Dell's Pointless Lists: Batman Movies

[FirstTimer]

Even if your just counting movies I still think of batman with kevin conroys voice he just had that angry, but still calm voice that you would imagine batman with. I think bales wayne was better, but his batman voice just never clicked with me.

Bales voice always fucking annoyed me.

It always reminded me of Jeff Joniak calling a Bears game and trying to say "TOUCHDOWN! TOUCHDOWN BEARS!" In a lower voice. Just blah.

[Ravin]

[stevsta]

Im going to radically say the rankings go 3. Batman Begins, 2. Batman (1989), 3. Batman: The Dark Knight

[dell71]

Is this the one where batman is running all stupid on the docks carrying a big bomb?

Yes.

Even if your just counting movies I still think of batman with kevin conroys voice he just had that angry, but still calm voice that you would imagine batman with. I think bales wayne was better, but his batman voice just never clicked with me.

Agreed, Conroy's voice is amazing. Downgraded him just a hair below Bale because Conroy just couldn't physically play Batman. As far as Bale's Bat-voice, I'm fine with it because it lends itself to the world Nolan created. Batman just can't have the same voice as Bruce Wayne, the most famous person in Gotham. He needs to do anything he can to disguise that. If that means doing some growling, so be it.

Im going to radically say the rankings go 4.?????, 3. Batman Begins, 2. Batman (1989), 3. Batman: The Dark Knight

Umm...#4 has already been posted.

[Maynard]

The only movies more overrated than Fight Club are Slumdog Millionaire and The Big Chill.

i liked the big chill and fight club. i agree that slumdog is over rated. but fight club is about the fanboys who secretly obsess about seeing brad pitt with his shirt off. even they know its a rather average movie

i get the impression that the dark knight rises is pretty much an over the top series of action scenes. idk how anyone can think that makes a film good

i also agree with stevsta that TDK will be #1....only because of the performance by ledger.

[stevsta]

Umm...#4 has already been posted.

I must have been really tired last night

[dell71]

3. Batman Begins
(2005)
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Batman…Christian Bale
James Gordon…Gary Oldman
Alfred…Michael Caine
Lucius Fox…Morgan Freeman
Rachel Dawes…Katie Holmes
Ra’s al Ghul…Jason Isaacs
The Scarecrow…Cillian Murphy
Carmine Falcone…Tom Wilkinson

If the old Adam West TV show and movie ruined Batman’s rep, the epic failure that was Joel Schumacher’s Batman & Robin murdered it. Batfans were rabid for a more serious treatment of the character and his universe. Eight years after that debacle, director Christopher Nolan delivered the goods with this sparkling gem. While Tim Burton’s 1989 movie gave us the basics of how a man decides to dress up as a bat and fight crime, Nolan’s flick really digs deep into the matter. It has long been accepted that Bruce Wayne goes off to foreign lands for a number of years to train and then comes back to Gotham and becomes Batman. For the first time, we get to see what he experienced during his time abroad. As such, Batman Begins becomes much more a story about Bruce Wayne than Batman. Two other characters are also explored more fully than in any Batman movie before it: James Gordon and the city of Gotham herself. Gordon is elevated from a flat sideline player to a fully formed man and secretive partner of Batman. Gotham is a more fully realized, more unique place. We can feel the love that our characters have for her. What makes all of this work is that it’s plain ol’ good storytelling.

Interesting sidenote:
Sam Hamm, co-writer of the screenplay for 1989’s “Batman”, on why he opted not to use a full on origin story:
“You totally destroy your credibility if you show the literal process by which Bruce Wayne becomes Batman.”
Hmmm…wonder what Sam thought of Batman Begins. As fate would have it, Mr. Hamm is partly responsible for Nolan’s first bat flick. He also wrote for the comic while he was working on the screenplay and created the character Henri Ducard whom you know, if you’ve seen BB, plays a prominent role. Sort of.

[dell71]

2. Batman
(1989)
Directed by Tim Burton
Batman…Michael Keaton
James Gordon…Pat Hingle
Alfred…Michael Gough
Vicki Vale…Kim Basinger
Alexander Knox…Robert Wuhl
Harvey Dent…Billy Dee Williams
The Joker…Jack Nicholson
Carl Grissom…Jack Palance

Believe it or not, the prevailing thought in Hollywood was once that comic book movies don’t work. Sure, there were the Superman movies but they were the exceptions. Anything not involving the man of steel flopped at the box office. Worse yet, any studios interested in making a Batman movie wanted to make it along the lines of the 1966 movie. Eventually, in the early 80s it was agreed upon that The Caped Crusader deserved a big screen treatment more in line with the way the character was initially conceived by Bob Kane way back in 1939. By the end of the decade, director Tim Burton brought it all to life. Heading into theaters we were skeptical of noted comic actor Michael Keaton getting the lead role. Thankfully, he nailed it. However, as seems often to be the case, The Joker is really the star of the show. It’s pretty obvious he would be since he’s played by the world’s greatest Lakers’ fan, Jack Nicholson. The old pro gives us a Joker that’s part Cesar Romero and part Jack Torrance (his character in The Shining). Batman himself was appropriately humorless, as was the overall tone whenever Joker wasn’t on-screen. The most enduring part of this movie’s legacy is that it forever changed the way studios, critics and the public viewed comic book movies. Not only was it an event before it ever hit theaters, it lived up to the hype earned massive amounts of money and was generally praised by critics. The fact that superhero movies dominate the theaters every summer can be traced back to this film. By the way, it’s also given us what I consider to be the coolest Batmobile (if a bit impractically designed) and the best soundtrack (courtesy of Prince).

Sidenote: The movie opened on Friday June 23, 1989. I went to see it on the following day at the Sunrise Multiplex in New York. I was a week shy of my high school graduation, two weeks from joining the U.S. Army. I received a little bit of a thrill before the show even started. First, a couple of guys came strolling in and sat a few rows in front of me. They were Ed Lover and Dr. Dre, then the hosts of the very popular “Yo! MTV Raps.” Next the star point guard of my favorite team, the New York Knicks, and current head coach of the Golden State Warriors Mark Jackson came strolling in with his wife singer/actress Desiree Coleman. Of course, I’m way too cool for autograph seeking but it was one of the nicer “hey, look!” moments of my life.

Sidenote to the sidenote: There was another time I knowingly shared a movie with an NBA star. The special occasion happened to be my first date with the woman I married. All together now: Aaaawwwww. Okay, enough. This time was in Durham, NC and the movie was Species. Seated immediately across the aisle was a young man fresh off being named Co-Rookie of the Year, Grant Hill. Apparently, word spread that he was there before our show started and a number of random young girls kept peeking into our theater, giggling and running off. A little more interesting was the fact that he was also parked next to us. We were walking a bit ahead of him, but could feel a bit of crowd starting to swell. We sped up our walk a bit to make sure we could actually get out before he was swarmed.

[dell71]

1. The Dark Knight
(2008)
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Batman…Christian Bale
James Gordon…Gary Oldman
Alfred…Michael Caine
Rachel Dawes…Maggie Gyllenhaal
Lucius Fox…Morgan Freeman
Harvey Dent…Aaron Eckhart
The Joker…Heath Ledger
Sal Maroni…Eric Roberts
The Scarecrow…Cillian Murphy

For my money, this is not only the best Batman movie but the best superhero movie of all-time and it’s really not that close. A huge part of it is that even as it is giving us what the fanboys want it goes against the grain of what we know superhero movies to be. It works as a crime drama, challenges our notions of right and wrong, gives us one of the best villains in cinematic history, consistently pulls us to the edge of our seats, has a phenomenally unnerving score and wraps it all up by giving us the most daring ending the genre has ever witnessed. In every other comic book flick, the hero is the clear cut winner when all is said and done. The only variation to that is when we see the bad guy is still alive to possibly come back for the sequel (or the emergence of another villain who’ll wreak havoc in the next movie). Even then, there’s no doubt that good has triumphed over evil. In The Dark Knight Batman’s victory is pyrrhic, at best. The cost of it is so great that it comes tumbling down around him in The Dark Knight Rises. Watching it for the first time, you can’t feel good about where our hero is headed when it’s over. Still, Batman, or even Bruce Wayne is hardly the central character. It could be argued that he’s the third most important character behind Jim Gordon and The Joker. Speaking of Joker, I’ve already mentioned that this version is a truly great villain. That’s thanks, in no small part, to the note-perfect performance by Heath Ledger. This Joker is what the die-hards have envisioned for decades and one casual movie goers were suitably horrified by. Gotham City deserved a better class of criminal and he gave it to them.

[SuperKevin]

Maggie Gyllenhaal's bulldog face keeps me from giving The Dark Knight a perfect 10

[Buzzman]

Even if your just counting movies I still think of batman with kevin conroys voice he just had that angry, but still calm voice that you would imagine batman with. I think bales wayne was better, but his batman voice just never clicked with me.

Can someone answer me this question. Back when I watched the Dark Knight trilogy all at once, I realized that the only time Batman talks in Waynes voice is at the end of Batman Begins when he tells Rachael the line about "its what we do that defines us" and when he does that he actually pulls the neck part of his suit back so he can talk normal. Does he have a voice changer of sorts that gives him the deep growl? It'd make sense.

[dell71]

^^^ Unless I missed it, the voice thing is never actually explained.

[Senser81]

I'm in the minority, but I liked Batman Begins way more than The Dark Knight.

The pacing of The Dark Knight was bad, IMO, (Joker appears...exciting scene...Batman appears...yawn...Gary Oldman appears...listen intently because he's going to explain whats going on...) and the movie/plot was way too contrived for my taste. I didn't really "buy" the ending, either. I see what they were trying to do, but it didn't make that much sense to me given the context of the movie.

The Keaton/Nicholsen Batman was a well done movie, but it was too "paint by numbers" for me. Jack Nicholsen as the Joker...gee, he just acts like himself but has more makeup on. Great. Keaton was ok as Batman, but I thought he was much better in Gung Ho. Considering the subsequent movies made by Tim Burton, this was probably his most "corporate", tame effort in filmmaking.

I thought Batman Begins gave a more linear story, and the material covered in the movie held my interest moreso than TDK. JMO.