Batman & Robin

Strangely enough, that's one ice-related pun that Mr.Freeze doesn't use in this film. Though it does adequately describe the movie. What was I thinking, watching Batman & Robin for a third time? Even worse, what was I doing actually starting to enjoy it?

Yes, there's something endearingly awful about a film that fails on almost every technical level. But it wasn't always so. The first two films in the franchise, anchored by the strong, and much undervalued lead of Michael Keaton, were enjoyable pop-art excursions by Tim Burton. The first, still by far the best, allowed Jack Nicholson to ham it up amongst retro stylings and the music of Prince. The second, Batman Returns, was a less successful effort to homage German expressionist cinema, the darkest of the four films, and struggled slightly under the weight of three villains.

The lesson wasn't learnt, and the usage of multiple baddies has been a fixed staple ever since. With the third, Batman Forever, the flat acting of new bat Val Kilmer was coupled with Joel Schumacher's garish direction and Chris O'Donnell's irritating Robin. Akiva Goldsman was now the writer, and any sense of depth had given way to trite puns and disjointed set pieces.

And so it was that everything that was symptomatically flawed with the series was expanded upon and magnified for the fourth, and by far the weakest, instalment. George Clooney has accepted a lot of the blame for this film, a humble admission but unfair. While he's clearly miscast as both Batman and Bruce Wayne, he doesn't give a bad performance per se. Rather, it's his back up that lets the side down. Uma Thurman (am I the only one who doesn't think she's that good-looking?) has a great time overdoing it as Poison Ivy, but she's joined by Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze. Schwarz, not exactly known for his acting skill, is unrecognisable under his costume, so what's the point? He gets to call Batman "Batunbuuurg", refers to Robin as "Buuurd Bouy" and only has 100 lines in total. The fact that 26% of these lines are lame puns on the word "ice" that even a two-year-old would struggle to find funny is even more deplorable. And when you hear Freeze tell Batman "Yew arr not zending mee too da cooola" the urge to use the video's "stop" button is almost insurmountable.

Bane makes up the trio, a monosyllabic muscleman in a gimp mask. A completely unnecessary addition, he offers nothing to the plot and goes largely forgotten. The introduction of wonky-mouthed Alicia Silverstone as a fatuous Batgirl character is also grating. And why doesn't her costume come fitted with Batnipples like the rest?

Tiny traces of amusement can be gleaned from Ivy's dialogue, with her urges that her "garden needs tending" adding some form of adult tone to the humour. However, it's unrelenting innuendo - "I'll help you grab your rocks" - does start to wear thin very quickly. I did smile at Batman's cashcard: "I never leave the cave without it"; and it's also nice to see some small references from other films. Even if it is just a glimpse of the Riddler's costume from Forever, some guards paraphrasing Cobra or some street bystanders dressed as Clockwork Orange Droogs. In fact, the idea of a Batman film as completely OTT comedy send-up may have worked, were the rest of the humour more sophisticated. "It's the hockey team from Hell"; "So this is where you hang out"; "I'll cancel the pizza"; oh, how lame and functional the dialogue is!

The film wraps up with a rather pathetic plot contrivance, and George having to dish out bland platitudes. "Not all heroes wear masks"; "to give life... that's true power". Oh, it really is abominably bad. Batman & Robin exists as a classic example of the Hollywood system folding in under its own weight. However, the universal slating this one got neglects one factor: while the least successful, it still made over $230,000,000 at the box office. I wonder how many people would be satisfied with "failures" like that?

The film does have nice costumes, and nice sets. Unfortunately that is about it. One major problem is some of the choices of actors.They were all wasted. George Clooney is quite a charming actor, but he is not my idea of Batman. Batman I don't think is supposed to be charming, he's supposed to be dark and brooding, and Clooney lacked that. What would Michael Keaten and Val Kilmer and even Christian Bale say when they see that Batman has turned charming? Chris O' Donnell looked uncomfortable, and in almost every movie where he is a hero, this includes the 1993 version of the Three Musketeers, he is rather lifeless. Uma Thurman does her best, but what they gave her to work with was ridiculous, and she just failed to deliver, while Alicia Silverstone was extremely annoying. The worst case was poor Arnold Schwarznegger. He was completely miscast as Mr Freeze, completely lacking the coldness and evilness that makes the character so memorable. Schwarznegger is a talented actor, but his skills are hidden beyond recognition in this movie, he just looked so uncomfortable and totally out of character. The direction from Joel Schummacher was disappointing as well, it lacked the artistic flair and the temperament that is needed to make a great film. This is further disadvantaged by a truly pathetic script that nobody in the cast could do anything with.(these actors deserved so much better)The special effects were okay, but very confused in terms of execution. In conclusion, not the worst movie, I have ever seen, but it is one of those films, where everything needed to make it memorable falls flat. 3/10 for effort. Bethany Cox

Generally considered one of the worst things ever brought to the screen, Batman & Robin is very fun. When people say this movie is terrible, I agree but they never acknowledge the redeeming qualities, which are what make this movie bad. Doesn't make much sense? Arnold delivers cheesy puns and one-liners galore, they do suck but are hilarious at the same time. George Clooney does such a bad job, you can't help laughing. Everybody is so over-the-top and cheesy, you have to laugh. That may be why Chris O'Donnell's and Silverstone's careers were pretty much ruined after this: gets recognized for Scent of a Woman; breaks out in Batman Forever; then gets screwed in this. Silverstone does some music videos, breaks out in Clueless, then gets screwed by this. All other actors pretty much had their feet firmly planted. The set design and special effects were actually well-done. But people criticized this portion for being too weird-looking and overly-extravagant. Maybe they were, but doing all that the way Schumacher did is extremely difficult. Plus it saves us from the bad story and bad acting. I did say the acting is funny, but after a while it gets to be too much. It starts off fun, but eventually gets boring since there is no good plot or characters. It just keeps going until you have enough. I know that two hours isn't very long for a movie, but in this case, it was. Just take twenty minutes away and it would have been better.

2/4

Batman & Robin, the big summer movie of 1997, I remember seeing this in the theater when I was 12 and even then I wasn't impressed. But when I was more grown up, I watched this film again, I figured since I loved the 3 previous Batman films, why not give this one another shot? Now, seeing this movie once again, I can understand the low rating on IMDb, this movie was just a pathetic attempt at merchandising Batman and making an over the top action movie that really had nothing to do with Batman. The casting was just oh, so plain wrong. We have Arnold Schwartzenegger as Dr. Freeze?! Not to mention the accent, the character was just someone you felt like you could laugh off. Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl, she was alright, but again, questionable casting since she seemed out of place. Now, George Clooney?! I couldn't believe how Val Kilmer got complained about, but George Clooney I can see why. He was just the most awkward Batman ever and didn't fit the role at all, he was only used for his popularity.

Batman is living it up with his bachelor lifestyle, but Robin is a bit upset that he is living under Batman's shadow and wishes to be the star. Alfred is becoming very sick and needs serious help; his niece, Barbara comes to his aid and hopes to help him and stays with Bruce Wayne. Dr. Freeze is our new villain and is looking for a cure for his wife who is frozen until he can find a cure for her, he also is intending for the world to pay for what has happened to him and his wife for some reason. Dr. Pamela Isley is a plant scientist/right activist and while her boss sees her finding out more than she needs to know about an experiment on his version of Frankenstien, named Bang, he "kills" her with her plants. But the plants chemicals have an effect on her and actually make her into Poisen Ivy. She and Freeze team up to take over Gothem and of course to split Batman and Robin forever, oh yeah, then kill them I guess.

Batman & Robin was really beyond over the top, the costumes were a bit silly and the story was just too family friendly. This is Batman, the Dark Knight, it's not meant to be this bright and so crazy. I couldn't believe Joel did this, I really wish I could get past this, I know he's going to get a bad rap for this film for the rest of his career. The acting was just stupid and not true to Batman at all. The problem here was that the story and setting just had nothing to do with what Batman truly is and was just an excuse to spend stupid money. Please, don't watch this film if you love Batman, or you'll be sorry.

2/10

I loved it as a kid, because I didn't know any better and years of nostalgia has keep it close to me. I'm not saying it's a good movie by any means, but the bright colors and characters cheesiness is what I loved about it, and never got Joel Schumacher fascination with bat nipples, but I digress. It has always been a guilty pleasure for just like Batman Forever is, and I think i always will.