For those who’ve listened to GWC #195 and would like to weigh in with their own opinion on who’s the best movie Batman, here’s the poll!
Val Kilmer.
Okay so here’s the thing its hard to separate the best movie from the best batman but the portrayal of batman is linked to the script. Now i’ll admit it batman returns is by far my favorite batman movie. I know most don’t agree but as i also voted for Michael Keaton as the best batman. Clooney doesn’t rank cause well that movie doesn’t really count and i’d just like to forget it ever happened. Bale was just full on the scary side of batman and nothing else. Val Kilmer was just a little bland in the role; not sure if thats on him or the script but either way he was forgetful in the role. I do think he could have played an awesome Batman in the right movie. as Sean said watch the saint, and see how good he could have been in batman. Now to Adam west. well i always hated the original show even as a kid. so i guess i’m biased in this account. I can see the way they went with trying to go full on comic light, but it always just seemed dumb to me. and finally to my fav Keaton, he was dark enough, as batman. Light enough as Bruce wayne, and slightly uncomfortable in both characters, and thats the batman i love.
I went with Mike too. I’ve always liked Keaton and thot he could put a pretty decent edge to his characters when called upon, and this role was perfect for him. He has a look in his eye that can be pretty dark. He can do sarcasm and humor well too, and he doesn’t sound like he’s talking through a kazoo.
And come on Chuck, Mr Mom a negative? I love that movie! 
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the Christian Bale Batman as well, and I appreciate the really dark darkness that he’s brought to the Dark Knight. But a little tiny bit of fun wouldn’t kill him, would it?
here’s a re-run of my rant from the #195 thread:
/ rant
I didn’t listen to #195 yet, but here’s my standard rap against the pre-Bale Batman movies.
First, though, West was an acceptable Batman. He has a small voice role in the Disney animated feature Meet the Robinsons. I hear that voice, and I think, “Now THAT is a hero.”
Nicholson’s Joker never impressed me. He’s Daffy Duck.
Among the countless deficiencies of the Burton/1990s Batman movies, here’s one of my chief gripes: The directors cast the actor to be Bruce Wayne, not The Batman.
Wayne/Batman is – among other things – an Olympic-caliber athlete who’s spent his life studying hand-to-hand combat in preparation for a life combatting crime. A guy like that is going to have a certain build. The Batman as portrayed in the Bale/Nolan movies is the first one to really acknowledge the physical realities of what Batman would be like.
I’m a big fan of Keaton, I like Kilmer, and Clooney is cool. But they’re they’re all just playing Batman.
/rant off
Originally Posted by CylonMATRIX
What is remarkable about Keaton is that he is equally capable of being the Joker as well as Batman.
That’s a great point. Keaton should have been huge, but he just fizzled somewhere along the line. He would have made a much better Joker.
At the time of the first Batman movie, there was some idle speculation that Christian Slater could be the Joker, and play him along the lines of the Killing Joke presentation of the character, make him more of a yin-yang with Batman. That would have been great. Let’s face it, the 80s-90s Batman movies, the scripts were no great shakes.
I remember, back in '92, there was in the comics, a darker, taller (and kinda ripped) version of the Joker, holding a big-ass handgun. Much like a counterpoint to Bale’s batman, but 17 years earlier.
Heath Ledger’s Joker was quite close to that, but his was an anarchist through and through, and not the criminal genius depicted in that comic I mentioned (so sorry I’m crap at quoting comic book issues #)
If I could put Michael Keaton’s portrayal inside of Christian Bale, that would be the winner. Best quote from any of the movies is when Kim Bassinger and some dude wander into an enormous hall filled with suits of armor from around the world. They are talking about the mysterious Bruce Wayne and wondering what he looks like. Michael Keaton walks up behind them as they ask the question out loud,
“I wonder where that armor is from”
“Japan” Michael Keaton responds. They look at him doubtfully.
“How do you know that?” she asks, almost rudely.
“I bought it in Japan.”
BOOM. Realization that they are in fact talking to Bruce Wayne. Classic.
Wow it’s interesting to compare this poll to the previous poll. I picked Keaton’s Batman as the best, even though I prefer the newer movies with Bale. Keaton just has a better all around Batman/Bruce Wayne IMO
I voted for Christian Bale, but I feel like I need to quantify that: Christian Bale in Batman Begins is, to me, the best film portrayal of Batman. In The Dark Knight, he overacts a little bit by overdoing the rasp, but in Batman Begins it has just enough snarl as to bring chills down my spine. Particularly in this scene:
Michael Keaton was fine, back in the day, but Tim Burton’s version of Batman hasn’t, in my mind, aged too well. I like my Batman gritty, and Burton’s, while grittier than the Adam West TV version, just had enough camp under the surface to make it unpalattable to me 20 years later (and the less said about Joel Schumaker’s take in Batman Forever and Batman and Robin the better, as far as I’m concerned).
I do think Gary Cole’s animated Batman deserves an honorable mention. After all, he did have at least one movie, Mask of the Phantasm, which is very good.
Yeah, that’s a cute scene, but it doesn’t belong in a Batman story. That’s more Spiderman, if Spiderman were a multi-millionaire and not a teenager with cash flow problems. Snarky comments are Spidey’s department, not Batman’s. Bruce Wayne is a seriously damaged soul who becomes so obsessed with his parents’ deaths as to subsume his psyche into the persona of Batman. When there’s humor in Batman, I think a very dry sarcasm is the way to go. Mark Waid wrote some great humor for Batman in this vein in Kingdom Come back in 1996.
Back when I used to read DC comics–or any comics, before they got too pricey for me–I liked something I read in a letters section or somewhere comparing Batman and Superman: Superman is the mask Clark Kent wears. Bruce Wayne is the mask Batman wears. This sense of BRUCE being the mask is something Chris Nolan has gotten right, for me. Batman can’t have any normal relationships. He can’t havea normal life. The closest he gets to that is as Bruce Wayne, and he’s too much of a D-bag as that persona to get too close to anyone.
Val Kilmer. It’s been years since I’ve seen “Batman Forever,” but it’s the only Batman movie I really enjoyed watching.
“The Dark Knight” is the best Batman movie, hands down, but Christian Bale just bores me. He’s a good actor, but he’s not engaging. And I really, really dislike Tim Burton movies, and after watching them both (the first one for the second time), there’s just no way I can vote for him.
Kilmer forever!
Michael Keaton, hands down. He is the only Batman that can look threatening with a smirk on his face. Christian Bale as an actor lacks, and although he plays a great Bruce Wayne (where as Keaton is a little weak), as Batman he leaves much to be desired (cough the voice cough).
But that’s just me.
This is poll is all good for the live action Batmen but i would have chosen Kevin Conroy who voiced the Animated series.
How can you be a good actor and not be engaging? I would think those two qualities were mutually exclusive.
His voice was appropriate for a billionaire trying to disguise his voice while getting up to some down and dirty vigilantism. Anything ‘lacking’ in his role as Batman came directly from the script, especially in the second movie where he wasnt even the main focus.
This is what I get for posting when I’m sleepy.
I’ve liked Bale in other roles, but as Batman, particulary in ‘Batman Begins,’ he really bores me. Granted, that whole movie bored me, so I don’t blame him entirely; thankfully I had Ledger in ‘Dark Knight’ to keep me interested.
I will reiterate what I said in the previous poll.
Prior to Batman Begins, the Burton movies are the best of the lot. However, in both Batman & Batman Returns, I always get the feeling that Tim Burton is more itnerested in making a Tim Burton movie than a Batman movie. Keaton does well with what he’s given & with Nicholson as his foil it makes that performance that much better. This is simply because Nicholson has the ability to make the people around him better.
Christian Bale with Batman Begins has a better script, a director who understands the material and a cast who is more interested in acting than stroking their ego’s because they’re in a Batman movie! Overall it’s a far superior offering out of all of them.
In The Dark Knight Bale plays the intensity too far. I can forgive him for that playing against a Joker that intense takes some serious skill to not just fade away. Let’s be honest here, the star of that movie was not Batman, it was Joker. I still think it was overall, a better movie than any of the 90’s films. It would have been better if they had ended it after the explsion & did the Harvey Dent story as a seperate movie. Quite honestly I think that’s really the biggest mistake of the entire thing. They tried too much. The rest IMO is just nit picky.
So in closing, Bale overall is the better Batman, because he has better tools to work with.
When has Tim Burton ever not done a Tim Burton film? J/K He is afterall a very stylized director.
I’m holding out on this poll until I have seen the other two Batman films. I have yet to see ‘Batman & Robin’ and ‘Batman Forever’. At the moment, I’m leaning toward Bale. It should be kept in mind that Nolan’s Batman follows a progression. Bale is portraying a tortured soul without the wisdom that will come with maturity. Keaton captures that wisdom and patience in his version but Bale is playing a very young Bruce Wayne/Batman.