I pride myself on overcoming my obsessive-compulsive completist tendencies and abstaining from owning Batman Forever and Batman and Robin. I've had many opportunities — recently, in fact.
Half Price Books is like a second home. There are two branches within 15 minutes of my house, so I often stop in after work or on a Sunday afternoon. I don't always find anything, and I don't always feel compelled to buy something just because I'm there.
I typically see a copy of either Batman Forever or Batman and Robin. Usually it's the latter. However, I rarely see the two-disc special editions with the silver bordering like the ones shown in the two previous entries.
Last week, I saw used copies of both films in two-disc special editions, both priced at $6.98 each. Both were in good condition.
Somehow I resisted, but I spent all week thinking about them. Do I need to own them, to complete the set? Should I own them for the special features alone? Should I consider them artifacts for which I am some sort of curator?
Is a shitty film worth owning for reasons that somehow transcend shittyness?
I would prefer to think of the Batman films as Bryan Singer thinks about the Superman films — the third and fourth installments never happened, or something. But when I see the shiny silver packaging and how that matches my two Burton-Keaton DVDs, I can't help but feel something's missing.
Hold on — when did I become a curator?
Eliminating Batman and Robin is easy; the film is a cinematic abomination. But I don't remember Batman Forever well enough to decide for sure, so this needs further review.
I entertained the advice of friends, all of whom looked at me like I had lost my mind. "You really need advice about Joel Schumacher's Batman films?"
Well, not really. I know they're both bad. The question is not about quality, but...should I own them? I'm talking about a sense of completion. Closing the loop. Owning all four films in which Michael Gough played Alfred. And Val Kilmer isn't that bad as Batman...right?
And if I'm going to justify buying Batman Forever, I might as well buy Batman and Robin to complete the set, right? Consider them a ricketty, shitty-ass bridge to the excellent Nolan-Bale films of recent years.
Enter the mind of a self-diagnosed obsessive-compulsive completist. I debated this for a few days and finally went back to the store on Sunday, but by then I had put aside the obsessiveness, sort of. I did look for them, though.
All they had was Batman and Robin. Problem solved. I'm not buying that one alone — who knows what the cashier will think? Now, buying both Schumacher films...that's a completist at work, and they can respect that, right? WHY DO I THINK ABOUT THIS STUFF?
Last night, I added Batman Forever to my Netflix queue to check out on Blu-Ray. Renting is not the same as buying.
Plus there are different rules for Blu-Ray. Oh, there are lots of rules.
I have never been a 'complete the collection' sort of guy, but I know quite a few people who are. We got into it when I saw he had purchased X-Men: The Last Stand. He took the point that he had to complete his collection. I pointed out that he spent $15 on something he's never, ever, ever going to watch.
ReplyDeleteWhen does the need to make it a collection start? When you own over half the films of a series? For example, does owning Jaws require you to buy the one with Michael Caine? How about the sequels to Psycho? Do I really need to own the Second Season of LOST?
I don't think that you need either of these Batman movies to complete a set. A shitty movie is still a shitty movie completist or not.
ReplyDeleteNote: Val Kilmer wasn't that good of a Batman.
ReplyDeleteRickety bridge, or none, I have to side with believing they never existed. You can do it, John. I believe in you, John.
http://www.virginmedia.com/images/1indy-tod-bridge.jpg *
*Despite the "virginmedia" in the URL, the picture this link links to is SFW. And, I think/know you'll appreciate the metaphor.
I've come to be a defender of Batman and Robin. Here is why.
ReplyDeleteBatman Forever in large part fails because it doesn't know what it is. It's Joel Schumacher trying to do his best Tim Burton impression because that is what the studio wanted.
On Batman and Robin, the studio let Schumacher fly. He made the Batman movie he wanted to make: an awful, campy tribute to the Adam West / Burt Ward television show with homo-erotic cyberpunk dressing. It's an awful mess, but it at least has Schumacher's tasteless vision fully realized.
Batman Forever is just bad, but Batman and Robin is so bad it's good.
sick i tell u!!!! -s
ReplyDelete