23 years of Batman trailers, all in one spot...

Purely for fun, here is pretty much every single theatrical trailer for every single modern-day live-action Batman film, from Tim Burton's Batman way back in 1989 to the one I'm seeing tonight.  Do enjoy, and feel free to add your own qualitative rankings.

Scott Mendelson

Feast your eyes on Benjamin Andrew Moore's awesome 'History of the Bat-Suit'.

This chart of Batman's various batsuits from 1939 to today is beyond impressive.  The artist's name is Benjamin Andrew Moore.  HERE is his site and HERE is his Twitter handle.  Click on the picture to 'embiggen'.  No more commentary, other than that I'm enough of a Batman nerd to confirm the accuracy of nearly every quote he uses, and in some case can tell you what story they came from.

Scott Mendelson

Actual Batman 3 news! Marion Cotillard isn't Talia Al Ghul, Joseph Gordon-Levitt isn't Black Mask, Dr. Strange, or Alberto Falcone.

As usual, everything you think you know about The Dark Knight Rises is wrong. After months of 'rumors', Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotillard have been officially signed for the third Chris Nolan Batman picture. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Cotillard is not be playing Talia Al Ghul, but rather 'Miranda Tate, a Wayne Enterprises board member eager to help a still-grieving Bruce Wayne resume his father’s philanthropic endeavors for Gotham.' This is certainly a notable development on two fronts: A) It implies that Wayne's relationship with Rachel Dawes will not be tossed under the rug and forgotten in the wake of her murder in The Dark Knight. B) It also implies that Nolan may be getting away from the whole 'Bruce Wayne pretends to be an asshole so no one suspects he's Batman' shtick that I do so loathe. It's a classic trope of the comics over the last twenty-five years or so, but it remains a silly and self-defeating concept, as it neuters the theoretically much-greater potential for social good that Bruce Wayne can provide so Batman can run around at night and beat up muggers.

Actual Batman 3 news! Warner Bros confirms: Anne Hathaway to play Selina Kyle, Tom Hardy to play Bane.

Well, chalk it up to one part 'duh', another part 'huh?'. After months of obnoxious speculation, Warner has onfirmed that Anne Hathaway will indeed be playing Selina Kyle in The Dark Knight Rises. It's a pretty no-brainer casting decision, as she is one of the bigger and more respected stars of her generation, and she amongst the various alleged front-runners had the least amount of tentpole, genre film experience. Nolan had stated months ago that it was indeed his intent to have a female antagonist, and really there are only three major baddies to choose from: Catwoman, Talia Al Ghul, and Poison Ivy. Of those, Catwoman is by far the most recognizable and/or popular. Of course, the press release makes no mention of 'Catwoman', so it's completely possible that Hathaway will merely be playing Ms. Kyle with no appearance by her costumed alter-ego.

First Looks: From X-Men to Green Lantern, ten years of comic book-film trailers.

It's hard to believe that it's been ten years since the modern comic book movie revival kicked off with X-Men and (kinda-sorta) Unbreakable. With the lukewarm response to the trailers to Thor and Green Lantern, and the Nolan Batman franchise wrapping up, we may just be on the tail-end of this particular run. For the sake of my own amusement, let us take a quick trip down memory lane with the most memorable trailers in the current comic book explosion. After all, in many ways, getting that first glimpse was often more exciting than seeing the actual film. For the record, this list will only include originals; no sequels (with one exception that I'll point out). And away we go...

Batman Live on Stage to open in the UK next summer.

Oddly enough, my daughter has become enough of a Superfriends junkie (somewhat by accident) that she'd probably gladly tag along if/when this show ever reaches Southern California. I mean, I did buy her tickets to Yo Gabba Gabba Live for next Saturday, so she kinda owes me. The site (click on the image) is pretty jam-packed, with character bios and games galore. This thing opens in the UK summer 2011, and it will allegedly expand into North America the following summer (just in time to cash in on The Dark Knight Rises, natch). So yes, unless the reviews are truly horrendous, I will be dragging Allison to this thing in a couple years. If I'm nice, I might let Wendy stay home. The official press release and a video clip with interviews are both after the jump.

Scott Mendelson

DVD Review: Secret Origin: the Story of DC Comics (2010)

Secret Origin: The Story of DC Comics
2010
90 minutes
Not Rated

Available on DVD from Warner Home Video on November 9th

by Scott Mendelson

Secret Origin is, at best, a cliff-notes version of the 75-year history of DC Comics. Running just 90 minutes, the film barely scratches the surface of the illustrious publishing house that literary changed the country. Narrated by Ryan Reynolds, the film is a primer of sorts for the casual superhero fan, perhaps younger audiences who have just discovered the four-color legends. But considering that anyone who would purchase this $20 barebones disc (there's not even a scene index) is likely already a knowledgeable fan of the DC universe, it is disappointing that this entertaining piece of history doesn't dig a little deeper, or linger a little longer in the less-reported annals of comic book history. It is swiftly paced and never boring, but it feels truncated. It is less a genuine documentary than a piece of marketing that probably should have been included as a supplemental feature on a future DC Comics film or cartoon.

Wow, actual Batman 3 news! The Dark Knight Rises will be 2D, with no Riddler.

Maybe it's because I'm getting older, or maybe because the rumor mill has gone into hyper-drive over the last few years, but I've spent quite a bit of time rolling my eyes at the nonstop onslaught of false rumors and non-news regarding Chris Nolan's third and theoretically final Batman picture. Some random blog posts a random rumor, and every other site runs with it and offers their subjective commentary before said rumor is debunked. So, when actual news turns up, straight from Chris Nolan himself, it is a somewhat noteworthy event. Long-story short. Chris Nolan revealed in an interview with the LA Times that the third Batman film will not be shot in 3D. It will not feature the Riddler. And it will be titled The Dark Knight Rises. Oh, and there's looking for a female lead of some kind, but that's not really news.

RIP: Tom Mankiewicz (1942-2010) Want to read a 27-year old Batman screenplay from the man who helped save Superman: The Movie?

The great Tom Mankiewicz has died at the age of 68. He is not a household name to the geek community, but he should be. Aside from writing three James Bond pictures (Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die, and The Man With the Golden Gun), he is the man who more or less created the modern comic book film. He, along with Richard Donner, salvaged the first Superman picture back in 1978. As Donner and Mankiewicz discuss at length on the DVD commentary for the 'director's cut', the original Superman screenplay by Mario Puzo (author of The Godfather) was campy, jokey, and not terribly respectful of the legendary character known as the Man of Steel. It was Donner and 'creative consultant' Mankiewicz who revamped the project, bringing pathos, drama, reverence, and a tone of solemn importance to the first modern comic book epic. Without the work of Richard Donner and Tom Mankiewicz, there likely would have been no Batman, X-Men, Spider-Man, Iron Man, or The Dark Knight, to say nothing of the various comic book-influenced projects that followed (The Incredibles, Unbreakable, The Matrix, etc).

June 23rd, 1989 - twenty years later, how Batman changed the movie business.

Believe it or not, Tim Burton's Batman turns twenty-years old tomorrow. First of all, the sheer number of 'I can't believe this movie is twenty-years old' conversations only reminds us what a gloriously good year for movies that 1989 really was. A sampling of 'important' movies celebrating their twentieth anniversary - Field of Dreams, Do the Right Thing, Glory, Lonesome Dove, The Little Mermaid, When Harry Met Sally, and The Killer. The year's highest grossing film was arguably the most important. Not in terms of quality of course; it remains one of my favorite films but I'm not going to pretend that it was robbed at the Oscars. It left an indelible mark on the industry for the next twenty-years, in ways both very good and very bad. In the truest sense, Batman was a game-changer.

1) It made opening weekend king.
Most people don't realize this, but the opening weekend record was actually broken three times in a single month in the summer of 1989. The summer kicked off over Memorial Day weekend with Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, which grossed $29.3 million over the Fri-Sun portion of its five-day opening. Just three weeks later, Ghostbusters II just barely edged past with $29.4 million over its maiden days. But it was one week after that where Batman all but redefined just how much money a film could make over its first three days. It ended the weekend with a $40.4 million. It was the first mega-opening weekend for an industry that would eventually concentrate almost exclusively on those first three days as the cornerstone for a movie's success. Pure opening Fri-Sun insanity didn't completely take hold until summer 2001 (where three only somewhat anticipated movies - The Mummy Returns, Planet of the Apes, and Rush Hour 2 - opened north of $60 million), but Batman was the first to already be an unqualified smash hit after those first days. It surpassed its $35 million budget by Sunday. It crossed $100 million in ten days, crossed $150 million in nineteen days, and told Hollywood that short-term profitability was a possibility. Eventually, it would become the only goal.

2) It shortened the theater-to-video window.
The shocking record-breaking opening weekend had pundits predicting that it would overtake ET: The Extra Terrestrial ($399 million before the 2002 rerelease) as the highest-grossing movie of all time. But it was not to be, as it ended its run with $251 million - good enough for number 5. While the film had what today would be considered a leggy run (it dropped an average of 25% over its first six weekends), the film was played out quickly enough for Warner Bros. to announce its home video release for November 18th, 1989 (less than five months after the theatrical release). In an age where sell-through cassette tapes were still somewhat of a rarity, Warner Bros. made a point to rush out its theatrical champion onto the home video market well in time for the Christmas blitz. This set a pattern for the ever shortening window, which has been a key factor in declining theater attendance, a pattern that also effectively killed the second-run market less than a decade later. Ironically, this trend-setting experiment was a failure in this case. The videotape of Batman actually sold below expectations, and even the R-rated Lethal Weapon 2 (another Warner title, and possibly the first R-rated priced to buy VHS tape) outsold it. But the damage was done, and the theatrical release would eventually become a glorified marketing tool for the DVD release. That became even more of a problem when DVDs became so cheap to rent that consumers stopped buying them, leaving studios desperately in search of a new revenue stream.

3) It redefined the modern screen villain.
This honor must be shared with Die Hard, as they both helped rescue the screen villain from decades of general blandness. While there were exceptions here and there (Robocop, Star Wars), most onscreen antagonists were relatively generic punching bags and/or target practice for our stalwart heroes. Quick - name the villains from Lethal Weapon, The French Connection, or Beverly Hills Cop. But Die Hard and Batman made the iconic screen villain all the rage. Alan Rickman's Hans Gruber was every bit the superior of Bruce Willis's John McClane, and for the first time since Goldfinger, the modern-day villain was arguably cooler than the hero. A year later, Batman took the next logical step and crafted a villain who was more memorable than the hero, and one who got top-billing above the protagonist and exceeded him in screen time. Jack Nicholson's Joker made it cool for major actors to take villain roles in popcorn genre adventures.

As I wrote in a prior piece on comic book movie villains, Jack Nicholson broke the mold. Some may carp that it was just Jack being Jack in makeup, but we forgot how shocking this performance really was. There had never been a true comic book villain that was this over-the-top in cinema before. The nonstop cackling, the completely random and wholesale slaughter, and the genuinely perverse pathology, this was all new terrain for cinema. While his campier moments recall The Shining or The Witches of Eastwick, his quieter, subtler scenes actually resemble the work he did as Eugene O'Neil in Warren Beatty's Reds. Unlike Heath Ledger's deliberate, proselytizing anarchist, Jack Nicholson's Joker just committed mass murder purely for the hell of it. The success of Batman and the critical raves/popularity of Jack Nicholson's Joker ushered in a whole slew of scene-stealing villains, sometimes portrayed by actors who theoretically wouldn't be caught dead in a comic book or action adventure film. These days, when high-profile genre pictures are green lit, audiences expect, nay demand, that high-caliber actors like Jeff Bridges (Iron Man) and Willem Dafoe (Spider-Man) be on hand to attempt to steal the film away from our stalwart heroes.

4. Against type-casting is now cool.
It seems like an insane argument today, but the casting of Michael Keaton lit a firestorm of controversy that lasted right up until opening day. Hardcore Bat-fans, afraid that the film would be more like the 1960s Adam West TV show, howled in protest at the idea of Mr. Mom/Beetlejuice being cast as the Caped Crusader. Of course, Michael Keaton was also a capable dramatic actor, having just wrapped Clean and Sober. Once the first preview premiered (January 12th, 1989 on Entertainment Tonight), most fears were allayed as the 90-second clip showed both a viciously brutal Batman and a wantonly murderous Joker doing battle in a pitch-black Gotham landscape. Tim Burton's reasoning, that he wanted an ordinary-looking Bruce Wayne to become an extraordinary Batman, makes sense in hindsight and now is the norm for comic book casting (see - Toby McGuire as Peter Parker and Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark). Thanks to Batman (and yes, Die Hard), modern-day action heroism was no longer reserved for tree-trunk muscle men and monosyllabic bodybuilders. By the time the 90s were in full-swing, it was cool for 'serious actors' like Nicolas Cage to try their hand in action/adventure properties. By the 2000s, it was absolutely commonplace for Matt Damon to be a razor-sharp CIA assassin or for Keanu Reeves to save the bus and then the world with his understated wit and befuddled exacerbation.

5. Merchandise and Hype rules the day.
Not since Star Wars had we seen such an avalanche of merchandising tie-ins for a single film (and much of the Star Wars merchandise came after the film's release). For about sixth months prior to the release, Bat-Mania was in full swing. Hundreds of T-shirts, action figures, collectors’ cups, and the like were on every shelf in every store. One cannot overestimate the sheer amount of tie-in merchandise or free media that this movie received prior to the release date. In many ways, it was the first preordained non-sequel blockbuster. It was the first modern film that everyone was told that they should see and that they would like. That's the norm today, with pre-sold concepts are arguably the only thing being made by Hollywood for much of the year. Although, to be fair, that's as much to blame on the corporatization of studios and the growing importance of overseas box office. Jaws and Star Wars were the first modern blockbusters by any plausible standard. But Batman was the first film that was absolutely expected to become a blockbuster.

6. It made the PG-13 into the must-have rating.
The PG-13 was only four years old in 1989, and summer 89 was its first test. License to Kill was the first James Bond film not to be rated PG. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ended up with a PG-13, which was appropriate since the gruesome, but PG-rated Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was primarily responsible for creating the rating in the first place. But Batman was the movie whose PG-13 received the most scrutiny. Why should a film based on a beloved superhero be so dark and violent as to not be appropriate for young children? Pundits wondered whether the violence and darkness would affect the movie's take, or whether its 'hardcore' content would actually help it overcome the stigma attached to the campy television show. In the end, Batman became the highest-grossing PG-13 movie of all time, a ranking it kept for four-years until Jurassic Park in 1993. In the years that followed, the all-inclusive rating became so popular over the next twenty years that the R-rated and/or PG-rated genre picture have since become an endangered species. Of course, the FCC rule changes in 2001 (spearheaded by Joe Lieberman) didn't help, mandating that R-rated films could only be advertised at certain times on television and certain ways online and on billboards. Today, alas, every studio all but forces filmmakers to squeeze into that PG-13 bracket whenever possible.

7. Finally, it made strip-mining the way to go.
Unfortunately, the last twenty-years have climaxed with an avalanche of adaptations of every conceivable preexisting property. Batman was one of the first presold properties that turned into a full-on franchise (Superman had tried it ten years earlier, to mixed success). Batman made it cool and theoretically profitable to adapt preexisting comic books for feature-film adaptation. The genie was out of the bottle and studios were soon digging for treasure in their archives. Classic TV shows (The Addams Family, The Fugitive), classic video games (Tomb Raider, Mortal Kombat), and even actions figures (Transformers) were all the rage. Recycling became and now remains the dominant form of big screen entertainment. Now, thanks to a lack of imagination, as well as the sheer expense of making and marketing single feature film, studios are all but completely averse to anything that isn't theoretically presold. It's not Tim Burton's fault, anymore than Spielberg and Lucas are to blame for starting the blockbuster rush. But the 'so much money in so little time' performance of the first Batman created a whole new mentality that today grips the industry. The lessons learned included the ability to make money quickly, the ability to cash in on a presold property, and the importance of the opening weekend. Originality in Hollywood is all but dead, consumed by the allure of the preexisting franchise and the convenience of the presold product and preordained blockbusterdom that Batman first delivered. For better or for worse, Tim Burton's Batman changed the movie business forever.

Scott Mendelson

For more Batman-related essays of this nature, including a detailed character analysis of Bruce Wayne in the first four Batman pictures, an artistic defense of the 1960s TV show, and a debunking of the 'Dark Knight endorses Bush/Cheney' myth, go to Batman at the Movies at Mendelson's Memos.

The best comic book villains in film history...

Just for fun, here is a rundown of the best performances by an actor/actress playing a comic book villain in the short, 30-year history of the modern comic book film. Some will be obvious, some where obvious but were forgotten to time, some are my personal favorites that didn't get the love they deserved. Here we go:

5. Timothy Dalton as Neville Sinclair in The Rocketeer (1991)

The film bombed back in 1991 and it frankly hasn't aged well. There's very little rocket-action to justify the $50 million budget, and only the actors make it watchable (see Terry O'Quinn as the noble Howard Hughes!). But the one timeless ingredient is the deliciously fun work by then-Bond actor Timothy Dalton as the devious Neville Sinclair. While he got a few good notices, he was overshadowed that summer by fellow film-stealing villains Robert Patrick (the T-1000 in Terminator 2) and Alan Rickman (The Sheriff Of Nottingham in Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves).

Part swashbuckling hear-throb movie-star, part covert Nazi-spy, all bad ass. An obvious riff on the false rumors of Errol Flynn's alleged association with the Nazi party, Dalton has a blast basically playing a tongue-in-cheek version of his uber-tough James Bond characterization. It's a shame that Dalton couldn't play more heavies, as he certainly was too menacing and roguish to be a stereotypical hero. Whether it's 'accidentally' stabbing his costar during a staged fight scene, or effortlessly stealing 21-year old Jennifer Connolly away from bland hero Billy Campbell, Dalton makes villainy seem like the most romantic job around.

4. Gene Hackman as Lex Luthor in Superman (1978)

Gene Hackman was the first modern comic book super villain. Hackman's work was an odd combination of the deranged mad scientist of pre-Crisis Superman, with the eventual post-Crisis Lex Luthor who was a suave narcissistic gentleman with the will to wreak chaos to achieve his glory and respect. You can get away with a lot of ham when you're introduced pushing a federal agent into a moving train. Yes Luthor was hammy and comical, but he was still absolutely homicidal, with a truly creative and logical scheme. Plus he was genuine threat to the Man Of Steel. The conversation that the two of them conduct is still a lovely scene, and the idea of super hero and super villain just talking shop has been used all-too infrequently (see The Shadow for an even better example of this). Come what may, Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor has my favorite super villain line of all time:

Superman: "Is that how a diseased maniac like you gets his kicks, Luthor? By plotting the deaths of innocent people?"

Luthor: "Why no. By causing the deaths of innocent people."

3. Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn/Green Goblin in Spider-Man (2002)

Say what you will about the Power Rangers outfit, but Willem Dafoe still gives one of the most three-dimensional performances in any comic book adventure to date. Even as Osborn descends into madness as The Green Goblin, the sympathetic and surprisingly good-hearted Norman Osborn stays in our good graces. By maintaining this fully formed character of Norman Osborn for the duration of the film, Dafoe makes everyone step up their game, as well as put the audience in an odd position. Sure we know The Green Goblin is a homicidal lunatic, but we still like Norman Osborn and are moved when his Green Goblin personality conflicts with Osborn's genuine desire to be a good person. He truly anguishes over having to kill Peter Parker, and he genuinely apologizes to his son for not being a better father (he may have ulterior motives, but he means every word of it). And Parker and Osborn's final smack down is still one of the best, most vicious brawls in super hero cinema.

His scene conversing with himself in front of a mirror is astonishing, and his appearance at the Parker's Thanksgiving dinner is priceless. Not only does he manage to flirt with Mary Jane and Aunt May at the same time, but he also calls out Mary Jane for the emotionally insecure train wreck that she is (see Spider-Man 2 and Spider-Man 3 for proof). Plus, he's the only character to openly acknowledge that Mary Jane as presented is purely a piece of meat, which is how the film treats her. Norman Osborn may be the villain, but as performed by Willem Dafoe, he is the most honest and most three-dimensional character in the whole Spider-Man series.

2. Jack Nicholson, Mark Hamill, and Health Ledger as The Joker in Batman (1989), Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm (1993), Batman Beyond: Return Of The Joker (2002), and The Dark Knight (2008)
Pick your favorite, drag one down to prop one up, I prefer to savor them all. Given the chance to portray the most important villain in comic literature, if not all literature for the last seventy-years, all three actors gave us definitive versions of The Clown Prince Of Crime.

Jack Nicholson broke the mold in Tim Burton's Batman. Some may carp that it was just Jack being Jack in makeup, but we forgot how shocking this performance really was. There had never been a true comic book villain that was this over-the-top in cinema before. The nonstop cackling, the completely random and wholesale slaughter, and the genuinely perverse pathology, this was all new terrain for cinema. While his campier moments recall The Shining or The Witches of Eastwick, his quieter subtler scenes actually resemble the work he did as Eugene O'Neil in Warren Beatty's Reds. Unlike Heath Ledger's deliberate, proselytizing anarchist, Jack Nicholson's Joker just committed mass murder purely for the hell of it.

Mark Hamill's Joker didn't have much of a motive either. While the cartoon's kid-friendly format reined in the character's more sadistic behavior, the actor and the writers found places to insert the diseased mania and homicidal compulsion where they could (it was inferred that The Joker was bumping off people left and right in capers that we weren't privy to). Mark Hamill's Joker was scary because he was genuinely funny, and the kind of guy who you'd enjoy hanging out with until you realized he had poisoned you with Joker venom thirty-minutes ago. Aside from the lack of onscreen bloodshed, this was the most accurate representation of the character to date. When people read a Batman comic book featuring The Joker, it is Hamill's voice they hear in the dialogue bubbles.

But, in Batman Beyond: Return Of The Joker, the gloves came off (and then on again due to censorship, then off again in an unrated DVD release... long story). Technically a story of future Bruce Wayne with his young apprentice Batman, it concerned the apparent resurrection of The Joker about forty-years after his apparent demise. But the heart of the film is a ten-minute flashback sequence, Batman's final battle with The Joker, where The Joker launches his final scheme against Batman, a decisive strike intended to shatter Batman in the most personal way possible. Of all the films featuring The Joker, live-action or otherwise, this is the only one where The Joker's actions truly sting and shock and almost shame us for enjoying his murderous antics for all these years.

Ah yes, the new kid on the block. While countless words have been written about Heath Ledger's work, it should be said that he portrays a very specific version of The Joker. His Joker is almost sane, seemingly reasonable in his thinking, however we disagree with his intentions. He is not a wanton mass murderer, but a calculating and cunning killer who attempts to bring about maximum chaos with minimum carnage (note that he does not explicitly kill a single innocent civilian, targeting only cops, criminals, vigilantes, and officers of the court). As I've mentioned elsewhere, his Joker comes closest to the one written by Ed Brubaker, be it Gotham Cental's Soft Targets or The Man Who Laughs. This Joker is a plausible real-world demon, the kind of anarchist who could very well exist in our actual reality. He is not funny, his methods of death are ordinary (no Joker Venom, no acid-squirting flowers) and he doesn't take all that much joy in his actions. To this Joker, dealing death and inspiring paranoia is a duty, a holy quest to expose the fragile nature of so-called civilized behavior and society.

1. Al Pacino as Big Boy Caprice in Dick Tracy (1990)

What the hell? "Is he crazy?", you're thinking. Watch Dick Tracy again. You'll notice something: It's an incredibly sorrowful and sad motion picture, an adult drama about three people who excel at doing the thing that makes them miserable and can't find a way to break free. Dick Tracy is the best cop in the city, but he anguishes because he knows he's not making a dent in crime, and he knows that he's giving up any chance for happiness and a traditional family life with Tess Trueheart. When he stumbles upon The Kid, he immediate realizes that this could be the gateway to the family life he's wanted. Breathless Mahoney excels only at being a piece of ass. Sure she can sing, but no one would care if she didn't look like Madonna. She knows that she's doomed to either wither away alone as the conquest of one lowlife after another, or die at the hands of some random thug who thought her singing was just for him. Dick Tracy is the only man to be remotely kind and respectful to her, and she instantly falls for him, hoping that he may be her ticket out of her sordid life.

At the center of this hell, perhaps the cause, is Al Pacino's Big Boy Caprice. He is a criminal by trade. He may enjoy the riches that crime brings, but he takes no joy in the misery he creates. He yearns for respectability but knows that it cannot be attained. When he smacks his singers, abuses Breathless, and murders rivals like Lips Manlis, he knows full well what a bastard he is. He feels only guilt and shame in it. When he accidentally finds himself kidnapping Tess Trueheart at the end of the picture, he finds himself in the company of a woman who is beautiful on the inside and the outside. In a different time, in a better world, she could be his ticket out of his life of crime and depravity. But he knows that is not to be. Of all the villains and monsters and murderers that have graced the comic-book inspired silver screen, Big Boy Caprice is the only one dares to invite pity as well as scorn and/or a twisted idealization. The Joker may make being an amoral monster look like fun. Neville Sinclair makes it look dashing and romantic. But Al Pacino dares to play Big Boy Caprice as a real-world villain in a four-color world. When he looks in the mirror, he only sees shame, despair, and the unforgiving gears of justice that will bring his story to its inevitable end. For him there is no escape, and he damn well knows it.

Scott Mendelson

Half a billion dollars domestic in 45 days.The Dark Knight crosses the $500 million mark in just 1.5 months.

The Dark Knight officially crossed the $500 million mark this morning, ending up with $502 million by weekend's end. Considering it ended Saturday with about $499 million, I'm surprised Warner didn't find a couple hundred-grand to make it 44 days. No matter, the real noteworthy thing here is that The Dark Knight made $500 million in two days more than it took Shrek 2 to make it to $400 million (Batman did that in an inexplicable 18 days). Oh, and it's new global total is $919 million (#10 all time, it'll be number 6 by next weekend). While the opening weekend record and related opening day records may fall soon enough, I don't think we are going to see these kind of long term numbers for a long time. Truly amazing.

Scott Mendelson

Why no Dark Knight video game?

A valid question, and one that has puzzled me since I recall seeing screen shots from a gaming magazine several months ago (whenever I fly, I indulge and buy a video game magazine from the airport book stores, the ultimate in guilty-pleasure light reading). Here's a nice Associated Press article, most of it being speculation, discussing why there was no official video game tie-in for The Dark Knight. There was a mobile phone game, but there was no video game released for any of the consoles.

I'm guessing it was a quality issue since the speculation involving only making games for sure-fire blockbusters is absurd. Speed Racer and The Incredible Hulk had video games, as did Kung Fu Panda and Prince Capsian. None of these films were expected to set any records.

The Batman franchise has had a mixed success history in video games. The Super Nintendo versions of Batman Returns and The Adventures Of Batman And Robin (ie - Batman: The Animated Series) are arguably the best Batman games ever made. But for every Batman: Vengeance, there have been mediocre or downright terrible games (the infamous Batman: Dark Tomorrow is probably the cream of the crap). But, unlike other franchises, most Batman games have been at least enjoyable (I'm fond of the 1991 Atari arcade adaption of Tim Burton's Batman).

I can only assume that The Dark Knight game was shelved because it brought up memories of the dreaded Superman game for Nintendo 64. Released in May of 1999, it was a game so astoundingly terrible that it quickly became the definitive adjective in describing poor video games ('dude, this game is Superman 64 bad!').

On the plus side, there's a good chance that Lego Batman will be one of the greatest Batman games ever created. If it's anywhere near as much fun as the Star Wars and Indiana Jones Lego video games, we'll have a new classic on our hands come Fall.

Scott Mendelson

Batman In The Movies - Sillier than 'Swear to ME!'

Glad to see I'm not the only one. When I first saw The Dark Knight in early July, one of my biggest issues was the over-the-top, obscenely goofy vocal put-on that Christian Bale affected for Batman. Whether it was aided by audio effects, or whether Bruce Wayne himself uses a voice modifier on his suit, it's still a silly voice. Sounding basically like a young weakling trying to sound older and more bad-ass, it's been compared to McGruff: The Crime Dog and it's been compared to 'sounded absurdly deep, like a 10-year-old putting on an `adult' voice to make prank phone calls.' (a reference actually referring to Bale's voice in Batman Begins, but far more accurate a description for The Dark Knight).

I'm all for Wayne changing his voice as Batman. I love the bit in the pilot for Batman: TAS when Batman, in costume, switches to his Bruce Wayne voice to take a phone call. But the issue is the quality of the voice he chooses. The voice in Batman Begins was a little shocking, mainly because no actor had made that choice (to intimidate with primal fury rather than subtle threats and sly posturing) in a prior Batman project. Still, it was effective and only slightly goofy in certain spots ("It's not who I am inside, but what I doooooooooo that defines me." comes to mind). Had Bale just stuck with that voice this time, it wouldn't have been nearly as silly.

But this new voice is even more over-the-top raspy, with a more affected lisp thrown in for good measure. It's not a deal breaker, but it does lessen the effectiveness of several dramatic scenes (especially towards the end, when he uses the voice in long, thoughtful and/or quiet conversations). And I'm glad I'm not the only one annoyed.

Oh, while I'm thrilled that Jake Coyle gave credit to the vocal performance of Kevin Conroy (correctly noting that many fans consider him the definitive Batman), he makes the lazy mistake of stating that Batman: The Animated Series came from "DC Comics of Batman as envisioned by Frank Miller, whose work heavily informs "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight."

First of all, once again, dark and gloomy Batman was not invented nor was it patented by Frank Miller. From a previous related essay-

Oh, and for the record, despite what writers seem to keep saying, Batman comics were dark, introspective, and violent again by 1969, a full seventeen years before Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. Yes, it was a groundbreaking piece of social satire, but crediting Miller with single-handedly saving Batman from the camp of the 1950s and 1960s is a slap in the face to Neal Adams, Denny O'Neil, Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers, and all of the other writers that did so much good, truly groundbreaking work in the 1970s and 1980s.

Second of all, if you watch the show, it takes bits and pieces from every era of Batman, but it feels to most resemble the tone of the 1970s Batman comics. Batman was a dark, driven adventurer with genuine issues, but he was not a sociopathic nutcase. He was able to maintain relationships with friends and quasi-family. The villains were murderous and somewhat three-dimensional, often sympathetic, but never so overburdened by psychosis that it overwhelmed the story telling. Ironically, this was the era that Batman Forever seemed to try to emulate, with mixed success (aside from Jones' terrible portrayal of Harvey Dent). But Timm/Burnett/Dini/Radomski beat them to it by a full three years.

Scott Mendelson

Batman In The Movies - Debunking the 'Dark Knight endorses the Bush/Cheney doctrine' stupidity...

Once a narrative gets going, especially a juicy one, it's hard to put back in the bottle. In the last two weeks, the official talking point, both of righteous conservatives and allegedly offended liberals, is that Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight explicitly endorses the 'War On Terror' doctrine that Bush and Cheney have carried out for the last several years. Absolute nonsense, as you'll see below (it's long as it's a bit of a 'point by point' rebuttal). Basically, the film asks many provocative questions and dares to not provide every answer. But, in the end, it comes out in favor of humanity's basic compassion and capacity for hope, community and sacrifice as opposed to self-interest and selfishness.
Heavy SPOILERS follow -

At the heart of this current madness is the 'chicken/egg' fallacy. Since taking office in January 2001, and especially after 9/11, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have conducted themselves in manner suggesting that they believe themselves to be cowboy super heroes, be it Batman, John Wayne, or Jack Bauer, fighting the forces of absolute darkness. They believe in simplistic notions of good and evil, might and right, and the ends justifying the means. Thus, it stands to reason that some of their rhetoric would resemble the very comic book superheroes they attempt to emulate. It's not a case of Batman sounding like Bush, but rather Bush trying to come off as a truly heroic figure such as Batman to justify his unheroic policies.

But aside from words, the actions do far more to differentiate the two. Even Batman's vigilantism is presented as something that is selfless and meant to inspire the people of Gotham to feel safer and take control of their corrupt city. Batman does not kill and never harms the innocent. Yes he does walk that fine line in terms of being judge and jury. Any movie about a superhero must deal with that, but that doesn't make Batman a right-winger.

Even as a vigilante, Batman is primarily concerned about protecting the innocent, even at the expense of punishing the guilty (he always chooses saving a life over capturing the villain, as seen at least twice in the film). Bush and co are primarily concerned with punishing the (allegedly) guilty, even at the expense of not protecting and/or punishing the (allegedly) innocent. One could argue that this is the defining split in liberal/conservative ideology. Speaking in broad terms, liberals are more concerned with protecting the (allegedly) innocent while conservatives are more concerned with punishing the (allegedly) guilty. And Batman constantly goes after the people who are actually responsible for the crime in Gotham, be it The Joker or the mob, rather than choosing straw men to hold up as evildoers. If you use the logic of the Bush administration, after discovering the location of The Joker and the intent of his plan, Batman would immediately dash after The Riddler or The Penguin and punish them severely while The Joker ran free.

In fact, the one character acts in that nature, who becomes a true Bush-type vigilante is presented as a tragic villain. As Harvey Dent becomes Two-Face and rampages through the Gotham underworld, he kills purely based on the flip of a coin rather than rational thoughts of justice. He becomes so determined to kill 'the evildoers' that he takes his anger out on the children of his alleged enemy. Not content to wrongly blame Jim Gordon for the death of Rachel, Harvey Dent decides to murder Gordon's young children as a form of punishment. In fact, Two-Face spends the last act of the film attempting to murder everyone tangentially connecting to his maiming except the person actually responsible: The Joker. So Two-Face targets everyone except the one person truly responsible for his plight, and then chooses innocent bystanders when those targets don't suffice. Almost sounds like Bush attacking Iraq to avenge the aggression Osama Bin Laden and 19 Saudi nationals.

As for the picture being right-wing because the Joker is a motiveless killer, that's just a variation on a right-wing cliche (that liberals make excuses for every criminal and thus want to set them all free). Hell, James Gordon himself made a speech about that subject in an Ed Brubaker written issue of Gotham Central (a series that The Dark Knight cribs from heavily). Basically, Gordon acknowledged that it is fine to feel compassion for criminals who are simply messed up or make stupid childish mistakes, and we can certainly sympathize with their actions now and then. But in order for society to function, it still can't be completely tolerated, so off to jail they go. I don't recall Nolan feeling too much pity for Jonathan Crane or Ra's Al Ghul or Carmone Falcone in Batman Begins. That Nolan presented Joe Chill as a flawed and guilt-ridden human does not make him a tree-hugging hippie, nor does his presentation of The Joker as an soulless demon make him an advocate for the Heritage Foundation.

Also used as ammunition is the idea that The Joker is an alleged stand-in for Osama Bin Laden, a wanton terrorist who kills indiscriminately and slaughters civilians on a whim. But the film shows quite clearly that this is not the case. The Joker kills only when he finds it necessary, and he only kills just enough people to cause panic in the city. In the course of the film, he kills slightly over 20 people, almost all of whom are cops, criminals, judges, vigilantes, or public officials. He does not explicitly kill a single bystander, even when left alone in Wayne's penthouse, because that is not part of his fiendish plan. He does not randomly blow up buildings and he does not randomly slaughter the innocent. The only time he even targets random bystanders is at the conclusion of the second-act chase scene, where he opens fire on random cars to goad Batman into using lethal force. Otherwise, the people that Joker chooses to kill are specific and intentional, with malice and forethought. Oh, and super villains have been videotaping their kidnappings and murders since the 1940s. Jack Nicholson's Joker did the exact same thing to an unlucky Smylax test subject in Tim Burton's Batman.

Further more, The Joker does not hate us for our freedoms anymore than Osama Bin Laden does. Whatever Bin Laden's motives are, The Joker simply wants to test his theory that people are generally selfish and evil and that when pushed, they'll turn on each other. One could fairly argue that Bin Laden's goal for the US is similar, to watch the country burn, but then one must acknowledge that in our current state, Bush has given Bin Laden exactly what he desired. The Joker is a much closer relative of the Zodiac killer (note how he mentions how few people he had to kill and how little destruction he had to cause in order to drive the city into panic).

Besides, in the end The Joker's experiment fails because the people of Gotham are shown to be unwilling or unable to be so self-centered that they would slaughter innocents to save themselves (as opposed to the stereotypical right-wing view that countless dead Iraqis are a fair price to save a few American lives). In one of the most emotional scenes, a hardened convict chooses to toss his ship's detonator out the window, potentially at the cost of his own life, rather than play a part in the shedding of innocent blood. In Nolan's world, criminals are not beyond rehabilitation and redemption, and thus Batman's mercy towards them is justified. Needless to say, Bush and co are not known for their mercy.

As far as Harvey Dent's cries about not giving into terrorism during the second act, let us remember that, immediately after 9/11, it was Bush who immediately closed the military bases in Saudi Arabia (which was one of Bin Laden's chief demands against the US). Bruce Wayne immediately wants to cave but is advised against it by Rachel and Alfred, two out of three of his moral compasses. Furthermore, Batman doesn't just want to quit because The Joker is killing people to expose him. Batman wants to quit because he doesn't want to become the type of man who would 'burn the forest down' to catch this madman. And, in the end, he doesn't have to. He does not kill The Joker and he still saves the lives of every person on the two doomed ferries. He even finds time to save the lives of Jim Gordon and his family. Yes, he has done things that maybe should be condemned, but he does them with a heavy heart, rather than a boastful chuckle.

Does this all mean that The Dark Knight is a liberal movie? Probably not anymore so that it's a conservative tract. In the end, Batman still tramples on the constitution as a matter of course (as he has done for seventy-years in the comic world). And yes, Batman commits an act of something strongly resembling 'extraordinary rendition' (the abduction of Lau from Hong Kong). It's more like rendition in the fashion that Clinton originally intended it when he (wrongly) allowed it back in 1998 (no torture, for one thing), but it still gave me the liberal heebie-jeebies. Although, one could argue, it is this extreme and illegal action that instigates the entire rampage by The Joker, since the mobsters overreact and hire The Joker out of desperation (and of course, Alfred warns him as it's happening). IE - Batman told them to 'bring it on', and they did in the form of a murderous clown. Whether or not Batman's actions resemble right-wing behavior, one would find it hard to argue that the film is championing this behavior, considering the blow back that occurs as a result. Again - questions but no solid answers.

It's true that Batman wiretaps every cell phone in Gotham in a desperate attempt to locate The Joker, but the film leaves the issue opened-ended. Yes, it's a ticking-bomb scenario, but it's strongly condemned by one of the film's chief moral outlets (if Morgan Freeman condemns something, most movie goers will believe him). Furthermore, unlike Bush's warrant-less spying, Batman does not keep copies of the phone calls, he does not spy on lawyers and political opponents (allegedly), he does not listen to the phone calls that are being monitored. When Lucius Fox discovers the machine, the audio is an indecipherable blur, with only the audio of The Joker himself distinguished amongst the masses. And, tellingly, as Gordon states in his closing monologue that 'sometimes people deserve to have their faith rewarded', we see Fox smile just a bit as he realizes that Wayne has programed the machine to destroy itself once its one-time use is finished. Point being, Batman knows damn well that what he is doing is wrong, but it may be necessary in this one case, in a manner which violates no one's privacy, since no one's phone call is actually listened to. It's still constitutionally awkward, but it's quite different than an illegal ongoing wiretapping program that collects countless random phone calls and stores them in a database for who knows what purpose.

And the finale of the movie brings about all kinds of questions, but it also exposes the fallacy of the whole right-wing argument in regards to The Dark Knight. In the end, Batman chooses to take the blame for Harvey Dent's murders so that the people of Gotham can still have their unwavering symbol of lawful justice and lawful heroism. On one hand, Nolan is stating that people desire symbols of people who do good within the law and within the system that has been set up for a civilized society (as opposed to Bush and Cheney, who brag about going above and outside the law in their pursuit of terrorists). On the other hand, it brings up the propaganda campaigns involving the fake rescue of Jessica Lynch and the false story surrounding the death of Pat Tillmen.

I'd personally argue that Batman's falling on the sword is unnecessary because the people of Gotham can be inspired by the selfless actions of the ferry passengers. Point being, The Dark Knight implicitly seems to endorse the idea that its ok for figures in authority to lie to people in order to make them feel better about themselves. Again, at the very least, Batman is making a sacrifice for the good of his city and as a way to make the criminal underworld afraid of him once more. Regardless of whether I endorse that decision, it must be acknowledged that it's based on the absurd notion that the criminals arrested by the squeaky-clean Dent would go free because he was kidnapped, brutalized, and snapped under duress.

But the biggest reason that The Dark Knight fails as an endorsement of Bush/Cheney is that Batman is actually successful at saving Gotham and he sacrifices for it. Batman loses his best friend and would-be lover, and he loses the trust of his business partner. Furthermore, in the end, he has lost the faith of the very people he strives to protect, choosing to forgo their love to protect their lives. While some argue that Bush and Cheney forgo the love of their constituents in order to keep us safe, the fact still remains that they have lost the faith only because they have failed in that duty outright. The Iraq war has left the Middle East in chaos, Bin Laden is still free, our country is going broke, and the average family is struggling like never before with such necessities as health care, food, and gas.

Batman is not Bush because Batman succeeds in his primary goal. He captures The Joker and saves countless lives without killing his enemy. Batman is not Bush because he makes sacrifices and pays horrible tolls for his quest, while Bush and Cheney have not only not sacrificed but benefited financially through their various business enterprises that have in turn profited from the various military engagements. It's a complicated, messy movie that wrestles with big questions. I don't think it completely aspires to any rigid political dogma. I'd argue that the film as a whole is a blistering bleak commentary on how we, as Americans caved into fear and irrationality following the 9/11 attacks (as The Joker states, we are only as civilized as circumstances allow us to be). But it sure as heck doesn't champion the unsuccessful and counter productive policies that make up the current 'War On Terror'.

Scott Mendelson

Batman In The Movies - Stories of The Dark Knight

If you liked The Dark Knight, then you'll love these comic stories that the film rips-off... well, sort of.

Chris Nolan and company are not shy about claiming that The Dark Knight takes some bits and pieces from some of the more famous Batman stories. The Long Halloween (an epic year-long story about how the crumbling mob in Gotham was supplanted by the super-villains), The Killing Joke (the definitive Joker story, from 1988), and Batman Vs The Joker (the first Joker story, from Batman 01 in 1940)... these are all cited as sources of inspiration. But there are three stories, unmentioned by anyone, that have an awful lot in common with the current Batman movie. Either it's a coincidence (probably), or someone owes someone a check or an acknowledgment.

Oh, and for the record, despite what writers seem to keep saying, Batman comics were dark, introspective, and violent again by 1969, a full seventeen years before Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. Yes, it was a groundbreaking piece of social satire, but crediting Miller with single-handedly saving Batman from the camp of the 1950s and 1960s is a slap in the face to Neal Adams, Denny O'Neil, Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers, and all of the other writers that did so much good, truly groundbreaking work in the 1970s and 1980s.

Anyway, onto the three unsung (possible) sources of inspiration for The Dark Knight:

Eye Of The Beholder - Batman Annual 11 (1990).
In my mind, this Andrew Helfner story is the definitive Harvey Dent origin story. While The Long Halloween weaves Dent's fall into a labyrinth tale of Batman's second year, the downfall of the Gotham mob, and the rise of the costumed freaks, Eye Of The Beholder is specifically about Harvey Dent. It was the first to suggest that Harvey had issues long before his face-scarring accident. Like The Dark Knight, Dent's downfall here comes not at the hands of a whole crowd of mobsters, but from a single insane murderer (in this case, a socialite who butchers senior citizens). This was the first story to tell the tale of how Batman and Gordon had teamed with Dent to make Batman's captures hold up in a court of law. Much of The Long Halloween's Dent-related story is taken directly from this under read story, even taking the same character names for minor characters. It's not so much that Nolan and co should have credited this story, but rather than Jeph Loeb and Time Sale should have acknowledged in when publicizing The Long Halloween six years later. It's well worth a read as it truly laid the groundwork for the Harvey Dent story as we know it today.


Batman: The Man Who Laughs (2005)
This swan song from Ed Brubaker, the last thing he did for DC Comics before becoming the prince of Marvel Comics (the king being his friend Brian Michael Bendis), is a re imagining of the Joker's first days in Gotham. There are bits and pieces that are used in The Dark Knight, such as The Joker's use of asylum inmates, the bond that grows between Batman and Gordon during The Joker's rampage, and Batman's shock at this very new kind of criminal, the sort that he had not trained for and was not prepared for. None of these ideas are terribly groundbreaking, but the unique element that The Man Who Laughs deals with is the panic of the city, the collapse of morale and the complete pandemonium that sets in as The Joker just keeps on killing. Like The Dark Knight, The Joker does have a master plan, a reason for his madness, and a twisted rationality behind his actions. The story of The Joker's first encounters with Batman has been told at least four times, and this is by far the best version.


Soft Targets - Gotham Central 13-16 (2004).
Also written by Ed Brubaker, along with Greg Rucka, this four-part comic arc basically serves as the blue print from the entire second act of The Dark Knight. Really. Go buy 'Unresolved Targets', the trade paperback of Gotham Central that collects Soft Targets and Unresolved. I'm leery to go into too many details as I don't want to spoil the story. But for those who don't believe me, thar be spoilers...
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The Joker targets public officials for death in the week before Christmas. After The Joker kills several people via sniper rifle, the entire city goes into panic mode and life in Gotham grinds to a halt. Bitterness against Batman grows as the cops wearily partake in another game between these two madmen. As the cops and Batman frantically attempt to bring this slaughter to a halt, The Joker turns himself in just before Christmas Eve. Sitting in an interrogation room, he is grilled by members of the Major Crimes Unit, when he tosses off a nasty surprise. He has kidnapped a famous news reporter and hidden her in a bomb-rigged location. In the end, for reasons that I won't reveal but that differ from the movie, it is revealed that The Joker's capture was part of the plan. Allowing himself to get beaten by a police officer, he turns the tables, kills that officer, and then goes on a killing spree inside the Gotham Police station leaving several cops dead in his wake. And, when the location of the missing reporter and the bomb is found, Batman must make a terrible choice between saving an innocent civilian and saving a police officer.


SPOILERS END


Sound familiar? Yes, any arch-typical Batman story is going to have elements that can't help but be similar to one story or another. But the sheer similarity of the general plot and the characterization and the consequences were genuinely surprising, especially with the Gotham Central story. Again, I bring this up mainly to inquire just why Nolan seemed intent on crediting stories that provided only general similarities to his script while missing other stories that almost seemed to be rough-drafts for the movie he would eventually make.

At the very least, you have three fantastic stories that are well worth checking out. Make that five, if you count the other Gotham Central storyline 'Unresolved' (a dark, sober murder mystery involving The Mad Hatter and The Penguin) and the story that comes with the hardback of The Man Who Laughs (a terrific three-part murder mystery involving Batman's friendship with Gordon and the original Green Lantern).

Space Chimps rockets to $9 million in five days. The Dark Knight does $203 million in same.

First of all, Mama Mia is already trailing Hairspray by about $30,000. And Space Chimps continues its epic quest to $25 million (it'll cross $10 million today). Oh, and Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull is about $1.4 million away from surpassing Iron Man in the battle for, um... soon to be second-highest grossing movie of the summer.

On that note...

Like the headline says, The Dark Knight has crossed the $200 million mark in a mere five days. Dropping a low 14.8%, The Dark Knight placed second on all-time Tuesday numbers with $20.8 million. Transformers made $27 million on Tuesday, its first full opening day (it had advance-night Monday night screenings starting at 8pm). By the time you read this, The Dark Knight will have surpassed Batman Begins' entire domestic total in just over five days. On Friday, it will likely out-gross the $251 million take of the original Tim Burton Batman, making it the highest grossing Batman film ever. Of course, adjusted for inflation, the original would have made about $433 million today... but hey, it's only Tuesday right? Amazing.

Frankly, in the era of the modern blockbuster, this is completely unprecedented. It's not just the sheer amount of money, but the speed and consistency of those large amounts. It broke the $200 million mark three days faster than the three previous record holders. It broke the record for best opening week with two days left to go. It'll likely make about $75 million from Mon-Thur, a total that only the very biggest blockbusters make on their opening weekend.

After a long, long absence from the top-tiers, Batman is finally acting like Batman. For comparison, mixing and matching the screen count and per-screen averages of Batman and The Dark Knight gets you $81 million for the first three days. Multiply that by 1.75 for inflation, then add $20 million for the Heath Ledger morbid curiosity factor and the front-loaded nature of today's business, and you've got The Dark Knight's opening weekend take almost to the dollar. Think inflation is too much? Consider that Batman cost $35 million back in 1989, 5.14x less than the $180 million budget of The Dark Knight. Each of the first three Batman films did unprecedented short-term damage to cash registers, so don't believe all the polls and pundits who give all the credit to Heath Ledger. Batman & Robin blew out due to infamous word of mouth and Batman Begins was just a trial run to get people back in the mood. If you make a good live-action Batman film, everyone will show up.

The difference is that none of the sequels had this kind of consistency. The sequels, specifically Batman Returns, pretty much invented the 'quick-kill blockbuster', in which a film opens huge, then plummets back to earth but still makes enough money in the first ten days to be considered a hit. Usually it's word of mouth, sometimes it's just a pent-up demand by a specific demographic that never spreads past the cult. Dropping 45-50% over your second weekend used to be a sign of distress. Now, it's called having legs. For comparison, in 1992, Batman Returns plunged 45% in its second-weekend and the panic bells sounded around the industry. In 2005, Batman Begins dropped 45% in its second weekend and everyone was relieved that it had legs and word of mouth following a softer than expected opening. But the word of mouth on this one is stunning and the numbers are barely dropping (hell, it only dropped 44% from Sunday to Monday, which is probably also a record for any mega-opening).

Obviously only an idiot would make long-term projections after five-days. Eventually, unless it's Titanic, and we shall assume it's not, it will eventually slow down. Spider-Man seemed a legitimate threat for number 01 after pulling in $223 million in 10 days. But, after a month Spidey lost momentum and limped to $405 million (it ended up number 5, which is where Batman ended up at the end of its run back in 1989). After it's $50 million+ second weekend, there were predictions that The Passion Of The Christ would threaten Titanic's all-time berth. Eventually, the faithful decided not to see it again and the film settled into a still-stunning $371 million.

I still believe to this day that had The Phantom Menace been well-liked by the geeks that it would have found that extra $170 million and crossed over (the perception was that everyone hated it yet it still made $431 million). And the sky would have been the limit had Pearl Harbor opened in November 2001 instead of May 2001. So, let's not start sending taunting letters to Jim Cameron just yet. No matter what, these numbers can't keep up because A) other geek-targeted films will flood the marketplace starting Friday and B) kids will be going back to college and school within the next forty-days.

Here are some fun numbers to chew on - The Dark Knight almost equaled Spider-Man's $114.844 million three-day weekend in just two days (by Saturday, it had $114.815 million). The Dark Knight can drop 53% next weekend and still cross the $73 million mark, which would set the record for a best second-weekend. And, if The Dark Knight drops the same 37% that Spidey dropped on its second weekend, we'll have the first $100 million non-opening weekend in history. Is that feasible? Not really (no more so than it equaling the 10% second-weekend drop of Twister or the 20% drop of Jurassic Park). Is it possible? Absolutely. Success feeds success. All of the free coverage will only make the mildly curious that much more likely to check it out.

Plausible numbers from here - $300 million in 10 days. $400 million in 17 days. The previous record is 44 days for Shrek 2, so don't panic if it takes a 'whopping' 25 days to make that meager $400 million. I will say with absolute certainty that it will be the highest grossing film of the year by this time next week, at least domestically (Batman films have a habit of being beaten internationally by Indiana Jones and Harry Potter). For now, anyway, Batfans and geeks alike are partying like it's 1989.

Scott Mendelson