Holy Crapola, Batman! This Movie Stinks!

I might have mentioned a time or two before, Gentle Reader, that I've been a fan of the Bat since I was two or three. No, really--that long. I have photographic proof. See for yourself:

Of course, in the mid-1970s, a person couldn't run down to Blockbuster and pick up a copy of more than half a dozen different Batman movies any 'ol time you wanted. My education and experience with the Bat came from that craptastic campy '60s show from ABC that, I'm assuming, was shown in syndication on one of the local broadcast stations. I'm sorry to admit that I've never asked Mum or Dad how we watched the show, if that is indeed how I was first exposed to Batman and Robin, for I don't have any memories of watching the show when I was very young. I do recall it airing on a UHF channel when I was in the first grade or so, but I must have watched it as a toddler, for how else could I have become so enamored of it that I was gifted with Batman and Robin Mego dolls (for Christmas) and Batman coloring books and reading books?

Enough tripping down Bat-memory lane, right?

Wrong!

Flash forward 31 and a half years approximately. While browsing the TV viewing guide for episodes of Monk to record to the DVR for later viewing, I happened to spy a listing for the 1966 Batman movie on AMC. (Yeah, I know--what happened to American Movie Classics? Is Wolf with Jack Nicholson or, ::shudder::, Catwoman with Halle Berry really a classic movie? Well, what happened, I think, is Turner Classic Movies. Doesn't Ted own the rights to a motherload of old movies and yanked their rights to show on a channel of his own?) Since I'd only ever seen bits and pieces of that '66 release (most memorably while at the roller rink in Ada while attending a camp for gifted and talented middle schoolers back in 1989, the fine year that brought us the Batman with Michael Keaton) and since I thought perhaps the boy might find it enjoyable as he's been on a Justice League kick for the last week or so (yes, it's a miraculous break from all things Star Wars), I figured why not add the movie to the 'ol DVR for a time when...well, when I have two and a half hours to kill?

Yes, It Really Is That Campy
Within the first 20 or so minutes of the movie, Robin has lowered Batman, in all his satin shorts glory, into the ocean off the coast of Gotham City as he was climbing down the Bat-Ladder attached to the Bat-Helicopter (or was it a Bat-Chopper? I don't remember the label--and by the FSM, the Bat Boys loved to label their stuff more than Martha Stewart!), where he has been attacked by a man-eating shark. A very tenacious man-eating shark that kept its grip on Batman's gray tights-clad leg even as Batman, clinging to the Bat-Ladder, was being lifted several feet above the water as the Bat-Helicoper climbed higher.

Oh wait, Gentle Reader. It gets better.

Robin must abandon temporarily his piloting duties to climb down the ladder to deliver unto Batman the can of shark repellent Bat-Spray. And thank the FSM Robin grabbed the right can! Batman really would have been up a creek without a paddle had Robin accidentally grabbed the can of manta ray repellent Bat-Spray or one of the other five cans of Bat-Spray to repel other marine life. But to top it off, Robin delivers the can while hanging upside-down from one of the Bat-Ladder's rungs. Good use of those circus trapeze act skills, Boy Wonder!

The shark explodes, by the way. Sorry if I ruin that for you.

The shark isn't the only marine life that gets it in a gruesome way in this flick. A porpoise takes a torpedo for the Dynamic Duo not too long after the shark becomes sashimi. Thank goodness PETA wasn't around back then.

I do have to take issue, though, with Batman's portrayal--or at least his prowess as a detective. Specifically, are we really supposed to believe that the World's Greatest Detective can't tell right away that the Soviet reporter he's attempting to seduce is Catwoman, another would-be seductee, in disguise? The leopard-print outfit she wears at the press conference in Commissioner Gordon's office when she makes her first appearance isn't a dead giveaway? Nevermind that Ms. KitKat (or whatever her nickname was) keeps saying "Purrrfectly" the exact same way Catwoman does.

Admittedly, the eyebrows might throw him....

Now I realize that men are sometimes prone to thinking with other body parts besides their brains, but really, I think Batman is typically above such things. That's why the whole Batman-Catwoman thing has been going on frickin' forever in the comics--Batdude doesn't think with his prick, therefore Catwoman doesn't get very far.

(Although admittedly in her own comics, she had bedded him a few times. And in his comics, we've seen her traipsing around the cave in one of his silk robes, I think. But that's just sex. It's nothing lasting.)

Rating the Batmen
In the 80 years Batman's been around--yes, the Bat will officially be an octogenarian this May--a good number of actors (professional and otherwise) have portrayed him on some sort of screen. In a post last summer about the joys of watching Batman Begins while running at the gym, I noted that I find Christian Bale pretty easy on the eyes. I suppose Clooney has a number of fans, and of the bits and pieces of whichever Batman movie he was in that I've seen, I'll agree that he's not hideous. Val Kilmer? Yeah, he had his day. Michael Keaton? Eh, not so much. I can't say much about whoever played Batman in either serial from the 40s.

That leaves (if I haven't forgotten anyone) Adam West. The memories I have of him from childhood don't leave a very positive impression on me--hammy acting, bad '60s-era clothes, awful '60s-era hair. So imagine my surprise when I find that when he's sporting a tux as Bruce Wayne, West isn't that awful to look at. Not that I find him incredibly attractive--far from it--but he's not the awkward, ugly presence I remember. And somehow after seeing that bit, I find it plausible--although very dubious--that he was once asked to play James Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service*, as West has claimed, but turned down the role on his belief that someone British ought to play the part.

As for poor Burt Ward, all I can say is this: Holy comb-over, Batman! Of course, the boy kept asking why Robin wasn't wearing any pants.

Indeed, poor Burt Ward.

*This is according to the Wiki entry for the '60s Batman TV series. In its entry for Adam West, the offer of the Bond role is for the movie Diamonds Are Forever. A mistake on Wiki editors' part, or can West not keep his story straight?

Cinematic Pay-off
Of course, what the '60s-era Batman franchise is remembered best for is the animated onomatopoeia added to the fight scenes in postproduction. Trippy fun, right?

Oh, in a bad movie filled with hammy acting, satin shorts and capes, foam rubber and Cesar Romero's pancake makeup-painted mustache, that final battle atop Penguin's surfaced submarine was made all the sweeter with its onomatopoeia! And the boy loved it--once, of course, Mommy and Daddy explained why those words were appearing on the TV.

All in all, getting to see the 1966 Batman movie in its entirety was not a total waste of two and a half hours of my life on a Sunday. I got some knitting done while I was watching, and we took advantage of commercials breaks to get the laundry done. We even saved the recording on the DVR in case the boy ever wants to see the flick from the beginning (he came in about halfway through). Or if I need to revisit those shots of West in a tux to check if I really have lost my tastes.