BATMAN RETURNS: 4K Blu-ray (Warner Bros. 1992) Warner Home Video

Tim Burton’s wicked world of malevolent miscreants made their reprise in the even more bizarrely twisted and ambitiously mounted, Batman Returns (1992), Warner Bros. expensive sequel to their register-ringing mega hit, Batman (1989). The delay between pictures allowed for audiences to forget just how awkward and lumbering the first picture had been – its $411.3 million world-wide box office intake mostly predicated on the studio’s shameless marketing blitzkrieg. This kept interest in the picture alive even after the critics began to review – and occasionally eviscerate - Batman as a ‘less than enthralling’ experience. Despite Burton’s claim at the time, that he would only endeavor to make a sequel if he could bring something new to this venture, Batman Returns is, as its title suggests, more of the same; darkly lit and employing many of the sets and costumes from the first movie, shelved at Pinewood Studios at a staggering cost of $250,000, with a few new oddities added into the mix. Killing Nicholson’s Joker at the end of the original movie was, in hindsight, a bad idea as it prevented one of DC Comic’s most reviled and revived villains from reappearing in the original 4-picture franchise. To account for this deficit, Burton turned to two more in Batman’s roguish alumni – the Penguin and Catwoman for inspiration. And in the casting of Danny DeVito and Michelle Pfeiffer to fill these characters Burton now had one delicious ham, and, a decidedly vampish sexpot to rely on when the screenplay predictably meandered into pointless vignettes.

In the interim between Batman and Batman Returns, Burton recharged his creative juices directing Edward Scissorhands (1990) for 2oth Century-Fox. Meanwhile, returning writer, Sam Hamm set about writing the first of two drafts with Batman’s creator, Bob Kane as his creative consultant. However, Burton was less than enthusiastic with these results and hired Heathers (1988) writer, Daniel Waters to do a complete rewrite. Waters streamlined much of Hamm’s initial high-concept, jettisoning the plan to have Harvey Dent return as the notorious Two-Face. Thus, Dent’s absence was filled by the character of Max Shreck – the Penguin’s long-lost brother, and, an insider’s nod to actor ‘Max Shreck’ who had played Count Orlok in Nosferatu (1922). Jon Peters and Peter Guber became the sequel’s executive producers, along with Benjamin Melniker and Michael E. Uslan, handing the baton of daily strife and struggles soon to afflict the production to Denise Di Novi and Burton. If anything, Batman Returns is an even more desolate and disturbing film than Batman; Burton, hiring Wesley Strick to crystalize the Penguin’s master plan. Again, the much-beloved sidekick, Robin (a.k.a Dick Grayson) was passed over as Strick felt there simply was not enough room for his inclusion. Incurring a $10 million boost to his salary to partake, Michael Keaton was signed to reprise the title role and, this time, received top-billing. However, the initial Catwoman – Annette Bening – had to recuse herself when she discovered she was pregnant. To find her replacement, the casting call opened wide, with the likes of Raquel Welch, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Madonna, Ellen Barkin, Cher, Bridget Fonda, Lorraine Bracco, Jennifer Beals and Susan Sarandon all in the running.

Wounded at having lost out on the part of Vicki Vale in the original movie, actress, Sean Young made her valiant stab to get noticed for this part, dressed in a homemade Cat-suit that singularly failed to impress Burton. At this juncture, a dark horse loomed on the horizon: Michelle Pfeiffer. Although unfamiliar with her work, Burton was entranced at their first meeting and shortly thereafter cast Pfeiffer in the part at the starting salary of $3 million, plus a percentage of the box office – $2 million more than Bening would have received had she run the course.  To prepare for the part of this ferocious female feline, Pfeiffer put herself through a strenuous regiment of kickboxing and also became a master of the whip. For the more athletic moments in the picture, stunt double, Kathy Long was brought in. While the search for Catwoman had been a minor odyssey, the casting of Danny DeVito as the Penguin proved – practically – a foregone conclusion. Indeed, Burton had envisioned the picture with no one else in the part, and Waters wrote the Penguin expressly with DeVito in mind.  As an homage to the sixties’ TV series, actor, Burgess Meredith (who had portrayed the Penguin alongside Adam West’s Batman) was hired as Tucker Cobblepot, the Penguin's father. Regrettably, illness prevented Meredith from partaking and this minor cameo was re-cast with Paul Reubens.

Unlike Batman, the sequel would be shot – not in Britain – but on two of the largest sound stages in Burbank and Universal City; Warner’s own Stage 16, housing the mammoth Gotham Plaza set, and, Stage 12 at Universal, where the Penguin’s underground lair was built, employing a half-million-gallon tank, filled with water and live penguins. Despite wild allegations from animal rights groups, the studio made every effort to ply these cold-water fowl with every luxury afforded them in the wilds – a refrigerated trailer with a private swimming pool, half-a-ton of ice brought in daily, fresh fish straight from the docks, and the added expense of refrigerating the entire set to a chilly 35 degrees. While these working conditions were idea for the penguins, they presented a distinct challenge to the human actors, particularly Michelle Pfeiffer, whose skin-tight ensemble was made of the flimsiest latex. One concession, the six pallbearer emperor penguins seen carrying the Penguin’s remains at the end of the movie were actually midgets in penguin garb. Meanwhile, the Warner back lot was encroached upon by other aspects of the production. At one point, it was estimated that nearly half the studio’s facilities were being exclusively dedicated to Batman Returns; Gotham’s free-standing streets, built on the studio’s old Brownstone and Hennessy streets. 

Bo Welch, Tim Burton’s life-long collaborator, replaced Anton Furst as production designer, owing to Furst’s commitments on Columbia Pictures’ Awakenings (1990). Tragically, this would be Furst’s final film credit, his addiction to alcohol, as well as the medically prescribed sleep-aid, Halcion – known for its side effects of amnesia, paranoia and depression - causing him to leap to his death from an eight-story parking deck on Nov. 24, 1991.  For his inspiration in reconceiving Gotham this second time around, Welch blended “Fascist architecture with World's Fair architecture”, employing Russian and German Expressionist influences. Meanwhile, make-up effects maestro, Stan Winston, toiled on finding the right look for Danny DeVito’s prosthetic transformation – an arduous process, taking 2-hours to apply. For Pfeiffer’s slinky feline, an entire wardrobe of latex cat suits, each costing $1,000, were created, hand-stitched together to give the illusion of a ‘stuffed cat’ body sock; Pfeiffer, powdered in talc and poured into its form-fitting garb, then brushed down with liquid silicone to give the suit its unique sheen. The Batsuit was also revamped out of a thinner and more flexible foam rubber, with its chest crest adapted to more closely resemble how it appears in the comics. The overt – and rigid – musculature of the original suit was also considerably toned down and streamlined. If anything, the secrecy that had preceded the release of the original movie was ramped up for this sequel, with Warner Bros. employing full-time security guards around the clock to oversee access to its art department; even denying Kevin Costner an impromptu visit. In all, Batman Returns cost Warner’s a whopping $80 million - $15 million allotted to its marketing campaign.

Batman Returns opens with an extended prologue, as wealthy socialites, Tucker (Paul Reubens) and Esther Cobblepot (Diane Salinger) prepare to welcome a new arrival into their stately home. Regrettably, the child – a boy named Oswald – is hideously deformed. Owing to their shame and social standing, the couple at first confine their child, who exhibits depraved behaviors, to a cage.  Ultimately, they reason that to drown him in a sewer would be a great relief. Instead, the boy survives and is befriended by a school of penguins from the Gotham Zoo, reared into adulthood as the quirky, hump-backed mutant – The Penguin. Thirty-three years pass. Millionaire Max Shreck (Christopher Walken) lays plans to construct a power plant near Gotham – a project challenged by the city’s ‘unnamed’ Mayor (Michael Murphy). During Shreck’s inaugural speech, Gotham comes under siege from a disgraced ex-circus troupe, known as the Red Triangle Gang. Despite Batman’s (Michael Keaton) best efforts, Shreck is abducted to the sewage tunnels far below the city. There, he meets Oswald Cobblepot – a.k.a. The Penguin (Danny DeVito), the gang’s secret leader. Blackmailing Shreck with exposure of his corporate crimes, The Penguin allows Schreck to return to the surface unharmed…though, with a dark purpose. Meanwhile, Shreck's unwitting secretary, Selina Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer) discovers her boss’ diabolical plan to drain Gotham of its energy resources, thus making the city dependent on his plant for their livelihood.  Attempting murder, Shreck pushes Selina from a high-rise window. Miraculously, she survives this perilous fall, is assaulted by a cacophony of ferial cats and thereafter, transformed into the malevolent Catwoman – now, hellbent on revenge.

At the Mayor’s press conference, The Penguin stages a faux kidnapping of the Mayor’s baby – then, almost immediately, feigns to have performed an intervention and rescue of the child, returned to the grateful Mayor and his wife. In response to his presumed valor, the Mayor allows the Penguin complete access to the Hall of Records in search of his own birth right.  Meanwhile, at Wayne Manor, Bruce voices his suspicions to Alfred about the Penguin's true motives. A cursory investigation ties the Penguin to the Red Triangle Gang. Meanwhile, Bruce has agreed to meet Shreck at his offices to discuss funding for the proposed power plant. Bruce makes an enemy of Shreck by refusing to back his plan. But the meeting is interrupted by Selina, who surprises Shreck, though otherwise, remains silent about how she survived her ordeal. Indeed, this is never entirely explained away as the fall ought to have killed her. In order to remove the obstacles standing in his way, Shreck encourages the Penguin to run for Mayor, in tandem, using the Red Triangle Gang to discredit the present Mayor’s crime-fighting policy. The city experiences a crime wave of unprecedented proportions – businesses torched and vandalized. Batman intervenes and meets Selina in her Catwoman garb for the first time as she tries to sabotage one of Shreck's businesses. In the ensuing confrontation, Selina is injured and swears revenge on Batman. Now, she allies with the Penguin to frame Batman.

Unknowing of Catwoman’s true identity, Wayne and Selina begin a romance. Meanwhile, the Penguin abducts and murders Gotham's Ice Princess (Cristi Conaway) – a Christmas-themed beauty queen. Batman is accused of the heinous crime; proof of the caped crime-fighter’s complicity compounded by the Penguin’s sabotage of the Batmobile, which leads police on a rampage through the streets of Gotham until Batman disconnects the device controlling it. Never a participant in this murder plot, Catwoman is now seen as a liability by the Penguin. Mercifully, the Penguin’s plan to off Catwoman fails. She survives an assault by taking a tumble into a nearby greenhouse. Batman records the Penguin's disparaging remarks made about Gotham’s citizenry and plays them back during his next public address to the voters, thereupon dismantling his fake image as a man of the people.  Publicly disgraced, the Penguin retreats into the sewers where he unleashes his most diabolical plan: to murder every Gotham first-born. At Shreck’s charity ball, Wayne and Selina inadvertently discover each other's secret identities. The Penguin resurfaces and reveals his plan to all, intending to take Shreck's son, Chip (Andrew Bryniarski) as his first victim. Instead, Shreck offers himself up in exchange.

Batman thwarts these kidnappings and pursues the retreating Penguin to his underground lair. Now, the Penguin, using a primitive form of mind control, sends his army of penguins to bomb the city. Mercifully, Batman and Alfred intercept this signal and reprogram the penguins to return to the sewer. Batman battles the Penguin and, during their confrontation, the Penguin is thrown through a window into the sewer’s toxic waters. Shreck escapes but is confronted by Catwoman, who intends to kill him. Instead, Batman pleads for clemency, revealing too much of himself in the process.  The murderous Shreck draws his gun and shoots Wayne and then, Selina multiple times. Although she survives the gun shots, she chooses to electrocute herself and Shreck with a stun gun, causing a massive explosion. Wayne, who came to this fight prepared and wearing body armor, discovers Shreck's corpse. But Selina is nowhere to be found. The Penguin briefly resurfaces, but succumbs to his injuries from the toxic sewage. Pallbearing emperor penguins carry his corpse into the murky abyss. In the aftermath, Batman is exonerated of any wrong doing and Gotham’s Commissioner Gordon breathes a sigh of relief the whole nasty affair has come to an end. On the car ride back to Wayne Manor, Bruce thinks he sees a silhouette of Selina in an alley. Ordering Alfred to stop the car, Bruce rushes to the scene, but finds only Selina’s cat and decides to take it home with him. Now, the Bat-Signal alerts Wayne to another crisis in the city. As he prepares to return to his crime-fighting ways, Catwoman quietly observes from a distance.  

Billed as the summer’s ‘big’ release, Batman Returns easily recouped its $80 million and was a sizable hit in 1992, grossing $266.8 million worldwide.  And although it received mostly solid praise from the critics back then, this is pretty much where my appreciation for the original 4-picture franchise ended. Like many, I would continue to attend the subsequent Batman features, hoping for the franchise to improve and/or ripen with age, a change of actors playing the lead, and, improved action sequences and special effects. The sub-genre of the superhero movie does serve a basic fundamental need, especially for hot-blooded, but otherwise emasculated males, desiring to take control of their personal lives by living vicariously through their fan-favorites up there on the screen. It is the same reason characters like Indiana Jones and James Bond remain popular – the iconography of the super-male, who does what he wants, takes what he wants, conquers what he sets out to achieve, and enjoys the company of sexy-as-hell women throwing themselves at his head, is the magic elixir for the male ego. It also keeps the cash registers ringing around the world. In the intervening decades, superheroes at the movies have become hugely popular. But Batman, and its subsequent 3-picture sequels (pre-Christopher Nolen’s involvement) do not necessarily represent the best of the bunch. In hindsight, it is the freakishness in these fantasies that seems to have soured with the passage of time. What appealed in the moment as, then, cutting edge – now leans far more toward a late-eighties and early-nineties reboot – even homage – to that sixties camp TV series that the film makers were initially so desperate to veer away from. The novelty of Batman Returns has worn thin in our present-day/market-saturated superhero milieu; the quirkiness of Burton at his best dating badly in comparison to the more recent spate of superhero offerings. Nominated for 2 Academy Awards (Best Visual Effects and Best Makeup – and losing on both accounts), Batman Returns is not long on plot or characterizations. It merely fills its run time with a lot of impressive sets and costumes, and occasionally, a moment or two of compelling action that, in totem, never entirely satisfies or entertains as it should.

Batman Returns is a visual feast, and Warner’s new 4K UHD Blu-ray release deftly extols the virtues in cinematographer, Stefan Czapsky’s gorgeously lit photography. Czapasky’s work is not as stylized as Roger Pratt’s on the first movie, though it retains the murkiness. The HDR color grading on this 4K disc extols all of the dark, rich and vibrant hues, and, is a huge advancement over the original Blu-ray release which looks thin by direct comparison. This tonal shift is amplified by added brightness that compliments color depth and overall saturation, while also magnifying the appeal of the darkly lit sequences that dominate this program. Even better, Warner’s mastering efforts have removed the modest gate weave that plagued the old Blu-ray. Textures really pop this time around and fine detail in the intricate set design is revealed for the first time since the movie’s theatrical release. Also, film grain exhibits a fine consistency that compliments and adds a film-like quality to this presentation. Wow – and very impressive!

As with Batman, Batman Returns gets a new Dolby Atmos soundtrack. There isn’t much to add here, except to say that it is as perfectly rendered as the image and will surely not disappoint. The only extra on the 4K disc is an audio commentary previously recorded for the Blu-ray. This is ported over on the Blu-ray edition (also included) and also, all of the extras that were a part of the old Blu-ray release. So, yes to The Bat, the Cat, and the Penguin, Shadows of the Bat: The Cinematic Saga of the Dark Knight Pt. 4 - Dark Side of the Knight, Batman Returns: The Heroes and The Villains, as well as independent video profiles on all of the principals, plus 6 additional featurettes covering all aspects of the production, a music video and theatrical trailer. So, you are losing nothing here. Bottom line: while Batman Returns has never looked better on home video, it’s still not a great movie – superhero or otherwise. The 4K Blu-ray is perfection. The movie – far less. So, judge and buy accordingly.

FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)

2.5

VIDEO/AUDIO

5+

EXTRAS

5+