Batman Forever (1995)

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Overview

Batman Forever was the third entry in the Burton/Schumacher Batman Films. In it Batman and Robin have to stop Two-Face and The Riddler from destroying Gotham City. The film was Joel Schumacher's first Batman film. The film was also Val Kilmer's debut as Batman, he only played Batman in one film due to him already starting on another movie by the time Batman and Robin was going into pre-production.

Plot

The film opens with Two-Face attempting to rob the second national bank, holding guard hostage in the bank vault. Batman arrives greeting the commissioner and Dr. Chase Meridian, a criminal psychoanalyst and asks the commissioner what floor Two-Face is on. he takes the elevator up to the floor where Two-face is, hiding in the top of the elevator. When the elevator Harvey has his men blast the door with their machine guns. The doors open and nobody is there, then Batman comes out taking down the guards. He runs over to the security guard bound and gagged in the vault, when he removes the gag the guard yells it's a trap and the door swings shut. A wrecking ball comes through the wall and Harvey's men attach a long chain to the vault, then a helicopter pulls it out. Soon acid begins to come out of the drawers within the vault. Batman grabs the guard's hearing aid so he can safe-crack the door open.

He then attaches a hook to the chain and fires a grappling hook into the wall. Telling the guard to hold he then the cuts the chain and the vault swings back into the bank. Climbing up the chain he climbs up onto the helicopter to the cockpit, the pilot yells to Two-Face and he begins to fire his gun, the bullets ricochet killing the pilot. Batman breaks the glass and climbs in. Two-Face had jammed the steering control and parachuted out. Right before the helicopter crashes into the Statue of Liberty Batman jumps off and lands in the water.

Later on Bruce then visits Wayne Enterprises, the tech department of his company where he meets Edward Nigma who is obsessed with Bruce. As Bruce is visiting Edward comes out and tries to convince Bruce to fund his invention. His device called the Box beams realistic 3D images from television signals into a person's brain. Noticing that Nimga said that the device manipulates brain waves Bruce denies funding for it because he feels it raises too many questions. Nigma however can't stand rejection especially from Bruce she continues to work on the project in secret.

Seeing the Batsignal in the sky Bruce heads to office where he has a secret tunnel that takes him to the batcave. Once there he puts the batsuit on and heads to the top of the Gotham City Police headquarters to meet Commissioner Gordon. When he arrives Batman finds Dr. Meridian who attempts to seduce him, he shrugs it off and leaves. Nigma's supervisor, Ed Stickley finds Nigma working after hours on his invention and threatens to fire Nigma if he doesn't stop working on The Box. Nigma then ties Stickley up and uses him as a human test subject.

Reception

The film received mixed reception with some criticizing the film for being "overly campy" and that the batsuit had rubber nipples and a codpiece on it. The reception of Val Kilmer as Batman was also mixed, with some praising him as Batman and others criticizing him. Also heavily criticized was Jim Carrey as The Riddler and Tommy Lee Jones with critics feeling their performances were too over the top.