Batman (DVD ) 1998

Very happy

Habituellement je ne suis par le plus grand fan de Tim Burton, mais je dois avouer que son film m’a énormément plu. Belle atmosphère, sombre, voire gothique.

Director Tim Burton turns in a hit for the second year in a row (following 1988's Beetlejuice)and gets everything right, from the casting to the writing to the dark direction this film takes from the very start. There is no campiness of the 1960's TV series to be found here, it's action packed and stays truer to the original comic books, and that is a good thing. The movie stars Michael Keaton, who makes an excellent Batman despite his rise to fame as a comedic actor and Jack Nicholson who holds nothing back in his fantastic performance as the Joker. Even the minor characters are very well cast and have done a terriffic job of bringing these characters to life.The sets are amazing as well. Furthmore, the tranfer on this Blu ray is nothing short of excellent, the picture quality is very crisp and clear and the audio is equally as impressive. This release also has an amazing array of extras, one being a three part presentation on the making of the movie starting from the very beginning of development all the way through to the Hollywood premiere. There is also a feature on the characters including Batman, Joker, Vicki Vale, etc which contains interviews with the actors who played them, plus many more extras. A top notch movie for sure, if you haven't seen it, you need to. You will NOT be disappointed.

One newspaper review back in 1989 said "believe the hype". I did. It worked. This is easily the best version of Batman ever seen. The one true purity in this magnificent film has to be Michael Keaton as Bruce Wayne/Batman. His dark, sub-surface insanity of a man, whose life was broken by seeing his parents murdered in front of him, set his life on a path of a highly dark alter-ego, will never truly be matched. Keaton's role in this film is unbelievable, basically because he's not a huge 6ft tall muscleman, but rather an ordinary guy with unlimited resources and harbouring an incredible secret. Keaton's work on Beetlejuice, Mr Mom and Pacific Heights, displays all too well that he's a highly creative and very unconventional actor, and also supremely talented. Batman needs to have an actor with a deep undercurrent. Michael Keaton has this quality 100%. Tim Burton's vision on this film lends a hugely enjoyable gothic, retro & anti-modern feel to it. Many scenes are almost as if they are from a time long passed. Danny Elfman's score is a masterwork, combining huge heroic theatrical pieces, woven with gentle intimate scores, and very dark, brooding undertones. The cathedral fight scene at the end, shows that Batman is not superhuman, is not all-conquering and all knowing, but rather just as a skilled man in a black bat-suit, trying to save his woman, and also hell-bent on revenge to the man who destroyed his childhood. His emergence from the wreckage, with his jaw covered in blood, sets this film apart from a typical comicbook hero movie. This is how Batman was meant to be seen. Dark, dangerous, and almost apparition-like. Kim Basinger provides an interesting lighter side to Wayne's darkest thoughts, and Jack Nicholson is outrageously insane as the demented Jack Napier/Joker, along with some classic one-liners such as "This town needs an enema" and "It can be truly said, that I have a bat in my belfry". Michael Gough was also very sensitive and a true gentleman as Wayne's butler, Alfred. It should also be remembered that this film came from a time when there was no CGI. All action was either live full size combined with miniatures and very detailed modelwork effects. It's totally obvious to say that absolutely NO Batman collection is complete without the one true version, which kick-started the franchise back into life. Production Design by the late Anton Furst was a masterpiece of creativity and innovation. It's no surprise that this film silenced the critics who ridiculed Keaton's casting as Batman, and blew all competition out of the water. Glad I was there to see this one back in '89. Buy it!

The quality of this 4K upgrade is stunning. The frame rate is smooth and the fidelity of the film is a joy to see. A truly marvellous job. As for the film itself, it’s a nothing too taxing (you won’t find a Scorsese-esque level of cinema here), but it’s so much fun to watch, which I would argue makes it a better experience than an Oscar-winning three/four hour epic. It’s always a treat to watch Keaton’s turn as the Caped Crusader, and Nicholson’s Joker provides great laughs. In conclusion: a brilliant upgrade for an already brilliant film