Eye Candy #253 - "Batman Forever"

Batman Forever:  The beginning of the end of the 80's-90's Batman franchise. While better than the trailing "Batman and Robin" (which sucked so bad, you could hear it OUT LOUD), it's a failure compared to the two previous films and demonstrates fully the "two villains is two too many" axiom. We've got Jim Carrey chewing scenery at a rate so great, that Tommy Lee Jones can't possibly keep up. And given what little Jones has to do in the film, it's not hard to see why - riding high off his fame and Oscar win for "The Fugitive", he got thrown a bone and he's second fiddle. There is simply too much going on involving too many people to really do justice to any of them. And in those moments when there isn't anything going on, then your script has to keep everyone, including the audience, busy and engaged. That doesn't happen. And unfortunately it's a lesson that movie studios blow over and over again. "Spider-man 3" had not one, not two, but THREE villains (and Thomas Hayden Church got the Jones-like post-Oscar buzz superhero part handout that time around). Kilmer is arguably the weakest of the recent Batmans but I don't believe it's because he's not a good actor. He's just not given any acting to do. And Schumacher, while he can deliver a good film from time to time ("Tigerland" and "the Lost Boys" are great examples), and seems he's a fan of the "idea" of a man running in a costume beating people up as a vigilante, he has no idea who or what Batman is all about. Which is fine, since the movie can be called "Riddler Forever" without too much trouble, anyway.