sorry, not sorry) for him, giving him legitimacy to eventually run for mayor so that Shreck can draw off power from Gotham’s grid in effort to profit from his own plant. Regarding Penguin’s stated desire to discover who he really is, claim his birthright, and try to figure out why his parents left him to die in the sewers of Gotham, only Bruce Wayne seems to not be fooled.

About why his parents abandoned him (and this doesn’t excuse the abandonment); the screams of his mother and the attending physician and the follow-up sequence of a box on the floor into which the family cat is sucked by a flipper-like appendage and consumed say it all. However, it’s Devito’s animalism as an adult that keeps us fixated on his disfigured personality (far more than his syndactyly) but you also can’t help feeling some sympathy. There is no one thing in the way Devito plays the Penguin that, on the face of it, elicits something like sympathy; it’s more that you sense the overall pain that drives this diminutive psychopath.

Yes, he’s all id; but god, Waters gave him some great lines:

“What you put in your toilet, I place on my mantle.” “You flush it, I flaunt it.” Actually, everyone gets some great dialogue; it’s just that Devito really seems to revel in the language more.

The last component of Devito’s performance hinges on the late, great Stan Winston’s make-up. This is not Burgess Meredith; this is Lon Chaney, and while the make-up is a work of art, it supports the performance as opposed to subsuming it.

As for Christopher Walken’s Shreck, he’s a douche; but compared to the Penguin, he’s an amateur. You glean early on that Cobblepot will drink his milkshake at some point, and probably eat both his lunch and Shreck, as well. That Shreck thinks he’s manipulating the Penguin by running him in a barely legitimate mayoral race – replete with adoring staff and PR people – is a miscalculation that will result in fatal consequences. However, Walken gives Shreck more depth than the character deserves. That is one of the actor’s strengths; it’s always a pleasure to see what he brings to one- or two-dimensional characters and while Waters’ script is fine and Max Shreck isn’t slighted for either dialogue or development, Walken brings a shade more nuance to the business mogul.

Also of note is “Chip”, Shreck’s son. As played by Andrew Bryniarski, he hits a tone somewhere between Eric and Donald Trump, Jr. Actually, Chip is more well-rounded, but not the brightest bulb on daddy’s payroll.

It’s the so-called “normal” guys who always let you down. Sickos never scare me. At least they’re committed.

-          Selina Kyle to Bruce Wayne

It’s Catwoman who steals almost every scene she’s in, though. I’m not sure, but that I think Selina could have been one of the victims of the Heathers; and how she turns and rebels against her life of alienation and expectation is a tour de force. As I mentioned earlier, it’s fanciful, but the sentiment is real, the anger and rage aren’t phony and you don’t question why Selina all of a sudden is proficient in martial arts, gymnastics, and the bull-whip. If anything, judging from her sexual frustration prior to her transformation, you might get the feeling that she’s more into kink than those earlier scenes would lead you to believe. When her boyfriend leaves a message that he’ll be going on the ski trip they planned alone, you wonder if maybe she didn’t suggest somewhere along the line that she’d like to explore bondage with him as the sub.

As it is, once Selina becomes Catwoman, just about everyone she meets is a submissive. When she reveals herself to Shreck, arriving late in the office (after he had tried to kill her the night before, facilitating the process of her metamorphosis), and Bruce Wayne whom she had “met” as Batman even earlier in the film, she’s in complete control. Both men know it, though neither would be likely to admit it. Oh. And Bruce is smitten.

The plot, by the way, is pretty simple, but as is so often the case in the best work, it’s the characters that drive the plot. In this case, each set-piece is presaged by something the character is doing with no exposition. All too often in these things, there’s at least one character tasked with having to explain what’s going on and why to other characters. Here it is very much “show, don’t tell.” Which is why the scenes between the principles work so well; their motivation is transparent (not their motives; we know why Shreck wants Penguin to be mayor, we know why the Penguin wants to be mayor, and we know why Selina wants to partner with them – in this case, to seek revenge on Batman who frankly, almost killed her, though her motivations are more complicated).

On that parenthetical note, let’s be clear. I don’t think Bats was actually trying to kill her; but she was a handful and man, did she make a play for him. Later in the movie, when Selina is with Bruce at Wayne Manor, we get a better sense of both of them and how they’re made for each other. It’s a great little scene that is interrupted when the tree re-lighting that’s being broadcast goes awry. Bruce heads out to become Batman, Selina tells Alfred she has to go (to change into Catwoman) and their next meeting is one of the best fights in comic book movies; it’s short and not particularly flashy, but as much Batman dishes out (including his signature head-butt), Catwoman pounds his ass. So to speak. It is less about the costumes than the people inhabiting them; he’s asserting himself as truth, justice, and let’s be real – patriarchy; she’s not taking his shit. Awesome.

By this point, Selina has teamed up with the Penguin to screw over city hall and Bats. The frame up is that the Ice Queen – the woman who actually lights up the Christmas tree – will be kidnapped by Batman and the city will turn against him and the mayor (by the way, I do like Michael Murphy…what a storied career he has!), ensuring an easier win for the Penguin. Dear god, though, the Penguin’s first line to Catwoman when he sees her in his lair? “Just the pussy I’ve been looking for.” He is so, so gross.

What Selina doesn’t realize is that the Ice Queen dies and Batman is framed for murder. After her death, Selina lets the Penguin know how she feels, and how disgusting she finds him when he suggests they have sex. He turns on her, claiming he did this for her and she “was giving all the signals”; yep, the Penguin’s an incel and proceeds to attach her to an umbrella that will fly her to a high altitude and we assume drop her to her death. This she doesn’t do. Oh, she falls all right, into a greenhouse where she lands unharmed but more enraged than ever.

There’s a bit of a chase after Batman who gets away in a Batmobile that’s been taken over by the Penguin. Batman is able to disable the control that Penguin had attached to the undercarriage (really don’t know how you’d make a care like that where you could reach through the floorboard to grab a device hanging from what looks like the gear box, but whatever) and get back to the Batcave and Wayne Manor where among other things, Alfred apprises Bruce of a masked gala ball coming up given by Max Schreck and to which he’s invited. He elects to go because Selina may be there. Conversely, she elects to go. Because she’s going to kill Max.

In the meantime, Bruce has found a way into playing the Penguin’s tirade about how he’s played the city like a fiddler from hell over the Penguin’s rally at city hall where he was going to turn the Gothamites against the mayor and Batman. Once they hear the recorded rant, the Penguin opens fire on the crowd and returns to the sewer with a new plan. “I am not Oswald! I am the Penguin! I am not a human being! I am an animal!”

Selina to Bruce (in a call-back to “Batman”):” It’s gonna be a hot time in the cold town tonight.”

Bruce to Selina: “You’ve got kind of a dark side, Selina.”

At the ball, Bruce and Selina are the only two attendees not wearing masks and it’s there that they confirm one another’s alternate identities. Bruce confides that he’s there because he was hoping she’d be there and she says that while she wishes she could say the same, she’s there to shoot Max. There’s a poignant moment when after she pulls out the pistol from her garter, Bruce tries to cover the gun and she pre-empts his possible speech about how killing Shreck won’t solve anything. He asks her who she thinks she is and Pfeiffer nails all the pathos in Selina with a sigh and a laugh and “I don’t know anymore, Bruce.” Two things stand out: one, Pfeiffer’s delivery and two, Keaton’s listening. His silences here (and elsewhere in his work) speak volumes. It’s that whole “being present” for your scene partner that cements moments like this.

In any case, the moment is short-lived. The Penguin shows up to begin setting his plan in motion to capture and slaughter the first-born of Gotham’s finest upstanding citizens. Yes, this is a dark film. Did I not mention that?

It’s a cock-eyed, comic book inspired plan as the Penguin has his penguin hoard outfitted with explosives to go out into Gotham and blow up the kids (and one assumes, their families). That doesn’t pan out – naturally – because Batman has rerouted the signals to return the penguins to the abandoned zoo from which they came (and where the Penguin had been raised from a child – many questions abound on this, but again, fantasy, kids).

There’s the confrontation between Batman and the Penguin and it turns out that the explosives are actually launched. The Penguin didn’t want to kill his babies, as it were. Thus, the concluding set piece are the rockets launching and decimating the zoo. A sink hole opens up and the Penguin falls into the luminous sewer below.

We find Catwoman having cornered Shreck in the sewer underground and getting ready to flay him with the bullwhip when Batman shows up. She wants to end him, Bruce wants him taken to jail to face justice. As she says, though, “the law doesn’t apply to people like him or us”. Bruce counters with taking Shreck to the police and the two of them going home together. And here is where it’s the first time that Wayne finally seems to realize that he’s not so different from his adversaries (even if he is attracted to this one): “We’re the same…Split right down the center.” He removes his cowl and asks her one more time and she scratches his face when he tries to touch her. It’s a hard moment because again, we’re so aware of the contradictory forces within Selina and between her and Bruce. However, there’s not much time to ruminate on this because Shreck pipes in.

He slowly puts two and two together, and realizes Selina Kyle is Catwoman (and tells her she’s fired), but I love his “Bruce Wayne, why are you dressed up like Batman?” and Selina’s response: “Because he is Batman, you moron.” Max counters: “Was” and shoots Bruce.

Then he shoots Selina who keeps coming toward him. He empties the gun in her but she’s still got multiple lives? She pulls out a taser and asks Shreck “how about a kiss, Anti-Claus?” She uses the taser and the exposed wiring around to kill him as the place continues to collapse. Penguin staggers into view, selects an umbrella with which to kill Batman, realizes it’s a real umbrella and dies.

Bruce goes over to where Selina and Max had been standing and pulls debris off of where their bodies should be. Only Max’s corpse is there. The destruction of the sewer under the zoo continues as another great set piece and eventually we cut to Alfred chauffeuring Bruce. As the pass an alleyway, Bruce sees a shadow of Catwoman agains a wall. He has Alfred stop, gets out, enters the alley and while he doesn’t find Selina, a black cat approaches him that he picks up and returns to the car. As Alfred and Bruce drive into the night, the camera tracks up to the roofs over Gotham, we see the Bat Signal in the distance and the back of Catwoman’s head comes into camera.

Random thoughts/stray observations:

Another great score by Danny Elfman. On the dance floor at the masked ball, the background music fades from Rick James’ “Superfreak” to Siouxie Sioux and the Banshees “Face to Face.” This is on their Twice Upon a Time compilation and it’s a stunning song. What I didn’t know is that Burton is a huge Siouxie and the Banshees fan and requested a song from them. They composed it with Danny Elfman.

Michael Gough as Alfred is a close second to Michael Caine. Both have devastatingly dry delivery. The dynamic is different, though, or maybe it’s just that Nolan’s take on the relationship is foregrounded and more pivotal to those films.

During Batman and the Penguin’s final confrontation: Penguin, “you’re just jealous because I’m a genuine freak and you have to wear a mask!” Batman: “You might be right.” Witty badinage, to be sure, but also, a genuine character point that defines this iteration of Batman more thoroughly than hours of action could do.

“Must you be the only man-beast in town?” Alfred to Bruce while Bruce is researching the Penguin.

Pfeiffer’s donning of her first glove is shot almost like a mirror to Lorre’s metal glove reveal in “Mad Love”.

Selina upon discovering Shreck’s plan to siphon off Gotham’s energy to bolster his plan to bid for getting his plants built: “It’s not like can just kill me…” Shreck: “Actually, it’s a lot like that.”

Practical effects are so beautiful. Real sets, matte paintings, all of it. This was a multimillion dollar old-timey movie.

There’s no Tim Burton like early Tim Burton (although, late Burton like “Big Eyes”, “Sweeny Todd”, and “Big Fish” is pretty good Tim Burton).

I’m foregoing the slasher flick. This was dark enough to be its own kind of horror movie. On to “Die Hard”!

 

A match made in heaven. "I'm into leather. You?" "Rubber." "Mmm. Cool."

Iconic? You want iconic? I got your iconic.

 

One of Stan Winston's make-up masterpieces.

Quintessentially Burton