'80s Movie Montage
Breaking down our favorite decade of flicks. Hosted by Anna Keizer and Derek Dehanke.
'80s Movie Montage
Batman
With special guest "Velvet Tom" Farnan, Anna and Derek discuss Tim Burton's 1989 Batman, as well as its impact on the many other iterations of the Dark Knight that followed.
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Anna Keizer and Derek Dehanke are the co-hosts of ‘80s Movie Montage. The idea for the podcast came when they realized just how much they talk – a lot – when watching films from their favorite cinematic era. Their wedding theme was “a light nod to the ‘80s,” so there’s that, too. Both hail from the Midwest but have called Los Angeles home for several years now. Anna is a writer who received her B.A. in Film/Video from Columbia College Chicago and M.A. in Film Studies from Chapman University. Her dark comedy short She Had It Coming was an Official Selection of 25 film festivals with several awards won for it among them. Derek is an attorney who also likes movies. It is a point of pride that most of their podcast episodes are longer than the movies they cover.
Tom Farnan is an actor and comedian best known for appearing in commercials. In between moments of inspiration, he’s a house husband, cat dad and jazz singer.
I want you to do it. I want you to tell all your friends about me.
SPEAKER_01:I'm Batman.
SPEAKER_02:Hello and welcome to 80s Movie Montage. I'm Derek.
SPEAKER_04:And I'm Anna.
SPEAKER_02:And we're here to tell all our friends about Batman. Because that's what the guy like Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Total total I I'm picking up what you're putting down.
SPEAKER_02:Perfect.
SPEAKER_04:Yes. Uh this episode is indeed 1989's Batman.
SPEAKER_02:It's necessary to be very specific. It is. And you can't just say, today we're talking about Batman.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. I mean, that can mean like 137 different kinds of Batmans.
SPEAKER_02:So And throughout the course of this episode, we'll probably only cover about 80 of those.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. I mean, to be fair with our special guest that we'll have on later on, we definitely, I think, covered all of our uh tracks with kind of going bouncing back and forth. I mean, obviously we focused on the 89 Batman, but I was thinking about this kind of after the fact. It's really hard at this point to just stay so narrowly focused on that film when there is this world, multiple kinds of worlds of Batman's that have come out since.
SPEAKER_02:There was before, but that 1980 89 version of the film and of Batman really like reignited interest and it it like broadened that interest and and got way more people into it, myself included, that before hadn't really been like as much of a comic book person. Same, you know.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, I we we actually have lots of friends that are like really big into comic books, that was never really my thing.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:But I do think that uh one of the things that this film does really well is, and we'll we'll jump into all of it, but I do think that for somebody like me who was never a comic book person and only really knew the name of Batman, the name of Joker, that kind of thing, you can get a lot out of the film. You don't necessarily have to understand what is supposed to be the background behind all of it. So all right. We got a lot of people to cover in this movie, so I'm gonna just jump right in. Okay, so we just talked about Batman, the world, the Batman comic books. Well, behind all of that is a gentleman by the name of Bob Kane. Although, again, unbeknownst to me, our special guest uh later on brought up that perhaps Bob Kane wasn't exactly the person behind the Batman character, that he maybe uh took some of that from someone else.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, we'll definitely talk about that a little bit more, but perhaps instead of creator, it should say also involved with the creation of for all intents and purposes.
SPEAKER_04:I'm I'm going off of you know the individuals who are currently credited for their role in this film. So Bob Kane wasn't per se involved with the film, but he was the creator behind all these different characters, um, besides Batman, Batwoman, Catwoman, Mr. Freeze, Joker, Penguin, Pennyworth, Robin, Scarecrow, Two Face, Vicky Vale, and then the parents, Martha and Thomas Wayne.
SPEAKER_01:So Martha. Why'd you say Martha?
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, man, we can have a whole conversation about that too. Um, but because this is the individual behind all these characters, he has like crazy credits on IMDB because there have been so many different iterations of these stories. And so he has like, it's crazy to look at his page. So it starts with Bob Kane, or at least right now he is the person credited. Moving on. So one of the individuals um who's credited both with like a story by and screenplay credit is a gentleman by the name of Sam Ham.
SPEAKER_01:Sam Ham.
SPEAKER_04:Sam Ham.
SPEAKER_01:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_04:He has uh not an extensive resume as far as a screenwriter goes, but one thing that I thought was fascinating was that in addition to both Batman and his story by credit for Batman Returns. Have you ever heard of a film called Never Cry Wolf?
SPEAKER_02:I I've never heard of a film. I don't think I have. I mean, I've heard of the phrase. Right.
SPEAKER_04:But so totally random sidebar, but I remember when I was a little tot, my dad having me watch this movie, and it was like one of those where it's like, you know, decades down the road, you're like, why in the world would you have a child watch this movie? Not because it was like particularly like violent, or you know, there's I re I don't recall any sex scenes to speak of. I have not watched the film since I was a child, but it's basically about this guy who like goes out in the wild and like tries to just like survive, and he it it's it's kind of like um the movie in the wild, yeah, before it. So um he is the screenwriter behind that movie, which I thought was just very odd. All right. Um, and then another one of his credits is uh Mantis, the like acronym Mantis. So I believe it was like a TV show.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. It sounds it sounds familiar. I don't know why it does. Maybe just because I'm aware that there are a whole range of insects also called Mantis.
SPEAKER_04:That is correct. So uh another gentleman who's credited, his name is Warren Scarin, and he has a couple interesting credits. Um, two of them are Beverly Hills Cop 2 and Beetlejuice.
SPEAKER_01:Nice.
SPEAKER_04:And then what I thought was interesting is that he has an uncredited credit for Top Gun.
SPEAKER_02:An uncredited credit.
SPEAKER_04:We've seen this a couple times now, where their name is underneath a particular movie, but then in parentheses it says uncredited.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_04:And my guess is because I kind of was like, well, what's his deal with this movie? And so he also was an associate producer on Top Gun. So my guess is that as producer, he made a couple suggestions pertaining to story, and so he has kind of this like unofficial credit.
SPEAKER_02:He was like, we should make it about planes.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02:Give that guy credit.
SPEAKER_04:So those are the individuals behind the story of this film and the screenplay of this film. One thing I'm really excited about is that this is the first time we get to talk about Tim Burton.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Who directed Batman.
SPEAKER_02:It won't be the last.
SPEAKER_04:Will not be the last, although the he really gets into his own in the 90s. So unfortunately, we're missing out on some of like the great, great films that he had in the 90s.
SPEAKER_02:But you heard it here first. Look forward to 90s movie montage.
SPEAKER_04:But you're correct. Like he does have a couple other 80s flicks that for sure at some point will come up for us.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Um, so I mean, again, like huge, big time director, still working. Uh, but among some of his earlier credits, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. So that will probably come up. Beetlejuice is actually coming up later this year. So that will be fun. We'll be covering that one soon. And then some of the ones that like I love Edward Scissor Hands. Adore that movie. Um, also was the dude behind Batman Returns, as I've mentioned before, actually my favorite of these two Tim Burton Batman movies. Uh Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Planet of the Apes, Big Fish, Corpse Bride, Alice in Wonderland, Frankie, Franken Weenie, Dumbo, the one that just came out.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:And then I did notice on his IMDB a Beetlejuice 2 has been announced.
SPEAKER_01:What?
SPEAKER_04:We'll see if anything actually comes of that. But yeah, so a dude that has like a really extensive resume, and also he's somebody where I feel like uh you know when you're watching a Tim Burton film.
SPEAKER_02:You do. I mean, chances are you'll see Helena Bottom Carter in the movie, and that'll be your first your first clue.
SPEAKER_04:You really love picking on her being in his films when really like you could say the same for a number of actors, but primarily Johnny Depp.
SPEAKER_02:I was convinced for years that Tim Burton had made all of the Harry Potter movies just because of her character. But no, it was like a thing that started that just like it became almost a parody of itself where like every successive movie he put out, she was just and she's great. She's fantastic, there's nothing wrong with it. I'm just saying that's how I know.
SPEAKER_04:I don't know if it's still so and I I hate to dive too deeply into like the personal lives of all these individuals in the films, but they did have a relationship for a while. I don't know if it's still current or whatever, that's none of our business. But like that, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:She is not a 1989 Batman.
SPEAKER_04:She is not. So Tim Burton, love him. Another guy who I adore, and much like uh, and our special guest brings this up, much like Spielberg and John Williams. This is an individual. Do you know who I'm talking about?
SPEAKER_01:Danny Elfman. There you go. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:So Danny Elfman is the gentleman behind the score of this film. And yeah, so he and Burton have a very long working relationship. He's pretty much called on to every film that Burton does, but he does his own stuff too. He's not, he's not just strictly working with Burton. I mean, he was on Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, but he was uh the guy behind Back to School.
SPEAKER_02:He's he's in that movie. Oh, is he? Boingo Boingo is is featured in the movie. We'll get to that.
SPEAKER_04:We'll get to that, and it's gonna be your pick.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Um, but back to school, also summer school.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:So there's that. Beetlejuice, of course, big top Pee-wee.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, not the first one?
SPEAKER_04:No, he was in Pee Wee's Big Adventures. Or was the guy.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, both of them.
SPEAKER_04:Um, so Scrooged.
SPEAKER_02:Alright.
SPEAKER_04:Dick Tracy, and then we're getting into coming back to some of Tim Burton's films. So Edward Sitzer Hands, Batman Returns, The Nightmare Before Christmas. Adore that movie and his contributions to it. I mean, that movie would just not not be what it is without Danny Elfman.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Uh Mission Impossible, the first one.
SPEAKER_02:I can kind of hear that. Now now that you say it, if I if I kind of like replay portions of that movie in my mind, I can kind of hear his his influence. I think I feel the same way about like this this version of Batman, the score that he created and that theme for Batman. Like when I think of Batman, I think of that almost no matter what version of Batman I'm I'm thinking about now.
SPEAKER_01:I agree.
SPEAKER_02:You know, it's it's like the uh the theme for Superman.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:That they tried to carry over. Yes, you know, they didn't even try that with this one with the Nolan movies. I don't think it would have worked. But no. Yeah, I mean that score just kind of like knocks you in the ass as soon as the movie starts. Like that first opening scene. It knocks you in the ass, which it's not comfortable, but it sets you up for a whole experience.
SPEAKER_04:You know what? People interpret film in all different ways. So if it kicks you in the ass, I'm gonna assume that's a good thing.
SPEAKER_02:It doesn't kick me in the ass, it knocks me in the ass. Oh, sorry, knocks you in the ass.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, let's let's let's move on. Let's just keep going. So also another one of we've brought this movie up before. Um, The Frighteners. Oh yeah. Adore that movie. Also, Goodwill Hunting. Okay. I mean, this guy, it's it's an interesting thing. And and this happens also, I think, with Burton, although maybe to a little bit of a lesser degree. I think that a lot of people, you know, you say, oh, well, you know, when you're watching, I just said it. You know, when you're watching a Tim Burton film, or you know when you're listening to a Danny Alfman score. I think that there is a certain element for both of those uh creative individuals where that's absolutely true. But they can absolutely branch out and and do more than what we all kind of think of when we think of those two individuals. And so that for me is one of those moments like Goodwill Hunting.
SPEAKER_02:Even John Williams has he scored some movies where you think, oh, I I wouldn't have thought that that he's done this. You know, he has that sound that you kind of recognize in a lot of the blockbuster movies. And the same kind of goes for Danny Elfman, where for the blockbusters you kind of hear some of the influences, but uh sure. I mean, yeah Goodwill hunting, I probably wouldn't notice it unless you had told me.
SPEAKER_04:Well, and and my apologies because like he is the guy that I I just couldn't stop myself from writing down all these different credits of his because it's just it they're all really just fantastic examples. I mean, we go back to again some Burton films, Sleepy Hollow, Planet of the Apes, the 2002 Spider-Man.
SPEAKER_02:Which one was that? Was that the like the first Toby Maguire? Okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Uh Big Fish, Corpse Bride, Nacho Libre.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, that's that's interesting. I didn't know that. Corpse Bride was uh Tim Burton. Correct. Uh Nacho Libre was not. No, I don't think. No. No, no.
SPEAKER_04:And what's funny is it's like he goes from a film like Nacho Libre to then a film like Milk with Sean Penn. I mean, talk about range.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, it's almost like a spiritual successor to Nacho Libre.
SPEAKER_04:And then just to wrap things up, there's several more I wanted to mention Alice in Wonderland, Silverlining's Playbook. Okay. Again, Frank and Weenie, American Hustle, Avengers Age of Ultron.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, really? Yeah. That's interesting.
SPEAKER_04:And then Dumbo.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:So he has a lot more credits, but I did my best to try to try to condense them down a little bit. Um, so as far as who shot this film, is this gentleman by the name of Roger Pratt. And he has like some pretty cool credits as well. The movie Brazil, The Fisher King. Oh, do you like Brazil?
SPEAKER_02:I'm aware of it.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Got it.
SPEAKER_02:Which is why I'm like, oh. Oh.
SPEAKER_04:The Fisher King, Shadowlands, Twelve Monkeys.
SPEAKER_02:It's a pretty good movie. I haven't seen the series.
SPEAKER_04:I haven't either. Yeah. The movie's great. Uh 12 Monkeys, and then he goes from 12 monkeys to 102 Dalmatians. So another dude with range. Shakala. I always will say that movie if I get a chance to, because I just like saying that way. He's on a couple Harry Potters. So he was uh the guy who shot Chamber of Secrets and Goblet of Fire.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. And then, you know, I know we have uh conflicted feelings about these kinds of movies, but he was the guy who shot the 2010 Karate Kid.
SPEAKER_02:Uh there's no conflict. I just don't care for it.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Fair enough.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, yeah, I I've heard that people have enjoyed it. It's fine.
SPEAKER_04:We've heard it's a movie.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, as we went over with our last guest. Right. There's there's one karate kid, and then there's this other movie that also has that name.
SPEAKER_04:If it appeals to another generation, awesome.
SPEAKER_02:At least it wasn't a poltergeist remake.
SPEAKER_04:That's right. Okay. So as far as uh the editor behind this movie, the guy who cut it, a gentleman by the name of Ray Lovejoy.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04:He has some, again, I mean, I feel very redundant saying this, but some really interesting credits. So he cut um 2001, A Space Odyssey.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. Right?
SPEAKER_04:I mean, it's like, okay, well, that's maybe all we need to say.
SPEAKER_02:That probably took a minute to do.
SPEAKER_04:Took a minute. The Shining.
SPEAKER_02:Alright.
SPEAKER_04:Aliens.
SPEAKER_02:Both of those were Kubrick, right? Yes, cracks. Okay.
SPEAKER_04:So it looks like he probably had a little bit of a relationship with him. Uh, Aliens. Alright. Like, literally, we just watched that last week. We did, yeah. Okay, so I don't know if you know this movie, but I had to bring it up because okay, a far-off place. Have you ever heard of this movie?
SPEAKER_02:I've heard of a far-off place.
SPEAKER_04:Reese Witherspoons in it. A much younger Reese Witherspoon. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like a teenage. Like, I I remember the title, but I don't know if I've ever even seen it.
SPEAKER_04:It's her and Ethan Embry, who it's it's anyway, it's this like uh they trek across like the desert, and anyway, I was young, loved it. I like watched that. It was like one of those movies where like something about it was just like, yeah. And I saw it several times in the theater, and I just loved that movie, and he he edited that movie.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I know what I was thinking of. I was thinking of the one with uh Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, you're thinking Far and Away.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Very different movie.
SPEAKER_02:Uh well, anyway, maybe I'll I'll uh like I don't think Reese Weatherspoon was in that too. She was not in that movie. Was she Irish in that too?
SPEAKER_04:No, no, no, no. Um it is a good movie, though. It's great. That's Ron Howard. Uh in any case, I'll make you watch a far-off place at some point in the future.
SPEAKER_02:Alright, I mean, that's fair because we're gonna watch Transformers the movie at some point.
SPEAKER_04:So Yeah, that's more than fair. And then Inventing the Abbots, which was another movie that I once upon a time loved. Um, okay, so we don't usually bring up these individuals, but I thought that given the type of movie that this is, we really should. And actually, I don't know if you were aware that this film this film did win an Oscar.
SPEAKER_02:Hmm.
SPEAKER_04:Can you guess what it might have been for?
SPEAKER_02:Oh man. No, I can't. I I I could it's it wasn't for a best picture, it wasn't for score, it was makeup.
SPEAKER_04:You're getting closer. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I was thinking makeup mainly because of Nicholson as the Joker, but totally.
SPEAKER_04:No, that's a very reasonable guess. Uh Best Art Direction. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense.
SPEAKER_01:That makes sense.
SPEAKER_04:And it also happens to be the first comic book film to have won, well, to have won a competitive Oscar, period.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And then that Oscar was for Best Art Direction. So I want to bring up some of the individuals who, you know, when we're talking about art direction, essentially in like the most simplistic terms, we're talking about the look of the film.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And it has a very distinct look. And so the gentleman who did the production design. So the two men who shared this Oscar were uh individuals by the names of Anton First and Peter Young. And so Anton First, he did the production design, a couple of his credits, full metal jacket and awakenings.
SPEAKER_03:All right.
SPEAKER_04:He uh, you know, not to go to this place, but I I feel like he could have probably done a lot more, but unfortunately he died very young at his own hand. Um so he he didn't get to do all that. Um then the other individual, Peter Young, he did set direction, uh decoration, pardon me. And among some of his other credits, and this will give you hopefully everybody who's listening a better idea of like what we're talking about and why these types of creatives are so important in establishing the look of a film. So here are some of his credits Superman 2 and 3 and 4, okay, The Dark Crystal, wow, Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, Sleepy Hollow, and Troy.
SPEAKER_02:Oh. So not- Yeah, I mean, when I think of those films, they all have like a really like like specific kind of like you identify this like look and feel with those, especially something like from the Dark Crystal to Troy, like they all had such a unique look to them.
SPEAKER_04:Exactly. And I mean, look, this is not at all to be disparaging to individuals who work in this regard on other films that maybe you don't immediately get hit over the head with like the look of the world because a lot of the times it's like something normal.
SPEAKER_02:That's an art in and of itself, isn't it? Exactly. No, absolutely like sometimes their job is to make you not notice a thing.
SPEAKER_04:Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So so it's not at all to disparage individuals who are really, really good at like, I don't know what you would say, like maybe a naturalistic kind of look. But for films where like it it is a world all into its own.
SPEAKER_02:It's so stylized. Exactly. 1989's Batman is is so stylized. They really put so much effort into making it feel like a comic was coming to life. Like they weren't at that time interested in making it quite as gritty as Nolan, but they certainly wanted to move it in a direction away from the traditional Adam West, like over-the-top cartoon Batman.
SPEAKER_04:And good call on their part. So, lastly, the person I want to bring up, um, we don't normally speak of the individuals in this category either, but costume design, which very much needs to be brought up for this type of film, I think.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Um, so gentleman by the name of Bob Ringwood.
SPEAKER_02:Was he the one responsible for getting all of Joker's henchmen those uh jackets with the Joker walls? Yeah, I'd say so. Perfect. He did a great job.
SPEAKER_04:He did a great job. So some of his credits, Dune, Empire of the Sun, Alien Three. He also was on Batman Returns and Batman Forever, and then he did another Alien, Alien Resurrection.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, Alien Three was basically like, what should we do for the uh costumes? Uh let's do rags. Okay.
SPEAKER_04:But it is a look. It is. It is a look. Um, and then he also a couple credits, AI, artificial intelligence, and he also was on Troy.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:So, and then there's a gentleman by the name of Tony Dunstraville, but he is uncredited. Yeah, you knew that was coming.
SPEAKER_02:Uncredited, but uncredited.
SPEAKER_04:And it's his only costume design credit, so I don't really understand what happened there that he has this like uncredit credit, but in the case.
SPEAKER_02:I think he worked on the ears on the batman.
SPEAKER_04:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Yeah. I think that's he did a little tweak. All right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Cool. So now we're gonna move into this a like amazing cast of individuals who are in this movie. Starting with, even though he's actually not the first person credited in the movie, Michael Keaton.
SPEAKER_02:He's not?
SPEAKER_04:No, who I mean at that time, actually, even in in 2020, I would say that it probably would happen that Jack Nicholson would be first credit. I mean, that makes sense, yeah. Anything.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:There'd be I'm trying to I'm trying to think of who could top Jack Nicholson in credits.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, that's an awkward silence, but we just so so you guys ponder that.
SPEAKER_04:Maybe that's our uh our call to action. Who would you say could top Jack Nicholson? In any case.
SPEAKER_02:In any case, in 1989, the answer would be probably no one.
SPEAKER_04:No one. Yeah. Yeah. So, but I am going to start with Keaton. I mean, he he is Batman, uh, also Bruce Wayne. So he has his duality.
SPEAKER_03:Spoilers.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, I I love this actor, and and I love in particular some of his earlier work, like Mr. Mom, hello. Yeah. Love that movie. We'll be covering it for sure. Also in Beetlejuice.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Also, Batman Returns.
SPEAKER_02:Spider-Man Homecoming.
SPEAKER_04:Yes. You're getting a little bit ahead of me, but but but you know what? It's interesting that you bring that up because you know, look, this happens for like lots of people. It's it's really just like kind of part of the industry. It's not to say that he wasn't working, but he did kind of go through what maybe some people would call a little bit of a lull in his career. And and then let me I think during that time, I mean he still was like a big star, but like speechless, multiplicity, Jackie Brown, Jack Frost.
SPEAKER_02:Um yeah, he was great in uh Jackie Brown, and then Jack Frost happened, and I mean it has an audience.
SPEAKER_04:Um but then uh the film Birdman or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance, so that in a big way brought him back. Kind of like John Travolta's hall. No, exactly in Pulp Fiction.
SPEAKER_02:He went through a Travolta lull and then came back from that, and now he's in a lot of stuff, and that gets us kind of to where he's been homecoming. Yeah, the vulture, I think, was his character. And and he again was playing this character with two different roles. I mean, he was kind of the villain.
SPEAKER_04:It's kind of like a little bit of a wink to like an ultra ego-ish kind of I mean, he's playing another, like not not superhero, but super villain.
SPEAKER_02:It's a different movie. A lot of time had passed. I would argue that his performance in Homecoming is actually a lot better than in Batman.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and I mean we really go into that with our guest in terms of like what this character of Batman slash Bruce Wayne was maybe intended to be and how and what his take was on that. It's a really interesting conversation.
SPEAKER_02:But at the time, he was great. Like it was it was a really like unique kind of thing to see an actor like Michael Keaton in this role as Batman.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, absolutely. Uh also another really great film, Spotlight.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thought about that.
SPEAKER_02:I for I forgot about that. Then I thought about it, then I forgot again.
SPEAKER_04:Also, we talk about this with Tom, our special guest, the founder. So that's the one where he plays uh son of a bitch. Yeah. If if you so for you guys out there, if you uh haven't seen this film, it's basically about the beginnings of McDonald's and how uh Ray Croc, who everybody thinks of as the founder of McDonald's, really wasn't. Um, and it's a really interesting film. He he does a great job in that movie playing that that individual. So and then also he was in Dumbo. So interesting. Okay, getting back to the dude that we were just talking about.
SPEAKER_02:The dude.
SPEAKER_04:Well, he's not the I'm not talking about Jeff Bridges, but um Jack Nicholson. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he plays the Joker slash Jack Napier, which was made up for the purposes of this film. There is no Jack Napier to speak of, as far as I know in the comic books, because as we talk with our guests, like part of what the Joker's allure was is that you just didn't really know anything about his background.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I think you kind of know what he tells you. At least that's one uh theory or one set of uh potential theories that I found when I was looking a little bit into like because obviously the the origin story is so different in in this version of Batman versus Joaquin Phoenix and the Joker. So I was curious about that. We talk about that a little bit more, and I think there are just it's one of those strange characters where yeah, there are different origin stories, and they're all kind of equally valid, except for the Suicide Squad Joker, which we're just not gonna talk about.
SPEAKER_04:Fair enough. We have plenty to talk about, so it's cool. Uh so Jack Nicholson, um I mean it's kind of amazing that we're talking. I mean, one of the most accomplished actors of all time. I believe he still holds the record for the most Oscars for a man to have won um among the ad award ceremony. And there's really obvious reasons why. I mean, this is the guy who was in movies like Easy Rider. That was, he had already been working for like a well over a decade at that point, but this was really, I think, kind of his breakout role. Um, so easy writer, five easy pieces, Chinatown. One flew over the cuckoo's nest, the Missouri Breaks, the shining, Reds. And then there's like kind of an interesting turn.
SPEAKER_02:Mars attacks.
SPEAKER_04:Right. You again, um in between, in between uh Reds and Mars Attacks, he has an interesting turn of his career where all of a sudden he starts doing kind of these like dramedies. Yeah. Uh in the he was like really big into these dramedies in the 80s. So he did Terms of Endearment, Pritzy's Honor, Heartburn, The Witches of Eastwick. And then we kind of swing back a little bit. I mean, again, that's kind of at the tail end, um, Mars Attacks is at the tail end of those films. And then, you know, one of my absolutely favorite movies that he's in, A Few Good Men.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Curl Jessup.
SPEAKER_04:Oh. Just I'm I'm captivated every time he's he's on the on the screen in that movie. Uh As Good As It Gets, I love him in that film as well.
SPEAKER_02:It's uh it's exhausting watching that movie, but it's good, and he's great in it.
SPEAKER_04:He's great. I mean, um, one of the few times where Best Actor and Best Actress won for a film, and that is one of those circumstances. Helen Hunt won for best actress.
SPEAKER_02:I would say that Anger Management is just an infuriating movie to try to watch.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Um, I didn't even put that on the list to be honest. I apologize for putting it on the list. No, it's okay. Um, but about Schmidt and And then honestly, one of his first or first, one of his last big roles, because he's essentially retired at this point. He hasn't worked in about 15 years. Um The Departed. Actually, I think it's been about closer to 10 years.
SPEAKER_02:He's just uh enjoying the Lakers.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I mean, he's he's done all right. He's he deserves some time off if he wants it. So that is Mr. Jack Nicholson. Okay. Moving on to the love interest in this movie, Vicky Vale, played by Kim Basinger. So she too has had kind of an interesting career a little bit echoing. Uh Michael Keaton.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, not Jack Nicholson. Um but uh so you know, she started. Well, again, she had some roles under her belt at this point, but she she was a Bond girl. Never say never again.
SPEAKER_03:Yep.
SPEAKER_04:So she had that. She was in the natural. I know you like that movie. We'll probably be covered at some point.
SPEAKER_02:I do like that movie. It's a weird movie. It's yeah. If we do if we do cover that, we'll talk about just how weird that movie is. Cool. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Looking forward to it. Nine and a half weeks. I remember as a child, like that was like a big deal.
SPEAKER_02:I remember never seeing that.
SPEAKER_04:Oh no, I've never seen it. But um, but like it was like, whoa, that's like really racy. Uh her and Mickey Rourke, I believe, are in that movie. In any case. Uh, Cool World, The Getaway. And then, so she also, I think, kind of went through like maybe a little bit of a lull, although that's not to say she wasn't continuing to work, it just maybe wasn't. As high profile. And then, hello, she wins the Oscar for LA Confidential.
unknown:Alright.
SPEAKER_04:So she came back in a big way too. And then I do remember her as uh Eminem's mother in Eight Mile.
SPEAKER_02:I remember her as someone who starred in a Tom Petty video.
SPEAKER_04:Yes. Which that's interesting because I thought of that immediately towards the end of the movie when Joker's dancing with her and she's just kind of flopping around as he is moving her around. It's like, oh, that's exactly what she does in Mary Jane.
SPEAKER_02:Vicky Vale's Last Dance.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, exactly. Um, and then the nice guys she's in, which need to see that movie. I am hearing kind of things.
SPEAKER_02:I have seen it. It is a good movie. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_04:Is she is she good in it?
SPEAKER_01:I don't remember.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. All right. Well, moving on uh to Robert Wool, who our special guest brings up. And there's good reason why he does. I mean, he is a smaller um plays a smaller role in this film. He is Alexander Knox, the reporter, who is like very adamant that he wants to find out who this Batman is. He's on the trail, and he does a great job in the movie. A couple of his other credits, he's like that guy.
SPEAKER_02:So So he he's his character is is Alexander Knox, right? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And uh he's like one for everybody out there, I think you'll know what I'm talking about when it's like, oh, I don't know who they're talking about. Like that name doesn't sound familiar to me. But as soon as you see him, you'd be like, oh yeah. You'd be like, oh, that's that guy.
SPEAKER_02:Well, you most people would recognize him as from Arlis. I bet.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_02:From the HBO show Arlus.
SPEAKER_04:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Fair. Um, he's also in Good Morning Vietnam. I know him from Bull Durham. He's like the assistant manager.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And then he's also in the bodyguard bodyguard and Cobb are some of his credits.
SPEAKER_02:I think what's interesting is that there's this strange crossover where the character Alexander Knox appears in uh I don't know how many episodes, but on the WB, they they have all their DC comic shows, and a lot of them have these universes that that meet up now. And so he's on an episode of Supergirl, that character, and it's played by the same guy.
SPEAKER_04:Interesting.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so there you go. There's some more crazy crossover stuff.
SPEAKER_04:Very crazy crossover stuff. So moving on to the individual who plays Commissioner Gordon, it is an actor by the name of Pat Hingle. He has had an extensive film career, 200 credits. Um, he's no longer with us, but uh, and his career, I mean, it started so far ahead of Batman. So I just wanted to really quickly kind of like bring up a few of those. He I think it was like his very first credit. He's not credited in it, but yeah, another uncredited credit. But on the waterfront.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, interesting.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, like his first first gig. Also, Splendor in the Grass. That's the one with uh Warren Beatty and Natalie Wood. Yep. Um, I just brought this up because I didn't know if this was just like his name as a human being or as the creature, but he's in something called Nevada Smith where he plays Bigfoot.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, well, I think I'm thinking it's gotta be.
SPEAKER_04:I think he's Bigfoot, yeah. Uh so I thought that was really interesting. He was in Gunsmoke, uh, the TV show. This I thought was really funny. So there was a show called Medical Center. Never heard of it.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, okay.
SPEAKER_04:But he has three credits, three different characters. I think it's hilarious when shows do that. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I I love it when it happens, and I love it when I notice it because like there's this aha.
SPEAKER_04:Right, right. They're like, nobody nobody will notice that you were this other guy last time you were on.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:I feel like most shows probably don't do that anymore, except for like maybe all the Law and Order shows, because they're just running out of actors at this point.
SPEAKER_02:Like they I feel I think he's done that in a couple things. He he looks like he was in a few episodes of Murder She Wrote.
SPEAKER_04:Playing different characters. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So that's just his thing.
SPEAKER_04:That was like his thing. Um also in Norma Ray, The Falcon and the Snowman, Brewster's Millions.
SPEAKER_02:That's a very problematic movie.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I mean, we'll we'll pro it might come up in the show at some point. So um Baby Boom. Okay. I love that movie. And then so he was Commissioner Gordon, not just in this one, but also came back for Batman Returns, Batman Forever, and Batman and Robin. So he was Gordon for all of those. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Who do you got left?
SPEAKER_04:We got a couple we got a couple people. I mean, it is the main cast. And and I feel bad because there's just always gonna be somebody who's inevitably left out.
SPEAKER_02:We're gonna bring up Lando.
SPEAKER_04:That's who I'm bringing up right now. Nice. Nice call. So Billy D. Williams, who plays Harvey Dent. Uh, yes, as Derek just mentioned, most people probably know him as Lando Cal Rizian from the Star Wars series. He is great in that. Um has, you know, other I mean, he has a crazy extensive career. And among some of his other credits, I just had to bring this one up because it's a great name. The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings.
SPEAKER_01:I gotta check that out.
SPEAKER_04:It's a movie.
SPEAKER_01:Sounds sounds pretty good. Right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And then as we mentioned, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Rise of Skywalker. So those are the three films that he comes back for.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Um, he also was on Dynasty, the 80s soap opera prime time type show. He was on that for a while. He was on something called Doubledare. He did he's done a lot in television.
SPEAKER_02:Something called Doubledare? You mean the not the Nickelodeon? No, okay.
SPEAKER_04:No, no, not not that. Okay. Something else called Doubledare.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:Um, yeah, some of his like other TV credits, 18 Wheels of Justice.
SPEAKER_02:How many? 18. All right. Sounds like a trucker type of thing. It does, right? Yeah. 18 Wheels of Justice. That's what it's called.
SPEAKER_04:Um General Hospital Night Shift and General Hospital.
SPEAKER_02:He was on both. It's good to know that General Hospital got a spinoff.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, right. I know. Uh Titan Maximum? Are you familiar? I mean, that is what it is. I'm not just making it up.
SPEAKER_02:Did you say Titan or like Titan?
SPEAKER_04:Titan.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, like you gotta tighten it up to the max?
SPEAKER_04:No, like the creatures who are overthrown by the Greek gods.
SPEAKER_01:No, I don't know that one.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Uh Diary of a Single Mom.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:So he's been working, just not necessarily on stuff that maybe you and I would be familiar with. But then also, I love this. He was Lando in the Lego movie.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And then he was Two Face in the Lego Batman movie.
SPEAKER_02:Which those are all great, by the way. Yeah. The Lego Batman movie is amazing. Um. Yeah. I I I also want to bring up another Star Wars reference. Okay. Since we brought up Lando. Uh Eckhart is the character in this 1989 Batman played by William Hootkins, who is Porkins. Porkins. Porkins from uh Star Wars, and strangely enough, he's also a character in a Superman movie.
SPEAKER_04:Well, you're hello, dude. Do you not remember the film we just covered?
SPEAKER_02:No. He's he's also in Raiders. Oh, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. He's in a ton of stuff.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, every time I see him now, I just think it's Porkins.
SPEAKER_04:It's Porkins. He's a great character actor. Uh kind of always has that like kind of like tough and like like he he's never playing a softy. He's always playing kind of a tough dude. Gruff. Gruff gruff. That's a better word for it. Okay. So wrapping up, but we do have to mention these individuals because again, they bring so much to the film, even in smaller roles. Um, we have Michael I want to say Goff. I I'm probably horribly mis mispronouncing his last name.
SPEAKER_02:It's better than if you said Michael Goo.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I don't think it's Michael Goo. Gow? Michael Gao? Okay. He plays Alfred, Alfred Pennyworth, and um he is a British actor. And just like Pat Hingle, his career precedes Batman by decades. Well, that makes sense because Yeah, he was an older individual once we were acquainted with him.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Um however, kind of like what we were talking about with Raiders, the fact that that movie also had a really large British cast. And so because of that, although these people had really accomplished careers, a lot of it was kind of strictly within like the British film and TV realm. So maybe some of our our listeners wouldn't be as familiar. Um, but among so he has like a huge list of credits, but among things that like I thought maybe our listeners wouldn't be like, oh, okay. Uh he was in the 1948 Anna Karenina. Um, he was in the 1962 Phantom of the Opera.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:He was in the TV series The Count of Monte Cristo, the TV series Pride and Prejudice. This is completely different from all those other credits, but I had to list it. He was in something called Horror Hospital.
SPEAKER_01:That sounds amazing. Right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Like that's something maybe in a couple months, Halloween time. Yeah, I think we need to check that out. He okay, so he was in the TV series Doctor Who.
SPEAKER_02:There are so many different like versions, I feel like, of Doctor Who.
SPEAKER_04:I figure.
SPEAKER_02:It's yeah. I don't I don't know.
SPEAKER_04:I'm not a Doctor Who person.
SPEAKER_02:I'm not either, really. But I know that there are like different, like different actors will kind of take that role of being the doctor, and the series spans decades.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and I don't know, honestly, I it could have been the easiest thing in the world. I didn't actually check if he actually was playing Doctor Who in the TV series, but he was just in the TV series. He also was in the Oscar winning film Out of Africa.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I've heard of that.
SPEAKER_04:He, like Pat Hinkle, came back and was Alfred for all those first four Batman movies. So he came back for Returns Forever and Batman and Robin. He also was in Age of Innocence and Sleepy Hollow, actually, in Corpse Pride. So Burton brought him back for a couple other movies.
SPEAKER_02:And tying it back to his work with Val Kilmer as Batman. Before that, he was also working with him in uh 1984's Top Secret.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, okay, that's awesome. Okay, wrapping it up, last two people. Gotta bring up Jack Palance. He plays Grissom.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. He has that great uh moment in the movie where he tells at that point Jack that he's his number one man, that the Joker then parodies with Bob the Goon, which is like such a weird moment of the film.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I'm like, that was an interesting choice.
SPEAKER_02:Because Bob has no freaking idea what's happening. That's like totally just for the audience.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like we get it, but I'm like, what does Bob think right now?
SPEAKER_04:And it's so funny because so we have Jack Nicholson parodying Jack Palance when Jack Nicholson has been parodied multiple times in other movies, like Tom Cruise does him in uh A Few Good Men. And then Greg Kinnear also does him in As Good as It Gets. And so it's like that's hilarious to me that this actor that tons of other people uh parody is doing a parody.
SPEAKER_02:The moment with Bob the Goon is just so insanely over the top. It's like he was just getting it all out of a system. Like everyone's gonna parody me.
SPEAKER_04:Well, that's something that uh I like it a load of me. I was I was reading about you know his experience with doing this film, and as it turns out, this is like one of his favorite roles. And for a while, he was like watching himself in this movie because he enjoyed it so much and like inviting people over to watch him before.
SPEAKER_02:He looks like he's having a great time.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and yeah, no, exactly. And so I think that part of it is he was truly allowed to kind of go wherever he wanted to go with the character, yeah. And and I think that must have been really fun as an actor to have that kind of freedom to do do whatever you want. So maybe that was one of those moments that he perhaps improvised. Uh who knows? But we are getting off track. So Jack Pallins, yeah. Uh okay, again, just like these other actors had a long career before Batman came along. He was in Shane. Shane. Did you ever see Shane?
SPEAKER_02:I I am aware of Shane, but I don't know if I've ever seen it.
SPEAKER_04:He was in the TV series version of the greatest show on earth that also won Best Picture. Uh, he was in a TV series called Bronk. I don't know what.
SPEAKER_01:Bronk?
SPEAKER_04:Bronk.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:Yep. He was in something, and again, I just had to bring this up because of the title alone. Cocaine Cowboys.
SPEAKER_01:That sounds amazing. Cocaine Cowboys.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Wow.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, right. Young Guns. Tango and Cash. And then probably the role that if you know Dreg Palance at all, this is probably what you identify him with.
SPEAKER_02:I think most, yeah, most of our viewers would probably recognize him from City Slickers. Exactly. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. And and good on him. He was so good in that role. He won Best Supporting Actor for it. So yeah. Okay. I just wanted to bring this person up real briefly. So Jerry Hall, who plays Alicia.
SPEAKER_02:The the love triangle.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Such as it was.
SPEAKER_04:So I mean, okay, so she has um close to I think two dozen IMDB credits. But she's, I mean, look, I don't think it's like throwing shade to say she's not really an actress. She's actually a model. She was like a supermodel for a very long time. And I think just by happenstance, kind of was put in some of these films. I mean, yeah, they needed they needed somebody pretty to be in this movie. And so she did, she did just fine. Um, what I thought was interesting again, like I don't usually go into the like the whole personal life thing, but probably what most people know her from outside of her modeling career is the fact that she was like in a relationship with Mick Jagger for quite a long time. And then I didn't know this. Did you know that she's now married to Rupert Murdoch?
SPEAKER_02:Wait a second. The Rupert Murdoch who is the the fox.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Isn't that crazy?
SPEAKER_02:That is crazy.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. So okay. Like that.
SPEAKER_02:It's it's like she married real life Grissom.
SPEAKER_04:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:In a way.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, yeah. We better hope no nobody higher up hears this uh podcast. Okay, so thank you for for bearing with us. I mean, I hopefully it wasn't too much of a burden. It's just there's so many amazing people who are part of this film. Um, okay, so quickly let's uh move through film synopsis.
SPEAKER_01:Oh yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Oh yeah. So as we do, we pull it from IMDB and then talk about how well we think they summed up the film. So here we go. The Dark Knight of Gotham City begins his war on crime with his first major enemy being Jack Napier, a criminal who becomes the clownishly homicidal joker.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I feel like um it's kind of an insult to call him the clownishly homicidal.
SPEAKER_04:It's a weird description of him. He's definitely homicidal.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:For sure. Uh I think Yeah, I don't I don't know how to do it.
SPEAKER_02:It's kind of a funny, funny, like his first his first baddie.
SPEAKER_04:His first bad, yeah. It it it is a weird way of also setting up the Batman character. Like it's like he just graduated college and now he's he's officially fighting crime.
SPEAKER_02:Just finished the Dark Knight Academy and he's ready for his first assignment.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, so it's and also because you know, I can't pretend to know off the top of my head how old Michael Keaton is, but even at the time that he filmed this, he he's kind of just always looked like a little bit older of an actor. I mean, I would say arguably, um maybe not as much George Clooney, but I would say that Val Kilmer appears to be a younger version of Batman. I would absolutely say that for Christian Bale. Ben Athlick intentionally was cast as an older version of Batman. Yeah. So that's not even comparable. But yeah, like Michael Keene has just kind of an older look to him. And so it is interesting. Like, what you been doing all these years, Bruce Wayne, that now all of a sudden you're deciding to um you know who people wanted to be Batman for for quite a while.
SPEAKER_02:I don't think it's ever gonna happen, but John Hamm would have been a really good Bruce Wayne.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. If they and I mean we talk about this with our special guests, though, you know, sometimes there are just like circumstances that you have a really amazing actor, and the performance doesn't exactly pan out the way that you maybe thought it would. And that happened with Val Kilmer, who I think would have also been a really amazing Bruce Wayne as the more kind of like playboy character of Bruce Wayne. Yeah. And he doesn't really come across that way.
SPEAKER_02:He had a tough go. I mean, it we talk about that a little bit. Yeah. With, you know, how how are you gonna be a quirky-ish character when you're opposite the Riddler played by Jim Carrey. Right. So it just would have been too much.
SPEAKER_04:Probably just too much energy going on there.
SPEAKER_02:But yeah, his his version of Bruce Wayne was uh about as lifeless as you could get. So at least Michael Keaton brought like a little Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, he has an interesting I I uh th that's probably one part where, you know, when I was talking earlier about, oh, you know, I didn't know anything about the comic books, and I feel like I got what I wanted out of the film. That's probably the one thing where it was lacking because I didn't necessarily know that Batman was supposed to be this like very intentionally outwardly playboy-y type of guy to throw people off his trail, as our special guest mentioned.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And so that was that was like a really interesting thing to learn because yeah, he absolutely doesn't play it that way. Um, okay.
SPEAKER_02:As far as the IMDB synopsis goes, I think they could have probably just said, it's Batman. You know, Batman, it's a movie with Batman. And that would have been fine.
SPEAKER_04:It would have been fine. Yeah. It would have been fine. I mean, we you know, talked to our guest at length about kind of his first memories of this movie. I mean, for me, I don't I do not remember if I saw it in the theater.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I definitely did.
SPEAKER_04:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it was I mean, it was kind of like this event. So like similar to our guest, I remember being really excited for it. Um, even though I wasn't as into the comics, I just thought it would this was gonna be something like different and kind of amazing to see. So I I do remember seeing it in the theater and just like loving all of it. And obviously, it hasn't it it's aged okay-ish, but in when you compare it to the Christopher Nolan versions of of Batman, it you know, it loses a little bit, but for its time it was great. I remember I still have that like nostalgic feeling of of being really impressed and seeing something like darker than we had seen before for a comic book movie. Um but yeah, it was good.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, I like the Burton films, I think, as much as I like the Nolan films, just for different reasons.
SPEAKER_02:The first two. The the second two Well, those aren't Burton films. That's fair, yeah. I I still think of that as like part of that series. Yeah, like that series, I I guess. I mean, it was just they just kept on making them. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Like people Which because, you know, it's it is called show business. Yeah. And so if they think they're gonna make money off of it, yeah. Um, I mean, yeah, and we we we get into this with Tom, but I as far as Nolan goes, you know, um his films are gorgeous to look at. I mean, everything is just so top of the line in every single way, and I I love the tone that he sets, but it uh it definitely lacks kind of the exact eccentricity.
SPEAKER_02:Well, it it does. I think one thing that that Nolan did not probably not intentionally, he just wanted to make the best Batman movies that he thought he could make, but in doing so, in creating a world that was so dark, I think that is spilled over into how they've tried to work on any of the other movies. Yeah. From like Superman, Man of Steel to Wonder Moon, like they've had to find a way to merge all of these all these worlds, and the one that they really made their biggest splash with was like the darkest goddamn world they could possibly have made. Right. Um so it was great for for like this dark night type of setting, but I wonder, like I don't know. I don't know if there's something in between Burton and Nolan that would have given us a better Justice League, for example.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, no, I see what you're saying.
SPEAKER_02:They're kind of resetting the character, like kind of like Spider-Man, where like every other year we're gonna get a different kind of Batman. Yeah. Um, so I I think they have like taken steps to pull like the Ben Affleck Batman is a little bit more in between. Like he's not the the Christian Bale Batman. His voice is almost as ridiculous.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, actually, really quickly, I I think it's about time for us to jump into our conversation with Tom. But one thing that I found really interesting that kind of set a tone for all the films, uh, is that you know, one thing that Michael Cain or Michael Cain, Michael Keaton was uh kind of struggling with was well, how how do I really differ differentiate these two aspects of the same person between Bruce Wayne and Batman? And so he came up with altering his his like voice register. Okay. Um, when he was Batman, and that has stuck.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, no, every yeah he altered his register, and then Christian Bale decided I'm just gonna go with making it totally unintelligible.
SPEAKER_04:And on that note, oh no, no, let's talk to Tom.
SPEAKER_02:Let's uh let's do that.
SPEAKER_04:And we are here with our very special guest today, actor, comedian, commuter, Tom Farnon, and lover, loser, legend, Velvet Tom. Welcome to the show, Tom.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you for having me. Having both of us. Of course. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:It's it's the first time we've had like a two-in-one. So this is pretty awesome for us.
SPEAKER_00:That's great. Yes. You get both my personalities.
SPEAKER_04:Love it. Well, we are super excited because this is a film, I think, unlike any other that we've had so far.
SPEAKER_02:It does feel different, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. It feels, I mean, for a variety of reasons. And we'll we'll go into all of those reasons, but in terms of it, you know, being sourced from like a comic book, from the fact that obviously it's not necessarily like set in the 80s.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, it's definitely not.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. So there's a lot of really interesting facets to this film that I'm excited to cover with you. So again, thank you so much for being on the show.
SPEAKER_00:Uh, thank you very much. You have no idea that this movie actually I was a little passionate about when I when I saw it.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, fantastic. That's what it was like.
SPEAKER_00:There was a lot of there was a lot of odd press around this movie at the time. Of course, we didn't really have IMDB to look it up and look at all the trivia. We had to sort of rely on entertainment weekly magazines, but a lot of interesting lore about this film, and it really impacted me.
SPEAKER_04:Huh. Well, then let's we're gonna just dive right in.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, let's go right into that.
SPEAKER_04:Yes. So typically, like, you know, we kick things off with first memories. Um, and that's what I'm gonna throw to you right now. So I would love to hear, since you've already mentioned exactly what it felt for you to watch this film for the first time, about how old you might have been, and just like first thoughts off that experience.
SPEAKER_00:Well, let's see, it was uh I was 17. It was the summer before my senior year of high school. Kansas City, Missouri is where I'm from. So I saw it at a uh a multiplex theater off of one of the biggest shopping malls, Metro North shopping mall, which is now empty and you know there's nothing there. And in fact, I don't think the multiplex is there anymore. Uh, they're just buildings that sit sit empty out in a big empty parking lot last I checked. But um I remember going and seeing this movie with friends. I remember there being a lot of buzz about it. Um I remember my first takeaway after watching it was it should have been called the Joker, because it was the Joker origin story over the Batman origin story.
SPEAKER_02:It was one of uh several Joker origin stories.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, well we'll go there, I'm sure.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but that was like, I mean, and I didn't really look at that as a criticism. I was just like, there wasn't a lot, there was there's a lot of Batman, uh, but there was a ton of Joker, you know. It was really just sort of centered around uh the casting, I thought, you know, sometimes I thought sometimes the stories of the movie sort of overshadowed the movie. But my first impression of it was really uh was really uh I don't know, I was excited about it.
SPEAKER_04:Like I wanted to build all of all of the Batman weapons, like I would have there were a lot of cool weapons, very like James Bond level cool weapons. Um curious, so when you went into this, like were you already like a comic book guy? Did you already have like any kind of appreciation for Batman, or did you kind of go into this cold? Like, where did you stand on that?
SPEAKER_00:Kind of, I mean, I kind of grew up with comic books. I mean, I obviously knew who Batman was and had seen the TV shows, you know, and syndicated uh programming throughout the years and was familiar with that sort of take on Batman and had friends in high school who were big Frank Miller fans, and I had read, I had read The Dark Knight at that point, I had read Gotham by Gaslight, I had read Mazzacelli's Batman Year One. So I I was really sort of uh in the comic book realm around there, had immersed myself in that in that story. Like uh day, I think it was Dave Mazzacelli's Batman Year One, that those series of comic books, was his graphic novel, was probably the more interesting story, and was probably the one Chris Nolan told later with uh with the bale, with Christian Bale. But Batman begins and all the Batman begins, and that all sort of interested me. And I certainly have thoughts about like the like the idea of crime and you know what kind of crime Batman was going for, and how how it's very interesting that that uh that the root of crime is usually at the top, you know. Rely on billionaires like Bruce Wayne, you know. Every great fortune comes a great crime. So really he lives a dichotomy as not only a vigilante, but as a criminal, maybe not knowing where his money really comes from.
SPEAKER_04:So this is gonna be a great conversation.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, that's that's like a super deep and interesting perspective. And also, I just wanted to note that it's really it's interesting to me that you had already had kind of more more than a base familiarity with with Batman, if with the graphic novels and some of the comics, because my experience before seeing this was really just the Adam West TV series, which was like the equivalent of like a live-action cartoon version of Batman, in some cases, even goofier than the cartoon. Actually, compared to the cartoons now, like way goofier still. Yeah. So when I saw the the 89 Batman, at that point, we had had like a couple Superman movies, I think, in the 80s. Um, but there wasn't really anything like that Tim Burton vision of Batman at that time. And so I was really excited about it, but it's interesting to hear that someone, you know, you obviously knew more about the character than than I did at that time. That movie is kind of what got me into looking at some of those graphic novels like The Dark Knight and later The Killing Joke.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, The Killing Joke was another one. Yeah, another another sort of joker-centric Yeah, very much.
SPEAKER_04:Well, kind of going hand in hand with where you kind of stood and knowing Batman lore and the whole thing. At the time that the film came out, were you already familiar with Tim Burton? Because I do feel like that plays a huge role in how this film is interpreted and just his really distinct style.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, Beetlejuice uh was was the introduction to that. Let's see. But he had already done a couple of things. And I was trying to remember.
SPEAKER_03:Pee Wee.
SPEAKER_00:Uh Tim Burton. He had done, he had done Beetlejuice, and then there was something in between.
SPEAKER_04:Pee-wee's Big Adventure.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah. Pee-wee. Oh, well, Pee Wee Herman. Oh my God. I was a huge fan of Pee-Wee Herman. I mean, I remember, you know, I was, I kind of, you know, I was a little insomniac as a kid. So I used to watch cable television all the time. And I think that was the first time I'd seen Pee-Wee Herman live at The Roxy, his live show, and to know that it was just done up the street at sunset, like around the 80s. And then that blossomed into a movie, which blossomed into a TV show.
SPEAKER_02:And a sequel.
SPEAKER_00:And a sequel on top of that. Yeah, that that was uh that was great. Um I love I think the thing that elevates Tim Burton's projects are Danny Elfman's music.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yes.
SPEAKER_00:Soundtracks are consistent. You know, he's almost like he's it's you know, it's almost like Spielberg and Williams, you know. Exactly. Same thing. Burton doesn't really do anything without Danny Elfman. And sometimes he can make he can make what's odd or what's mundane seem very exciting just with the exciting music. But intro.
SPEAKER_04:I mean great intro.
SPEAKER_02:The very opening of Batman, it's like it's almost geared to let you know for anyone who's not familiar with what's about to happen, this is not going to be the Adam West Batman. And so just that that intro is just amazing.
SPEAKER_00:But very exciting. You know, it's funny though, you know, if you listen to it because the soundtrack almost plays throughout the entire music. I mean, uh movie. There really isn't any dead time to where there isn't any music. And I own that soundtrack. I used to listen to that soundtrack all the time. I just because there was like, you know, he'd put little Easter eggs into it, like there was um uh God, I can't remember.
SPEAKER_02:A lot of prints in that soundtrack.
SPEAKER_00:You know what? You know what's so weird. This is this is uh this is perspective for you when we're talking about Prince is just four years before that Purple Rain came out. Isn't that so rad? And he he already had had done two movies in between this. He had already done uh he had already done Graffiti Bridge, Under the Cherry Moon. So he was an accomplished O'Tour already, and then here he is basically the pop soundtrack of Batman.
SPEAKER_04:How did you feel about kind of that mashup between Burton and because I, you know, in doing research for the film, kind of got what I took away was not exactly uh a welcoming approach from Burton. He didn't particularly think that Prince needed to be part of this film, but I think that the higher powers that be thought that it could be more marketable with Prince being part of it. And so I'm curious how you felt that came together.
SPEAKER_00:I'm probably sure that Prince felt the same way. He was probably he didn't probably think that he needed to be part of that project anyway. He was already like mega pop star, and then there was more to come after that. So so I don't know, you know, it was plus or minus. Of course, I think he didn't a Prince song end up in one of the sequel soundtracks too. I want to say like a Prince Song ended up like on the Batman Forever soundtrack.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, that you know what? I will have to look that up. Anything's possible.
SPEAKER_00:And Kiss from a Rose, of course, by Seal.
SPEAKER_04:Totally, right? Arguably the best part of uh Batman Forever.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my gosh. I really oh uh we'll get there.
SPEAKER_04:We'll get there with those.
SPEAKER_00:I have so much, yeah, I have so many thoughts about just the Bruce Wayne character and especially Michael Keaton. I I don't know. They play they play Bruce Wayne so studious and reserved, and the cover is supposed to be that he's supposed to be this obnoxious billionaire playboy to throw off the scent that he's vigilante. And everybody, all the actors, including Keaton, I would have rather seen Keaton from Night Shift play Bruce Wayne, or even Shades of Beetlejuice. I would have rather seen him be more obnoxious in the role.
SPEAKER_04:Well, we can, I mean, we can go there right now because that's another really interesting aspect of the film, his casting. Again, from what I came across, you know, there was a lot of um I don't know if you would say backl well, yeah. I mean, I guess you could fairly say backlash, both in terms of any of the executives involved, it took a lot of convincing for them to agree to have him in the role. And then also prior to it coming out, not necessarily kind of like with Ben Affleck, you know. I don't I don't think there was a whole lot of um enthusiasm. Yeah, and I think in contrast to, you know, we'll get into all these different iterations of Batman, but like I think Christian Bale people were on board. I don't I don't remember coming across anything where people weren't um enthusiastic about him being cast, but there definitely was that surrounding Keaton. And and you're totally right in terms of what the character ideally was supposed to kind of bring out to your point of throwing people off the trail. So do you feel like the way that he portrayed it worked? And do you think that maybe he was more cerebral in his approach because he, I don't know, was like trying to show people that he wasn't just that wacky character from Beetlejuice and maybe he went too far in the other direction?
SPEAKER_00:Uh yes, yes, yes, and yes, all of that. I think that I think he underplayed the character, but maybe he was noted to underplay the character so that Jack Nicholson's Joker would seem uh would seem a, you know, a uh oddball contrast. Um but and also his I think Keaton's star was rising at that point, and you know, he just wasn't doing he just wasn't the rom-com dad anymore, he wasn't Mr. Mom, you know, it's kind of you know this was his chance to make a transition into something, and we were supposed to I I guess we're supposed to tap into the the darkness of the dark night with Tim Burton, you know, he kind of kept some of the wackyness of the cartoon with the goon squad. Yeah, but but wanted to make sure that Gotham was gothic, you know.
SPEAKER_02:Where people succeeded at that.
SPEAKER_00:Where the wardrobe was the 50s and all the cars were from the 80s. So, you know. A weird jumping of genres, I noticed. It was like uh and I'm re-watching, you know, I rewatched the film last week uh just to kind of get the feel of it, and I certainly don't have the same feelings about it that I did when it first came out. It was it was remarkable when it came out, but then I I look back and I go, Oh my god, look at this editing. You know, I mean everything was practical. There wasn't a lot of there wasn't a lot of CGI to this.
SPEAKER_04:You could see it though, like a couple instances of it are kind of noticeable.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, at the very beginning when the the first family is kind of mugged outside the theater, and then you see from the top overhead shot of a building, and you see the silhouette of Batman that looks like somebody just like hand drew and animated it. Yeah, yeah, and put that in. Uh, but at the time I'm like, oh, that's kind of cool.
SPEAKER_04:But when I watched when Joker felt to his death, I that kind of came up again.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, there are some strange things with it. I don't, I mean, I I appreciate that uh with um the Joker kind of like getting his whole gang together, he still had time for like branding to get them all like patches for their jackets. They did express on that.
SPEAKER_00:He did certainly take whatever whatever whatever finances and he really put it towards his his wardrobe and everything. It's important.
SPEAKER_04:Well, okay, so you brought up how you view it very differently now than in terms of when it first came out. And I wanted to go a little bit more into that because I'm curious if for you you feel like it um you can view it differently independently of everything, which has been considerable since, or do you feel like there has been an impact on you in terms of not just seeing the other iterations of Batman and kind of like that first group of films that came out, including Val Kilmer and George Clooney, but then you know, we had the trilogy, the Nolan trilogy, and then we had Ben Affleck. So do you feel like any of that factors into how you now see this film?
SPEAKER_00:Uh you know what? I haven't seen Affleck do Batman. I just, I just, I don't really, I mean uh Ben Affleck maybe he's going through a tough time right now. I just don't really watch him, you know. I just don't find that he has much chemistry with anybody he's on on camera with. So I just got it. I kind of skipped Affleck, you know. But uh I I like the Christian Bale thing. I think Christian Bale kind of hit the hit closest to the Bruce Wayne note because it's the Bruce Wayne character that's really sort of tormented and messed up. But also, what I liked about Batman altogether is that he didn't have a superpower. He was a human guy who had wealth and used wealth uh to make a series of vehicles that were always on the road illegally and in the sky. Any of that stuff, you know. I mean, he was a true vigilante. I mean, he even broke the law uh using his wealth. We didn't really ever find out where his wealth came from. You know, Thomas Wayne was a doctor who tried to shun his wealth, but you know, at the end of at the end of the day, he lived on a manor and he tried to use his money for good, but he was always just focusing on Gotham and going back to the theme of wherever there's a great fortune, there's a great crime. You know, I feel that Bruce Wayne could have probably been more effective as an obnoxious billionaire playboy uh exposing his billionaire friends to uh to audits and investigations and and such than dressing up like a bat and terrorizing drug drug kingpins.
SPEAKER_02:Well, the um I think you're right that the Christian Bale version of Batman played up the kind of obnoxious Playboy nature of Bruce Wayne, certainly more than than Michael Keaton's version did. Although, I mean the closest that Michael Keaton gets is bragging about his collection of obscure statues towards the beginning of uh the 1989 version. And I will say that Affleck has he's he's okay as Batman. It's and he's he's a fine Bruce Wayne. It it's it's serviceable for sure. There is one funny moment that I wanted to um let you know about in case you're ever inclined inspired or inclined in uh Justice League when he first meets the Flash character, Barry, and Barry asks him what his superpower is, and he just says, I'm rich, and then they drive off.
SPEAKER_04:So there is that awareness. Although uh, you know, I agree with both of you in terms of Christian Bale and this Playboy persona that he puts on. What I really appreciated about that performance throughout all the films is that you know that he's doing it intentionally. Like you understand that he realizes he does have to kind of put up this persona. And I think that there's an interesting complexity there because he doesn't want, he doesn't want to be, I think, really truly looked at that way as kind of this, you know, playboy who maybe, you know, intelligent or not, you know, kind of just wants his money and has a girl on each arm. And I think that that's so interesting to me that he understands that that's also part of what he has to do. It kind of feels for me that the he understands that that's also part of his burden because that's so anthetical to who he really is.
SPEAKER_02:He's more convincing at it though, because when he's in those in those moments where you know he's off on a yacht with a ballet company or whatever, like he when you see him in that, it's it it seems like yeah, he's I don't know if he if he really hates all this, but he seems like he's enjoying himself. Whereas Michael Keaton's Bruce Wayne is clearly not really interested in any of any of like that Playboy image. Like he's there because he thinks it's uh something that he has to do to have this like alter ego, but he seems really disinterested in that. Like he's leaving the party to like listen in on the commissioner and another detective.
SPEAKER_00:Right. And and he leaves the party so obviously, you know. I think probably the the hidden hero in this movie is Robert Wool's character because at least he stayed consistent throughout it, and he kind of got the shaft in the end for being for being loyal. And, you know, I mean, he was, you know, he was he was puerile, but you know, I mean he did a great job.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, and from what I did a great job.
SPEAKER_00:I thought I thought Knox was uh was a great character. Uh uh, but um oh god, where were we gonna go with that? I yeah, uh getting back to disinterested. I mean, it was the way he he described his his sort of war room. He had a very good opportunity to play an eccentric at that moment. At least we could have gotten eccentricity out of it. Right. But but instead, we got a pretty uh dry Batman's already been kind of established, even though there's grumblings about this new crazy vigilante in the neighborhood.
SPEAKER_04:Um you know we don't really see much of the origin of the Batman, but and you're and it what's so fascinating about that is I mean, you I think you hit it earlier when you said, I'm surprised they didn't call it the Joker, because it's really so much more about that character. And not only did they not give orange an origin story to Batman, in light of all the things that you were talking about, where he was kind of new on the scene, he wasn't this established character in the city. But then again, from what I came across, because I, you know, not a comic book person, don't don't know anything about that world, but I did read that there never was an origin story for the Joker. That was part of the allure of the character, is that you had no idea what what caused him to be who he was, and that they made a deliberate choice in the film to give him an origin story. So they don't give an origin story to the person that is supposed to be, you know, headlining this film. Uh, and the film is called Batman, but then they give this artificial one to the secondary character.
SPEAKER_02:Well, there I mean, part of it is that there's not maybe there's not like an established origin story, but there are several different origin stories, and one theory or thing that I've read about the Joker is that most of these come from his perspective, and he will use different origin stories in order to manipulate people.
SPEAKER_04:Well, they did that in The Dark Knight. Yeah, that's exactly what he did.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So, um, so there there is a red hood type of origin story for the Joker that involves like a chemical plant and spell. And this, like the 1989 Batman kind of follows that. Then there's another one that the Joaquin Phoenix Joker, it's that's not even 100% in line with like the killing joke version.
SPEAKER_00:No.
SPEAKER_02:I think it was the killing joke where he was the comedian, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, he was the comedian, he had a pregnant wife, something. Yeah. He made a he made a devil's bargain with somebody and ended up in a vat of something and then went mad.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. There are a lot of weird I mean, there there are a few characters that have like different origin stories that are all like kind of valid depending on the time of day.
SPEAKER_00:I I mean, yeah, yeah. Pick your yeah, pick your poison. I I thought that I thought the the Phoenix Joker was uh Joaquin Phoenix's joker was really good. I mean, probably a more uh grounded origin story, I think. You know, it's just and and the mayhem that he caused in such a short period of time, I think. And also, if you've ever done open mics, there's this there's always that guy of who is this idiot, and next thing you know, he's famous. So, you know the thing about that uh consistent, so that's definitely consistent.
SPEAKER_02:That that Joker movie kind of made me feel like well, I never thought that I would want a Joker slash Batman slash Requiem for a Dream crossover. And then I saw that movie and I realized, no, I don't want that.
SPEAKER_00:Um like that though. Oh boy.
SPEAKER_04:It's all very arbitrary. I I realize this upon saying it, but you know, I didn't I I wasn't necessarily on board with Affleck. I think the only reason why I was even drawn towards this new batch of um Justice League type films is because I was very interested in Wonder Woman. And I also thought that um, you know, I liked the couple Batman films or um, pardon me, Superman films that had come out. So, you know, now that they're all kind of trying to go in that direction via Marvel, that's what got me into seeing those performances. However, in contrast, again, there's really no objective basis for this, but I really, I really loved the Heath Ledger performance in The Dark Knight. And I wasn't really on board with this new version of Joker and obviously won the Academy Award for the performance, and I did catch glimpses of it when Derek was watching it, but it just felt like do we really need another one? But I guess you could say that for so many. Uh Spider-Man has entered the chip. Yeah, exactly. So there's so there's so much to go with that. But you know, we can definitely go there, but I'm curious because you, you know, again kind of mentioning the differences between not just the portrayals of Batman and Joker in uh the 89 film, but the the somberness of Batman and compared to Joker. I mean, that was the last thing that I really picked up on with our most recent viewing. I not that I ever thought although otherwise really, but I was so blown away by Nicholson's performance. And I'm curious, you know, kind of we're talking about all these different versions of performances. Like, how how did you feel about him in this film? And then now that we're several decades down the line and you've seen other performances of that character, do you feel like it still holds up? It's just its own thing. Like, where are your thoughts on that?
SPEAKER_00:I remember a comment that I made. I probably made a Facebook comment after seeing after seeing The Dark Knight and seeing um I'm sorry, I I'm blanking on. Ledger. Ledger, Heath Ledger's performance. I think I commented on Facebook that I bet Jack Nicholson wished he turned in the Heath Ledger performance. Because I really thought Heath Ledger really kind of found the the offness of Joker, the the uh the unpredictability of the character. Uh but I mean Jack Nicholson, I mean, he was he was he was getting a second wind in his career. I mean, there was just and and it all surrounded around his eyebrows and his smile. It was all about the sinister face that he makes. It was just all about that. But you know, after seeing after uh seeing The Shining and then seeing Weach Witches of Eastwick, so sinister character in a comedy. Uh at least that's what I felt like, and I felt like it was it was a it was definitely a comedy. Uh he was poised for this. There's like, who else at the time could you even imagine playing the Joker uh in 1989? I can't there is not one actor. I don't even think, you know, you know, Jim Carrey eventually came around and became an awesome riddler, uh, in my opinion, at least.
SPEAKER_04:Uh he wasn't I I'd like to miss Riddler.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, we could talk about other, yeah, but I mean Robin Williams probably would have been a great joker. It's just that he Robin Williams is just so goddamn sweet, you know. I mean, no one no one would see him play the joker. Not at that time. Nicholson already had a sinister gene built in, you know, that we had already seen on screen.
SPEAKER_04:Funny story, since you mention Robin Williams, uh, when they were going through the casting process, I don't know if you already knew this, but uh they did offer it, I believe, first to Nicholson, and he was not he was hesitating, he wasn't fully committed. And then so they offered it to Williams, and Williams said sure, he wanted to do it.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, this is insane because I didn't know any of this. And when neither did you just said who else could have done it, I was thinking, like, as far as just kind of being insane or having this like wacky performance, Robin Williams is the first name that came to mind.
SPEAKER_04:So he agrees to do the role, and they go back to Nicholson and say, Hey, look, Williams agreed to do this, so you have to let us know right now. And that's what convinced him to say, sure, I will do it. Because of that, Williams was so upset that they had basically used him as bait that he refused to do any more Warner Brother films until he got an apology from them for their behavior. Wow. Which I appreciate that because he he also did that with Aladdin, you know, and the way he was treated through that. So um, you know, I'm not surprised that he kind of took that stance. And yeah, that is that's a shitty thing to do. Um, but that's how that kind of all came about.
SPEAKER_00:That's Hollywood, man. Uh tons of examples of that. And he's just just a casualty of that being held at bait. And he would have crushed it. I think he probably would have crushed it. And then it definitely would have been, it definitely would have been the Joker because he just would have overpowered. I don't even know if Tim, you know, I mean, it's just like when you look at Tim Burton and some of the performances that were turned in, you know, Michael Keaton turned in a great performance with Beetlejuice, but it was probably a very rehearsed and very thought-out performance, probably not as stream of conscious as Williams would have been. I mean, I can only speculate, but I mean Robin Williams, that was my guy. I watched everything. I remember Mork and Mindy as a kid watching that. Oh, yeah. Religious with it. And then when Jonathan Winters came on the show, I was just like, oh my god, look at these two heavy hitters. Because at that point, I was, I think we had a whole boatload of comedy albums down in our basement, and I was just listening to them. Uh, and Jonathan Winters just being one of them. I was like, wait, this guy is on that TV right now, and they were just both killing it. They didn't even need to write a script, they just let these guys go. And often that's what made television at the time.
SPEAKER_02:I don't know how well that would have worked on on Batman because yeah, Williams would just would have been kind of going crazy the whole time. It would have been it would have been insanely entertaining. And the only the only advantage I would give to Nicholson is he does, I think, have that sinister quality that Anna mentioned. I think he would bring more of that. I think Williams in some of his later movies showed that he can certainly give that. Yeah. I don't know if in 89 it would have it would have been there in the same way it was later in his career.
SPEAKER_00:Uh did you guys ever see Death to Smoochie?
SPEAKER_02:Uh yeah. But yeah, I have seen that. Not since it came out. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:It was Danny DeVito directed it, and uh basically Robin Williams played, he he was a children's show host, and he was beloved until he was outed for doing all these awful things and having you know awful habits, drug habits, prostitution habits, things like that, and his star went down, you know. Uh a lot like what the press did to Pee-wee Herman, you know, just uh outed his sexuality, and then and then he was like, Well, how can he be on Saturday morning television? What an abomination. So so but you got to see a really, you know, happy go lucky to the cameras, really dark side uh that Robin Williams brought in. So I think he definitely could have nailed the Joker. But uh looking back, I watching it again, Jack Nicholson's performance. Of course, I liked what Robert Wool did. Um what else? What else?
SPEAKER_04:I'm trying to think if there's somebody else's performance that sort of well, one thing that was interesting is uh, you know, the fact that they had this origin story for the Joker, the the way in which they did that, you know, he had to have a boss. And I I did think that that was excellent casting because like when you have someone like Jack Nicholson, who do you have as a Jack Nicholson's boss?
SPEAKER_02:As long as their first name is Jack, it'll work.
SPEAKER_04:And and I thought that that was a really uh great bit of casting because it's like, okay, of anybody who's out there, sure, Jack Pallance. I could see that. I could see Jack Pallance being Jack Nicholson's boss, yeah. And so I think that that worked really well for the small amount of time he was in it. Yes. Um, yeah. So they they did great in that regard.
SPEAKER_00:I I agree. And there is uh there was a second uh win to somebody's career that you know was legendary, but you pretty much forgot his name. But I think after that was City Slickers, I think he ended up doing those movies and then ended up doing push-ups on stage.
SPEAKER_04:Yes! That I still have that ingrained in my memory, that moment. I can't even remember, I think, but I think it might have been at the Oscars even when he won. I think he did it, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So, you know, that I I think that that is the you know, sort of the happy happy stories that come out of doing this movie is giving, you know, is giving an old guy a second chance at a pretty darn good career, you know. Um, but yeah, good casting on that part.
SPEAKER_04:Well, okay, so one thing that you brought up in a couple couple different moments that I wanted to try to get back to is the the villains. I mean, we have been talking about them in great length, but I will say that and I this kind of ties into another question I wanted to ask. So the the third and fourth films um of kind of like that first grouping of Batman films that the the torch was passed for whatever reason. I actually did not research it, so I don't know if you know any more than I do about why it went from Tim Burton to Joel Schumacher. But you know, Batman Forever and then Batman and Robin, although I can't say that either are a film that I don't even know if I've watched since they first came out. I do remember again being very impressed with the commitment that the actors had as the villains. I do that does still stick with me. Like I do think that, like you said, um, Jim Carrey, Tommy Lee Jones, Uma Thurman, and I don't know, Schwarzenegger.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, I think that they did Oh God, Mr.
SPEAKER_00:Freeze.
SPEAKER_04:I do think that they committed, and that's they have to learn to lose by not committing.
SPEAKER_00:I think yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And I I can appreciate that. I mean, in terms of you know, the the recasting of Batman, you know, for each of those films, the fact that for whatever reason Burton do you do you know why Burton did he just decide he didn't want to continue with?
SPEAKER_00:the the franchise or something else I don't have any clue I mean I think a lot of decisions were made uh in in cocaine addled comics I think I think a lot of it was I mean you turned it over to Joel Schumacher uh you know I think he you know I think he was a pretty interesting presence on set apparently and and made the making of the film more about him than actually what was going on. I I think that uh Jim Carrey and Joel Schumacher uh butted heads but Jim Carrey and most big directors sort of butted heads at that time. No fault against any of them like I said you know probably just artists really trying to work it out and entertainment media sort of blowing it up bigger than it actually was but I don't I don't know I mean they just became I mean you lost you lost all the great music because I don't think any of those soundtracks so I don't think they were very dynamic but they were filled with a pop soundtrack. So then what replaced it was you know Seal, U2, the flaming lips uh I can't think of there's some other ones on that soundtrack because I think I really kind of liked some of the music that came out of I do have a confession I do know that I have the Batman forever soundtrack.
SPEAKER_02:Oh I do too yeah I have both Batman I still have them on CD somewhere yes me do yeah yeah I mean I think if if the 1989 version kind of like set this dark tone that Batman returns kind of dialed up a few more notches they took for the for the next two for Forever and Batman and Robin they really just played more on the on the cartoony slash I guess their interpretation of a comic book perspective because it was just really bright colors and like everything was it was kind of spastic.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah they were very much so out there. Yes and I don't want to Jones oh my god I just can't believe you know I mean he went from every shit house dog house outhouse to great roll hearty bones you know who you know I thought I mean really Aaron Eckhart man that guy just talk about talk about some guy coming to terms with having half his face burnt off that guy really I thought Aaron Eckhart did a good job as as two face as well. He really did but you want to know why I mean when you think about the villains of them all of them suffered from mental illness all of them even you know I mean you know it's like even Bruce Wayne suffered from PTSD right that's why he went through all of this and Arkham Asylum was always sort of a was sort of the place where they ended up going thinking that that was the place where they needed to be this is another this is another part of my philosophy is that if Bruce Wayne just would have not been Batman and just been the most obnoxious guy, you know, almost Trumpian in a way to put all of his billionaire buddies on blast. He could eventually buy them out, absorb their companies and then just put Wayne Industries out of business and then allot the Wayne fortune to go to certain things that Gotham needs like mental health care. So maybe Arkham Asylum can actually provide the help that Penguin and the Riddler and the Joker really deserve. You know in the reality if you step outside if you make Batman a real guy Bruce Wayne is more effective at fixing people's problems than Batman is. He could have been Bill Gates.
SPEAKER_04:Well that's what I was just gonna you just took it from me because that no it's I didn't mean it I didn't mean it so aggressively I just meant that you're yeah you're both totally right. The look on your face right when I said it was great because I that is one thing that you know I guess it just is you know part and parcel of of this world and this character but he's so obsessed with Gotham City and like you're a billionaire like there's so much more good you could do in the world. Why don't you get out there once in a while yeah and I mean you're totally right like Bill Gates also a billionaire and he is worldwide affect you know like doing good things for the globe.
SPEAKER_00:It's like why Gotham City problem you know I mean Bruce Wayne is part of the problem.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Even when he's talking on behalf of Wayne Enterprises it's like look at this great monora we've built for Gotham it's like that's so puny in compared to what he could do.
SPEAKER_04:It's just it's yeah that's always been kind of a weird hangup that I personally have had with this story. And I think uh Bruce Wayne also has the same hang up.
SPEAKER_00:Maybe he does I mean maybe he tries to shun his riches I mean he certainly used it to his advantage but I mean but they but they also missed an opportunity of just showing how greedy corporations are and he is and if and if he's going to maintain the Batman you know if he's gonna maintain the bat cave and the vehicles and the surveillance and everything that means he's gonna have to go out and be a billionaire motherfucker to somebody because if he's getting the money somebody who probably deserves it isn't so so really Batman is just as much of a criminal as the criminals he puts away you know I I think that's probably where I've evolved with the character is that if there's a problem at the bottom look to the top and he's the top and all he wants to do is put mob bosses away and I'm like I'm sorry the mob organized crime is just a symptom of bigger problems that exactly that happened.
SPEAKER_02:You have made your opinions clearer on the Afflack Affleck?
SPEAKER_00:I'm sorry for Affleck he can take me not not really caring for his performances you know I really I really like the town I thought the town was good I thought he was great in the town I mean goodwill hunting you know he did his part hunting the reason I brought this up wasn't to uh defend necessarily talk any more about hatred at all it was really more about the the next Batman because they are they are like working on the next iteration of Batman with um a former vampire yeah yeah I don't I don't know what to think about that any more than I knew what to think about literally any other actor who's been in that role I all I can do is hope.
SPEAKER_02:I don't think I care anymore.
SPEAKER_00:I think that's that I think I'm beyond I think I'm beyond caring because uh you know Clooney Clooney made a uh a good Bruce Wayne because we already already thought that Clooney was kind of a playboy anyway so exactly he's like Tony Stark in that in that sense like he was a great person to cast for for that part of the role. I thought so but you know what we obsessed about in the Clooney version of Batman nipples on the coffee I mean that's what we that's what we focused on and I'm just like that's a that's just a damn shame you know that we threw away a great opportunity to actually have a pretty you know uh Batman that you could take serious and then you know I mean when you look at Batman and Robin I mean Chris O'Donnell I mean Jesus can you um can you have more vanilla wafers and warm milk in a performance than he's he's just the most I I can't I'm you know what I even LL Cool J can't make him exciting on any size screen he's just so dull and he and Alicia Silverstones too I was like what Batgirl as did you know that I I forgot that Bane was in that movie I forgot that Bane was in that movie too I think he's just like a maniac who's quickly dispatched I don't I don't know how long he's even in the movie but Bane is actually a character in that Batman and Robin.
SPEAKER_02:Huh really yeah I mean that just goes to show how little I was paying attention at that point I think very yeah no I I think I I honestly thought there were like five more movies because they all seem to kind of blend in together that first one uh stands out like I said before as something that was really different at the time and then Batman Returns was kind of like everything we enjoyed and then some and then dialed up a little and then the wheels just really fell off and they were okay to watch like I've I've seen them multiple times just because they're I still kind of like enjoy that that universe or that world even if I kind of don't enjoy at all what they did with it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr Freeze was like a caricature of Arnold Schwarzenegger acting as a caricature of himself. It's like it just got crazy.
SPEAKER_00:But it's also this orgy of stars that they kind of threw on you too you know it's just anybody who had a name in Hollywood would got thrown into this movie. And Chris O'Donnell I think you poor Chris O'Donnell um I mean he he had his moments he's done good things I know he actually was had a really great cameo in fried green tomatoes yeah he's that Chris O'Donnell and uh I think Circle of Friends I remember liking that movie and liking him in any case uh also with the Pacino um yeah Sunt of a woman yeah woman but you know he was just getting pushed around in that movie like he really was oh he really was dirty it was a dirty dish rag with the Ivy League haircut that just got tossed around by Alpha floppy hair um welcome to joining the roast of Chris O'Donnell sorry I think you can take it I think I think he could he's he's probably doing just fine with all those uh ri uh residuals coming in um so really quickly just on the tail end of this conversation about you know where the last two films went Batman Forever and Batman Robin I mean I think a couple of things one you know if if if Burton just decided that he was ready to move on more power to him I think that if they're going to have somebody take over the helm of that you you have to have somebody with a strong vision and I don't mean to um you know besmirch the name of Schumacher he just recently passed and he did a lot of other great work love the Lost Boys you know so it's not like he's a he was a bad director far from it.
SPEAKER_04:But I don't think that he was the right visionary to to pass the reins off to and you know it I don't know if you necessarily have had to have a love of of Batman. I I really don't know the backgrounds of Burton or Nolan in terms of whether or not they're already fans of this character and were comic book people but you you have to have a really strong vision and I think you have to be able to tap into something even if you're not a fan of the character or comic books. And I think Burton did that really well and then Nolan did that really well and he just was so ill suited and I think that you know you've been saying this whole time in terms of the world and the characters it starts at the top same goes for a production and I I he just wasn't the right person. And I think he chose to focus on all the wrong things. And unfortunately it it makes for now these two films that people just love to smack around and joke about it is fun.
SPEAKER_02:You know what it reminds me of though in all honesty I I hesitate to go here. Okay. But so Burton had created this world and it's obviously very different from the the different perspective Nolan took on Batman but but Burton had this his vision of of Batman and then he was no longer involved that kind of they get kind of an outline of what this world of Batman includes and they just didn't do a good job of of moving that forward. It's like this other popular uh series that was on HBO where these guys had kind of like an outline to run with and it just didn't end well. It just didn't end well. Of course I'm talking about Game of Thrones.
SPEAKER_00:Right, right yeah DD guys yeah yeah everything you were talking about just reminding me of it's a good comparison it's a fair comparison it's lost it's they got lost in their story too you know I mean they just couldn't they couldn't wrap it up they couldn't put a big button on it I think maybe Tim Burton was probably just interested in doing things doing other things.
SPEAKER_04:He had a lot of great movies that came after that yeah look he had so many he had so many projects to cast Helena Bottom Carter in he just had to move on to get to those and John A down yes I well you know what she can she can read the phone book on camera as far as I think there and listen she is a great actress and honestly one of my favorite roles that she's in is completely non-Tim Burton I love her in Fight Club so yeah she's great in Fight Club yeah she was absolutely great in Fight Club I mean she was not underwritten she was like the most compelling thing to happen when she came on camera during that movie I thought um I I just want to say Tom that this has been fantastic like well thank you yes I agree this has been a great conversation uh awesome I you and you know what I've never failed to be impressed by our guests and maybe it's just you know kismet and and luck in terms of like we get these people who like very sincerely have deep feelings and passion for the film that we're talking to them about but this is certainly no exception like you have brought to the table so many interesting per perspectives on the film and and really the series as a whole so this has been awesome. Really really enjoyed talking to you about this film.
SPEAKER_02:I have had questions before on whether or not the Joker should have been able to take down the Batwing with that hilariously long gun. And so that's what I'm taking out of this is confirmation that no that wouldn't work.
SPEAKER_00:I'm so glad you brought that up so like we're not the only ones thinking that uh yeah really I mean it there it's just that Batman was just as new of a superhero as Joker was as a supervillain. Yeah. Uh and I just like he was like where does he get these wonderful toys but then he could shoot one out of the sky and where'd you get yours where'd you get that rod man? Look at that. Well on that note to do this this is so great.
SPEAKER_04:I love doing this stuff I could sit and I could talk 12 more minutes about well that's actually the most perfect segue because I wanted to ask you know again we there's a this like strange disclaimer that we bring up with all of our guests about how we're just in strange times and we talk to so many wonderful creatives who maybe aren't quite doing the things they would normally do. But uh I would love to see what you've been up to and what you have going on.
SPEAKER_00:Well I tell you what yes this has been a very very strange time uh me and my wife are doing a lot of homesteading right now a lot of bread baking and a lot of vegetable growing so that you know we've been really trying to stay home and make the best of of staying inside because we do think that that's very important. The only times we go outside are not not very often to enjoy myself I go for a bike ride and then I just try and whiz past people as quickly as possible. Creatively uh I I am Velvet Tom. I am a lover loser legend lounge act velvet tom and I decided with this uh this time to do something that I've been wanting to do for a long time and that is the same platform as this to start a podcast. So I started an interview podcast uh called Bad Timing with Velvet Tom because uh A I can't believe that there wasn't a podcast called Bad Timing so I'm glad I got the name uh from it but uh also it's just terrible timing to be doing something like this like but not because I think people I think my guests so far have appreciated uh the time to connect because yeah uh because isolation is sort of the name of the game if we're going to if we're going to take care of this uh this coronavirus and this pandemic at all uh so we try and reach out at all different media and platforms and thank god for technology these days I mean imagine this happening even like imagine this being 9-11 you know happening exactly in 2001 and and how difficult it would have been to be connected so I went ahead and a podcast no Netflix no nothing um well no you would have had to wait for the damn DVDs in the mail that's true yeah yeah and get those and then uh so the podcast is basically uh it's mostly people in the arts and just interviewing them and finding out what they're doing during this time that's awesome and how they're being creative where can uh where can our listeners find your podcast uh anywhere you listen to podcasts except for Spotify I haven't been on that platform but you can listen on SoundCloud Stitcher iTunes it's called Bad Timing with Velvet Tom uh most of my interviews have been women in the arts so it seems like that that is my biggest focus is most of it has been actors models a friend of mine that I did uh Velvet Tom show with the Velvet Tom cabaret hour that I used to perform at three clubs a few years ago Ariel Hartman is one of my comedy partners so her and I have a big two-parter where we're just sitting there talking with one another and just laughing our faces off. So um so it seems like the focus is women in the arts. I have a new episode dropping tomorrow uh with uh director Debbie Bradshaw and her and I have a lot of parallels we found out that we lived parallel lives in Chicago but we never met until 2013 at Langer's Deli out here in LA that is so cool I love that so listen for that I took July off so we're starting back August and we're just and I try and do once a week. Perfect and also on Instagram I uh I on my at Velvet Tom uh I think I'm gonna start doing a weekly live show called it's whatever day of the week it is with Velvet Tom. That sounds amazing uh and also on Facebook I've been doing this just uh I do Facebook live every Monday Wednesday and Friday I've been doing mad libs with people I got these two big uh tablets of mad libs if you remember what those are sure do yeah love the mad libs so I do that three times a week uh with people and they come on give me suggestions and then I read back what we created to them and so and people have been really liking that I mean that is just a way to check out for people is to make up funny stuff. So that's what I've been doing creatively to stay busy. I tried the free fender guitar stuff so I tried again to teach myself guitar and holy shit are you kidding me last failed.
SPEAKER_02:So now now we are living parallel lives because I have I have started that same process.
SPEAKER_00:Oh you have yeah I don't know how it's gonna work but my fingers hurt I I liked what I learned at the beginning there was just no real consistency for me to pick up the guitar and keep playing uh I think I'm just a singer I just think I like that instrument I think I just like my voice that you know it's easier to tune up it's it's in me so I can maintain it you know I don't have to buy strings for it. Awesome.
SPEAKER_04:We love your voice too.
SPEAKER_02:Oh well thank you thank you very much I would love to listen to it for the next seven minutes at least but but thank you again so much for for taking the time to to go through not just 1989's Batman but all basically all the Batman 36 of them so many Batmans really so many Batmans.
SPEAKER_00:When there's another Batman we know who to reach out to we know who we're calling and we will with the Bat cycle is it me I don't it's gonna be you're gonna be you I will I'll I'll bone up on my Batman I'll even watch Afflex Batman if that's what it takes.
SPEAKER_04:That was going to be a contingency all right Tom take care and thank you. Thank you I love you guys thank you so much love you and we're back from our fantastic conversation with Tom Farnan we again thank you lover loser legend legend yes so we appreciate so much him bringing to the table a lot of really interesting perspectives on the film and you know what said it before say it again I mean our guests come through so big every time with just having really interesting things to talk about with all of our movies and this was no exception. So yeah that was awesome. Okay so actually this might be the first time in a little bit in like a minute that this is maybe like a legitimate question. Oh would you I know okay so like I know you're gonna watch the film again yeah but like are you gonna watch the film again?
SPEAKER_02:Well I mean I mean for most of the movies that we've brought up like would you watch it again? Yeah if it's on I don't I don't know like there are fewer of them where I'm actually gonna make a point of watching it from start to finish again. But if it's on I'm always gonna watch like this one Batman Returns I do like those. If I turn it on because I just see like oh there's a Batman thing on and then I see George Clooney or Val Kilmer I might be changing channels pretty quickly uh because I have seen those I've seen them a couple times but this this first one um yeah I I really enjoy it and I think it has a special place in just kind of like the world of comic book cinema.
SPEAKER_04:So yeah I would cool I mean for me I I think it's actually happened not too uh long ago where they were ha they were running the films on television and you know for this first one it's kind of like okay well if you like want to have it on and I'm like doing something else on my computer cool no problem. In contrast and I've made this like really evident at this point if like I see that Batman Returns is on if you see Danny DeVito in a little bodysuit with flippers I'm watching it yeah I'm like really gonna watch it. So that's just kind of a little bit of a difference for me. Yeah but you know we talked about call to action I don't know I really can't think of anything other than that uh Jack Nicholson question. Although the the one thing that I was kind of thinking about is this is it's unfair though because it kind of pertains more towards like the real true comic book fans. We keep kind of seeing a little bit of a repeat with the types of villains that that we're seeing in all these different kinds of films. Yeah and so is there somebody else out there that you would want to see in a Batman movie.
SPEAKER_02:I mean we've seen Joker oh so many times um I there's so many different like Batman and Joker stories and they really do play each other in the comics in a way where they're like inseparable really but the way that that's been portrayed in the movies it makes it feel like they're kind of trying to do the same thing every time because we're getting a different version of them. Right. So it's like we're it it kind of takes you out of it. You don't you never get a chance to see like successive interactions with the same Batman and Joker because they're always just like rehashing stuff.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah that's actually a really interesting point that we're bringing up at the very tail end of our podcast. But that is really interesting that there's kind of this like finality to oh okay the good guy beat the bad guy so the next movie we're gonna talk about a new bad guy.
SPEAKER_02:It's never really over with the Joker.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like anyways uh so so my question would be not necessarily about the different villains but who would you like to see as Bruce Wayne? Who do you think would be a good we're we know who we're getting in the next one. Yeah but if you could cast anyone you wanted to who would you have in in that role?
SPEAKER_04:Also fair question. Tom Sellick Okay So moving on to our sneak peek for our next episode that will be coming up two weeks from now.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah what is it?
SPEAKER_04:The ne the ending story Wow all right I mean it's I know that the I know that the vocal chops aren't exactly there but I just love that song and I love that movie.
SPEAKER_02:So my my second call to action is Oh no what's your favorite what's your favorite moment of never ending story so that we can feature it at the beginning of of that episode.
SPEAKER_04:Good job.
SPEAKER_02:We're always looking for new fun little bits to put at the beginning of the episode so tell us what your favorite moment is in never ending story and maybe you'll hear it when the episode begins.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah no that's actually a really good good call and so that people can do that if they feel so inclined.
SPEAKER_02:Where would they even how would they let us know?
SPEAKER_04:They can let us know through Facebook or Twitter or Instagram. We have the same handle for all three it is at 80s montage pod and 80s is 80S and that's about it. So yes two weeks from now never running story very excited thank you for being with us.
SPEAKER_02:We'll see you then