Batman: The Movie [Blu-ray]When Batman (Adam West) and Robin (Burt Ward) get a tip that Commodore Schmidlapp (Reginald Denny) is in danger aboard his yacht, they launch a rescue mission. But the tip is a set-up by four of the most powerful villains ever, who seek to defeat the Dynamic Duo once and for all! Armed with a dehydrator that can turn humans into dust, the fearsome foursome intends to take over the world! Can the Caped Crusaders use their high-flying heroism and groovy gadgetry to declaw Catwoman (Lee Meriwether), ice the Penguin (Burgess Meredith), upstage the Joker (Cesar Romero), and stump the Riddler (Frank Gorshin) in time?Holy camp site, Batman! After a fabulously successful season on TV, the campy comic book adventure hit the big screen, complete with painful puns, outrageous supervillains, and fights punctuated with word balloons sporting such onomatopoeic syllables as “Pow!,” “Thud!,” and “Blammo!” Adam West’s wooden Batman is the cowled vigilante alter ego of straight-arrow millionaire Bruce Wayne and Bruce Ward’s Robin (a.k.a. Dick Grayson, Bruce’s young collegiate protégé) his overeager sidekick in hot pants. Together they battle an unholy alliance of Gotham City’s greatest criminals: the Joker (Cesar Romero, whooping up a storm), the Riddler (giggling Frank Gorshin), the Penguin (cackling Burgess Meredith), and the purr-fectly sexy Catwoman (Lee Meriwether slinking in a skin-tight black bodysuit). The criminals are, naturally, out to conquer the world, but with a little help from their unending supply of utility belt devices (bat shark repellent, anyone?), our dynamic duo thwarts their nefarious plans at every turn. Since the TV show ran under 30 minutes an episode (with commercials), the 105-minute film runs a little thin–a little camp goes a long way–but fans of the small-screen show will enjoy the spoofing tone throughout. Leslie H. Martinson directs Lorenzo Semple’s screenplay like a big-budget TV episode minus the cliffhanger endings. –Sean Axmaker
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Review by Christoph B. Gondek for Batman: The Movie [Blu-ray]
Rating:
The key things to know about the DVD are:
1) The colors jump off the screen, it is a great transfer
2) The featurette with Adam West (Batman) and Burt Ward (Robin) is good, though they cover a lot of the same ground in the commentary
3) The Batmobile feature is very cool
4) The commentary is awesome. Adam and Burt have a great chemistry and really seem to love both the movie and the show. Their tongues are firmly in their cheeks druing the commentary (Adam West’s views on Bruce Wayne alone are worth the price of admission), but you will learn about the production and such secrets as:
Why did ABC tear down the Batcave so quickly after cancellation?
What did Burt Ward really think about the BatCycle?
How and why did Lee Meriweather get to play Catwoman?
Why did Adam and Burt have to spend two hours each week getting oxygen at the Fox infirmary?
The team at Fox had a lot of love for this movie and it shows. Buy this DVD and get Fox to release some series episodes with Adam, Burt, Julie Newmar (Catwoman) and Frank Gorshin (Riddler)doing commentary!