Batman: The Movie (1966) (Part One)
(Not to be confused with Batman: The Other Movie (1989) or THE Batman: The Other Other Movie (2022))
"The
Dynamic Duo faces four supervillains who plan to hold the world for
ransom with the help of a secret invention that instantly dehydrates
people."
69 minutes
[Part Two, in which the Dark Knight just can't get rid of a bomb.]
[Part Three, in which the Boy Wonder helps kill radioactive goons.]
"RD-Lieutenant Jr Grade Schmidlapp". Vince mispronounces the name.
RD has yet to get the movie they are about to discuss shown at the Skyline before Disney bought original rights holders Fox. Vince once saw the Planet of the Apes movies over a long night at a drive-in. RD offers to bring Vince to his location. Vince: "Interesting."
The movie begins with a dedication "to the enemies of crime and to lovers of adventure" before it cuts to a couple making out. (:06) Then the credits have shots of a running man, Batman smiling smugly for the camera, Robin preparing for combat, and the villains randomly acting in the spotlight, while a different theme than that from the series plays.
Out on a drive around town in a gold Chrysler Imperial, Bruce and Dick return to Stately Wayne Manor to answer an anonymous call to save a scientist on a yacht. Bra-ed Aunt Harriet and Alfred are outside gardening and looking extremely happy despite RD being confused by Alfred's weird looking stool. The Narrator accompanies the Duo as they slide down the Batpoles with Automatic Costume Change Levers and set off in the Batmobile.
An aerial shot then shows Robin suddenly having a case of male pattern baldness as they speed down the highway. Vince: "Can they not drive a car?"
They get to the airport where their Batcopter is stationed for some reason instead of the Batcave, (:16) and everyone in the city watches them in amazement as they fly above them. Where do they think they are, Metropolis?
At the yacht Robin lowers the Batladder while warning his friend on it to be careful for some reason. The Bros laud the stunts used for it to distract the fact that Robin (or his middle aged stunt double) is flying the helicopter.
Suddenly the yacht just vanishes, startling Robin to drop man and ladder into the sea. (:22) But Batman holds on, and he is slowly pulled up while cartoon sound punching a shark stuck on his leg and urinating through a leak. The prop shark, not Batman. Cue Robin having to bring down the Shark Repellent Bat-Spray, hanging upside-down to do it for some reason while leaving the copter on autopilot. The spray is so effective the shark explodes when it hits the water. RD also saw the other specific repellents they had in the vehicle as required for different types of animals.
Cut to Gordon's office where the Duo are holding a press conference and the Commissioner randomly shouts at the journalists. While this may be his usual uselessness at work, Batman soon also becomes flustered by their questions on the boat or exploding shark. It's not as if Bruce is also head of a huge corporation who might also have to engage with employees and media on a regular basis or anything.
Then the Moscow Bugle's Kitanya Irenya Tatanya Karenska Alisoff, aka Miss KITKA, asks him to take off his mask, shocking the crowd. Batman dismisses her query: "This young lady is a stranger to our shores." RD is reminded of when Bobby Heenan would say that about the Iron Sheik. When Kitka calls them vigilantes (which they have almost always been), Gordon becomes appalled. O'Hara tries to end things on the excuse of being "busy".
In private, Batman admits to lying for once, somewhat different from his ever truthful behavior in the series. He asks Gordon to find out which supervillains are on the loose, which is a worrying thing since they technically should know these things already. This is probably just an excuse to get the Narrator to act as their CCTV computer voice.
In this case our villains are the Penguin (Gordon: "That pompous, waddling master of foul play, maestro of a million criminal umbrellas!"), the Joker (O'Hara: "That devilish clown prince of crime! Oh, if I only had a nickel for every time he's baffled us!"), the Riddler (Batman: "Loose to plague us with his criminal conundrums!"), and Catwoman (Robin: "Gosh! And the Catwoman!")
Further, to deduce who among them could be the culprit, they use their most awesome weapon: weird logic.
Batman: "Pretty 'fishy' what happened to me on that ladder."
Gordon: "You mean where there's a fish there could be a Penguin?"
Robin: "But wait! It happened at sea. See? C for Catwoman!"
Batman: "Yet an exploding shark was pulling my leg..."
Gordon: "The Joker!"
O'Hara: "All adds up to a sinister riddle. Riddle-R. Riddler!"
Gordon: "Oh, the thought strikes me. So dreadful, I scarcely dare give it utterance."
Batman: "The four of them. Their forces combined."
Robin: "Holy nightmare!"
The villains have set up their lair in a pier tavern, where a goon calls the arriving Kitka Catwoman. (:38) Catwoman: "Don't use my real name in public!" RD concedes Lee Meriwether is "fine" but sadly no Julie Newmar.
The villains already have an official banner and logo of the United Underworld: "Today Gotham City, tomorrow the world!" Joker resolves a dispute between Penguin and Riddler using joy buzzer handshakes. A good effort, but it's not as good a joke as Penguin having a "Penguin food tank" as an aquarium. They've somehow convinced their captive scientist that he's still on board his yacht in deep fog, but since he's English (if you couldn't tell by his name of Commodore Schmidlapp) he keeps asking for tea. Joker gets some for him despite having a "ghastly pallor" which he excuses to being below decks. Despite supposedly being a genius with an invention worth "millions of Yankee dollars", Schmidlapp doesn't notice the "sea" consists of one guy moving a picture of the ocean up and down, blowing a blow-horn, and paddling water with a flipper.
In the Batcave the Duo find out there was an out of place buoy near the yacht. Batman thinks the yacht was never there in the first place, which Vince finds remarkable with the then new state of holograms. So Batman and his sidekick Male Pattern Baldness Robin get to the site on the Batboat.
The Penguin's pre-nuclear submarine is already there laying in wait (and looking like a penguin), while the villains still refuse to get along. Penguin to Joker: ""On land, you may command. At sea, it is me!" He then uses the papier-mâché periscope to spy on the Duo and their "skullduggery ahead" as they find a shark cage at the buoy.
Robin: "They loaded the shark with TNT!"
Batman: "Is there nothing sacred to those poor devils?"
His attempts to lift fingerprints are stopped by salt and corrosion, "the infamous enemies of the crimefighter!" But why would he even need to? Don't they already know who they are dealing with here? Does the extra running time of a movie give him extra time to make sure his crimefighting is in order or something?
Before firing torpedoes the Penguin first commands to activate the Penguin Magnet to trap them through their utility belts. Batman struggles to get out his sonic screwdriver Bat Transmitter to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow. He manages to detonate two torpedoes, but a third is still active and the power has run out. The villains see the explosion and celebrate with "yo ho ho", but the Duo manage to escape anyway thanks to an intervening "almost human" porpoise who got in the path. Forget Batman behaving like Superman, now he thinks he's Aquaman too?
In the clear they call a vice admiral at the Pentagon who talks like he's still out at sea and is playing (surprisingly strategic) tiddlywinks with his secretary. (:57) On checking on the status of surplus submarines he acts as his own phone on hold, whistling Anchors Aweigh over the receiver while looking for the information in a Rolodex. He finds they sold one to a "P. N. Guin" who's only given contact is a P.O. box. Not even a telephone number too? Or a shipping address to deliver a fully sized and armed submarine?
Sensing Batman is about to blow a gasket the admiral tries to calm him down.
Batman: "Disposing of pre-atomic submarines to persons who don't even leave their full addresses...GOOD DAY, ADMIRAL!"
Then the submarine fires a Polaris missile which explodes into riddles "in the form of a joke".
The Bros decide to leave things there for the taping. RD wishes he was there for the table read. Vince enjoyed seeing the actors all together having fun in their overacting.
Young Vince once tried sneaking into a drive-in with others in a car trunk. RD shows that the Skyline is carpeted with grass.
- Special Guest Villains: Catwoman [2] (Lee Meriwether), The Joker [4] (Cesar Romero) [4], The Penguin [4] (Burgess Meredith) [4], The Riddler [5] (Frank Gorshin) [5]
- Screen Captures: 2. RD, RD
- Brown Hornet Escapes: 1. Almost human porpoise
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