BATMAN AND ROBIN (1949)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*

FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*

CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological*


Two bat-flights this time out, one sanctioned by DC Comics as a legitimate adaptation of BATMAN, the other meant to ride the coattails of the sixties' successful Bat-teleseries. (Note: originally I paired this with a review of a Mexican BATWOMAN movie.)

In my review of the 1943 Batman serial, I said that although the production values were "cheapjack," director Lambert Hillyer occasionally gave certain scenes an Expressionistic flair in keeping with the original inspirations of the comic book series.  The serial also benefitted from a pleasingly hateful villain, even if he isn't politically correct in modern times.

In contrast, Columbia's second and last Batman serial lacks any virtue except the sort of fast action characteristic of serial-king Spencer G. Bennett.  Unfortunately, because the budget still isn't good enough to give the titular heroes decent costumes, the action-scenes look much less impressive than in Bennett's strongest serial-works, such as 1943's MASKED MARVEL.  Robert Lowery takes over the role of Batman but doesn't manage the Zorro-esque charm of the previous actor, while John Duncan rarely impresses watchers with anything but the sense that he's far too old to be a "boy wonder."

The serial does at least score with a powerful masked villain, the Wizard, who boasts abilities of hypnotism and (eventually) invisibility.  However, his main raison d'etre is that he commands a machine that allows him to control cars and other motor-vehicles remotely, which seems like a rather punk device next to, say, the Flying Wing seen in both 1937's DICK TRACY and 1938's FIGHTING DEVIL DOGS. There's not much suspense devoted to revealing the villain's identity in that the serial provides a prominant red herring but no "least likely suspects."  On the whole BATMAN AND ROBIN's best moments are those that proved unintentionally funny, as when Batman fights a hood who accidentally (?) rips off his cape, whereon the hero tries to re-don it during the fight.