A 90 minute animated super-hero action/comedy film.
Gotham City is filled with diabolical villains whose master plans include locking up a stage band in a closet and gate crashing everyone's favourite TV program. They play musical instruments really badly and reveal their dastardly plot via confounded puzzles that only a genius of dubious reasoning could solve. Thank goodness for Batman is here.
Everything that made the 1960s Batman and Robin so charming and funny is here with spades on. Sorry
that should be, 'with bat-spades on.' Those inducted into Batman lore will note lots of references to other movies. For the rest just enjoy the fun.
The animation is very well done. The 2D and 3D elements are well crafted together. I particularly appreciated the camera panning homage around the bat mobile.
Adam West, Burt Ward and Julie Newmar returned to voice their roles from the classic Batman TV shows of the 1960s. There were other Batman adaptations for the movies before him (Lewis Wilson anyone?) but Adam West is the one we all remember.
Julie Newmar got her deserved place back in this movie. She played Catwoman in the original TV series but was replaced by Lee Meriwether in the 1966 Batman movie. Lee might have been prettier but that's not all you look for in Catwoman. When it comes to filling out a cat suit to the correct proportions there was none finer than Julie.
Batman, Return of the Caped Crusader was expected to go straight-to-DVD but it did get a short cinema release. One showing in the Vue was all there was in Blackpool. Our group was the first to arrive and my imagination of a horde of boisterous youths throwing popcorn at the screen did not occur. We all sat in a polite little block in the centre seats and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The pre and post film extras were fun; I hope and expect they'll find their way onto the DVD too.
I was surprised when I saw the film was PG rather than U. There is nothing in the movie that very young children will find distressing though they will not appreciate all the humour. The range of flash cards; {kpow}, {splat} here included such words as, {fracture} but that hardly counts as an increase in the level of violence.
The types of humour used in this movie include; droll, parody, farce, screwball and slapstick. All delivered with a very straight face. If you enjoy those then sign up.
Who won't enjoy this movie? Batman purists may lift their nose and turn away. The 1960s TV shows were parodies of the comics and don't take the material seriously in any way. This film does the same. If you are a critical comic fan and believe Batman should have a dignified portrayal then you will not like this.
"To the bat-(append your contraption here)."
