Batman (1943)

Absolutely Fantastic

A lot of fun.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Japanese spymaster Prince Daka operates a covert espionage organization located in Gotham City's now-deserted Little Tokyo which turns American scientists into pliable zombies. Batman might be one of my favorite characters of all time but this movie was just way too big of B-Movie material than A and even Adam West and George Clooney were way better than this mess. Plus what was up with the 4hrs and 20mins running time? This was just absurd in so many different levels to even just begin to express it. If you love Batman? Just skip this please. (0/10)

The 'serial world' has, as I've been for some years vaguely aware, its own fanbase which overlaps to a degree with that of vintage film in general; but on the basis of this, my first serial experience, I can't say that I'm a convert just yet.I wasn't expecting anything very sophisticated, and I can live happily with elements that others mock: non-ironic dialogue, costumes, special effects. Supposedly beyond-the-pale racism doesn't worry me much in the context of a wartime adventure, although I did boggle at the story-internal logic of the American government's carrying out a praiseworthy internment of all the slant-eyed Japs it could find, then apparently being surprised that those who evaded this round-up should be hostile! Inevitably, in low-budget live action, the imagination is expected to supply translation of certain trappings into their comic-book equivalents -- swirling capes, super-athletic leaps, sinister electric apparatus -- but to do actors and studio justice, they often manage quite well. Batman and Robin climb nimbly, drop convincing distances and do their best to sprint and leap in suitably heroic costumed pose; in the absence of modern fabrics, this Batman's tights have an admitted tendency to wrinkle, but he really doesn't merit the sarcastic 'Fatman' epithet. And as an actor, Lewis Wilson does a good job of differentiating charmingly ineffectual Bruce and his masterful alter ego.No, my problems with this serial were mainly with the sheer mind-numbing boredom that began to set in around Chapters Four to Ten. It was the massive degree of padding -- inside this fifteen-chapter epic, there is a reasonably-paced six- or seven-chapter story waiting to come out. It was, once the novelty of a superhero who loses his fights had worn off, the tedium of endlessly-repeated episodes in which Batman and/or Robin get beaten up and left for dead in order to provide the cliff-hanger of the week; in fact, it was, above all, the monotonous succession of flatly-resounding fists and bruisefree knockdowns that seemed to be the serial's staple diet. Whatever happened to insanely complicated evil schemes? What became of tying victims to train tracks, attaching them to rapidly-ascending hydrogen balloons, suspending them over pits of snakes with acid eating through the cord, or subverting their defences with irresistibly alluring Oriental houris? Watching a constant diet of rough-hatted gangsters trading punches got very dull very quickly. I felt like cheering every time a character actually got killed -- especially when this involved being eaten by ravenous crocodiles! The villains are, of course, regrettably stupid (the most interesting episodes are those in which they actually make some advance, posing a genuine threat to the heroes, rather than being constantly foiled). Perhaps the crowning example is when a man is put into suspended animation and revived momentarily by high technology before dying... all in order to *hand* over a message which could have been delivered far more simply in the same package without him! The scenario might at least have made it a cryptogram with a verbal key carried only by the doomed bearer...Daka is the most interesting opponent as he is the only one who is actually intelligent (he comes up with the more plausible theory that there is in fact a whole rival organization of uniformed Batmen, rather than a single one who perpetually survives reports of his certain demise!). Even when apparently defeated, he is constantly devising further expedients to reverse the situation, and our heroes, being lovable non-violent types, manage to dispose of him only by accident as Robin hits the wrong switch on the control panel; a twist that actually struck me as an ingenious in-character solution that preserved the respective abilities of both parties. (For originality, it certainly beats fighting the Evil Overlord on the edge of a precipice so that he can stupidly tumble in without your connivance.) The beginning of the serial looked mildly enjoyable, at an inoffensive 6/10. The final chapters, ten or so weeks later, pick up again on quality. But the middle chapters, where the villains have lost their superweapon in Chapter 1 and spend all their time trying to get fuel for a replacement and punching people in the interim, become a soporific and lengthy exercise in spending time getting nowhere. It isn't bad enough to be entertaining in itself -- it's just boring.Watching the entire run in one marathon cinema session is not, of course, the way this serial was ever intended to be seen, and it brings an unfair emphasis to the inevitably repetitious formulae of the genre. But to be honest, if I hadn't been thus trapped in front of the screen I doubt if I would have bothered to keep following the chapters week after week in the hopes that the plot would finally progress. Like certain recent TV series I could name, it would just have annoyed and bored me too much to stick it until the promised grand finale. I'm not the greatest of fans of the season-long 'plot arc', and I don't think I'm cut out to be a full-fledged member of the serial squadron just yet...

As serial addicts know, chapter plays are driven by a logic all their own, a logic which often ignores plausibility. Viewers should always check their common sense in the lobby to enjoy these old cliffhangers. "Batman" is no exception and contains some especially enjoyable lapses of credulity.My favorite "Batman" moment involves the message that the captain of a Japanese submarine wants to impart to spymaster Daka. Although he speaks to him on short wave radio, he does not give him the message directly but tells him to follow "Plan 92," a labarynthian scheme which involves sending his henchmen to Smuggler's Cove to pick up a coffin that is only be accessible at low tide. Why the message was not communicated while they were speaking to each other directly is not explained. Instead of using a more discreet truck or van to transport the coffin, Daka orders his men to contact a third-party local funeral parlor to transport the coffin back to the ring's headquarters. The audience can only surmise what the henchmen could possibly say to the undertakers to explain why a coffin would be on partially submerged rocks near a beach that wouldn't arouse suspicion. When the coffin does arrive, it shows no sign of having been underwater and contains the body of a uniformed Japanese soldier. Daka explains that he is in a state of "animated suspension" and revives him with smoke-filled electrical charges directed a la Dr. Frankenstein into his wrists. Although the soldier will only be conscious for "a few moments" before dying with finality, Daka wastes time by first welcoming him to the country that will soon become "a colony of Japan's expanding empire." The soldier sits up with difficulty, delivers the Banzai greeting and conveys the message that the henchmen should steal the Lockwood plane, (one of the film's MacGuffins), and rendezvous with the submarine at Pelican Island. Before he dies, the soldier rips a button off his uniform, gives it to Daka, and tells him it contains more information. Why the information is formatted this way is also unexplained. He then dies with finality, only too happy to have given his life for the Emperor.The rationale which required the death of a soldier and the coffin to convey a byzantine message that could have been communicated directly by radio is left a mystery. Serials usually omit logical explanation. In another delightful scene, Daka orders Batman brought into headquarters inside a coffin so that he can feed him to his pet crocodiles. Actor J. Carroll Naish obviously relished playing the sadistic Zaca, and his scenes involving him feeding the crocodiles roasted chickens from a zombie's picnic basket are among the film's most enjoyable. When the coffin carrying Batman arrives, Zaca doesn't seem to want to open the coffin in order to confirm that the Caped Crusader is indeed inside it and summarily orders the six foot pine box thrown into the narrow, constricted crocodile pit. It obviously hits at least one of his beloved pet crocs on the head, and, even if the heavy wooden box didn't injure him, it would have severely restricted further movements of the reptiles in the narrow confines of their habitat. Why not simply take the body out of the coffin first? Any serial lover will know the answer. The body is one of Daka's henchmen, not the Dark Avenger, inside the pine box. Later on, when the crocodile pit is shown, the pine coffin has mysteriously vanished. So much for logic and continuity!

Back in the 1940's while war was raging, movie houses hosted movie serials to the people. This was DC comics first attempt as far as movie serials are concerned and its about time that this was released on DVD. Lewis Wilson was the first man to put on the cape and cowl and since then we have had some good batman movies and some bad batman movies. But this one is started the ball rolling. Lewis Wilson is no longer with us and He will always be knows as the first actor to play Batman. True and fact you don't see Batman go into his utility belt to grab a batarang or go into a bat mobile for that matter, you do however see him and robin use there fists on fighting crime. I really love this serial and i'm glad that this is out on DVD where it belongs. and its about time also