Daily Batman: Year of the Cat

“Year of the Cat” by RealityMisfit06 on the d.a.

You’ve probably heard by now that Anne Hathaway, as I speculated and fervently hoped in the past, has been cast as Selina Kyle in the new Christopher Nolan film The Dark Knight Rises.

I’m reading sassy molassy left and right about how Ms. Hathaway is unsuited to the role because she is “too nice” and wholesome. I guess you just don’t know her like me, fans of Havoc, GQ readers, the FBI, and the Vatican do.*

I predict this beautiful, complex, and plenty dark actress will prove the doubters wrong. Yes, I’m biased, because I’ve said before that she’s one of the best and most interesting actresses out there today, but even I am prone to take the long view when it comes to my number-one all-time favorite comic book character, so I hope my defense does not get dismissed out of hand.

I further add that she has merely been cast as Selina Kyle, and we have no idea in what direction the character will go in this particular film, as Nolan is slowly developing his own universe in his Batman movies — and, as a final warning to those who are up in arms about this casting choice, you think all people everywhere in the world were in unanimous excitement when Michelle Pfeiffer was cast in Batman Returns? Was there unilateral rejoicing at the decision to put Halle Berry in the Catwoman movie of which it’s best I just stop speaking?

Of course not. This is an iconic character. There will always be rumblings of discontent, no matter what. All I can say is, remember how you felt when you first heard Heath Ledger was tapped as the Joker? Misgiving-less? I wasn’t: I thought it was an inexplicable and potentially terrible decision. And how do I feel about that choice now? How do you?

Exactly.

Give Nolan, and the lovely and talented Anne Hathaway, a chance.



*The Vatican?? What am I talking about? Answer: I’m talking about taste in men almost as historically bad as that of your hostess. Read all about the sad affair. Saw her mock herself on SNL for it, though. You have to really respect a good sense of humor.

Movie Moment — 12 Days of Highly Tolerable Holiday Movies: Batman Returns

When a corrupt businessman and the grotesque Penguin plot to take control of Gotham City, only Batman can stop them, while the Catwoman has her own agenda.

(the imdb)

Paul “Pee-Wee Herman” Ruebens and Diane Salinger, who was Simone in Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, do the ol’ cameo-for-a-pal gig as the Penguin’s parents. Ms. Salinger has also appeared in Ghost World, Charmed, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

[Screenplay writer Daniel] Waters “came up with a social satire that had an evil mogul backing a bid for the Mayor’s office by the Penguin,” Waters reported. “I wanted to show that the true villains of our world don’t necessarily wear costumes.” The plot device of Penguin running for Mayor came from the 1960s TV series episodes “Hizzoner the Penguin” and “Dizzoner the Penguin”.

(the wiki)

Something about the filmmaker’s eccentric, surreal, childlike images seems to strike a deep chord in the mass psyche: he makes nightmares that taste like candy.

(David Ansen. “A Gotham Gothic.” June 22, 1992. Newsweek.)

Burton’s given this borderline schizoid an equally unsettled love interest: Catwoman also has a double life. Formerly Max Shreck’s gawky, lonely secretary, Selina Kyle, she’s hurled out a window by her boss when he discovers she’s on to his nefarious scheme, and emerges from near death as the whip-cracking, man-hating avenger Catwoman.

(Ibid.)

Waters’s script never makes the rules of Selina’s back-and-forth switches into Catwoman clear, but what twisted, dirty fun Pfeiffer has with this role! …

They’re doomed lovers for the age of alienation, turned on by each other’s kinkiness.

(Ibid.)

Mistletoe can be deadly if you eat it.

But a kiss can be even deadlier if you mean it.

Mmm, no. Not really. Ingesting mistletoe is way worse. You can check it out, but I’m pretty sure the numbers will back me up.

All damaged children in disguise (none of them heroic), the dysfunctional half-menagerie can’t help but understand one another.

(Rita Kempley. “Batman Returns.” June 19, 1992. Washington Post.)

Even back in the days when Batman lived in comic books, his world was a little darker than, say, Superman’s. There was a shade of film noir in Gotham City, in contrast to the deco 1930s optimism of Superman’s Metropolis.

(Roger Ebert. “Batman Returns.” June 19, 1992. Chicago Sun-Times.)

You said you were only going to scare the Ice Princess.

She looked pretty scared to me!

Let me guess — rich goody-goody type?

But when it comes down to it, who’s holding the umbrella?

Click to enlarge the note. It reads, “Dear Penguin, The children regret they’re unable to attend.” I would have definitely guessed that Batman’s chosen handwriting style was printing in all caps, but I could not have predicted the personalized stationery. He is full of surprises.

Two lives left. I think I’ll save one for next Christmas.

I wish I could hand out World Peace and Unconditional Love, wrapped in a big bow.

You can’t go wrong with Christopher Walken! Crank it up while you’re wrapping gifts.

via.

For a movie that almost didn’t get made, Batman Returns did well for itself. It is a commercial sequel, yes, but as an entertaining and visually delighting film it’s a supreme success which rises head and shoulders above the dross and dreck like “Shrek the Halls.” A highly tolerable holiday film.

Daily Batman: Love madness edition

Drawing by ChOkOcristi on the deviantart.

Daily Batman: Movie Moment — Batman Returns

Batman Returns (Tim Burton, 1992). Screenplay by Daniel Waters.

Steamy couchy times with the Bat and the Cat. Who would predict, and what is that like?

SELINA
Well? Was “Vicki” right? About
your difficulty with duality?

BRUCE
If I said yes, then you might
think me a Norman Bates, or a Ted
Bundy type … and then you might
not let me kiss you.

SELINA
It’s the so-called “normal” guys
who always let you down. Sickos
never scare me. At least they’re
commited.

BRUCE
Then you’ve come to the
right lonely mansion.

BRUCE
I … never fool around on the
first date.

SELINA
Me neither, on the second.

BRUCE
So. What’re you doing three dates
from now?

Kicking some ass in the sewers.

All screencaps courtesy youdodoodletoo on the photobucket. Many hearfelt thanks!

Daily Batman — Take this phone and shove it

Oh, my stars and garters, yes. I hate the telephone. I had to spend all kinds of time on the phone yesterday wading through officious folklore and bureaucratic shenanigans, and, as a consequence, I’ve kept my phone off almost this whole day. I only turned it on when Miss D, knowing me too well, alerted me to the fact that she’d be calling in the late morning and I ought to turn my cell on at least until I heard from her. I did, and, once she called, I silenced it again.

I warned her that I think I am slowly transitioning toward abandoning phones as a method of communication altogether. It started with my hatred of texting and has steadily devolved since, to the point that I scowl any time I see someone with so much as a bluetooth earpiece strolling around. Ass, I think to myself, and actively begin to draw wide Borg comparisons. Go ahead, everyone else on Earth it seems, and do join the collective hive-mind of buzz and nothing-talk, but resistance is not so futile in my book. People will claim to hate their cell phones and act like it’s such a hassle to be tethered to everyone they know at all times, shrugging and alluding to the convenience of being able to instantly hear from colleagues or family, but the truth is mainly that you have just allowed the phone to become necessary, and to paraphrase Ms. Steinem, it is no more needed than a shrimp’s hipster fixie bicycle, even if he does have the coolest nalgene bottle evah, with a special attachment for him to hook it on the bike so he can take drinks at intersections and look like hot shit. (You know how shellfish care about appearances. Pfft. Sooo shallow. You’d never catch a catfish pulling that manner of chicanery.)

Look, I’m sure Alexander Graham Bell was a nice guy with nothing but good intentions who could not possibly have foreseen the midnight calls of drunk out-of-touch friends or robo-dialing mortgage adjusters who interrupt dinner, but when I run across him in Heaven, he’s getting a punch in the gut just the same.

Bonus Patricia Highsmith sketch because I can and she was the source of the quote that started this chain of luddite fit-pitchery. I do not have a Graham Greene sketch or I’d post one of him as well — The Destructors is a favorite short story from Way Back.

Daily Batman: It happens, Michelle Pfeiffer as Selina Kyle edition

Every now and then it happens that a kitteh-lady is wired a little differently in the heat-between-the-upstairs-downstairs department.

“It’s the so-called ‘normal’ guys who always let you down. Sickos never scare me. At least they’re committed.” — Batman Returns (1992).

Freak fetishes. They are a Thing.

Daily Batman: Look, ma, no gag reflex! edition

Catwoman not only sez sucks to yer parakeet, she also sez: “Look, Ma, no gag reflex!”

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!

Unlikely G: Scarface edition

Elvira Hancock, you money-grubbing whore-queen, I love you.

“Oh my god, gangster shit is hella boring.”