Batman & Robin (1997)

There's a moment in Batman & Robin where Mr. Freeze, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger in a suit that appears to have been constructed entirely from rejected disco ball offcuts, delivers yet another ice pun with the absolute conviction of a man who has never once questioned a creative decision in his life. And something happens to your brain at that point. It short-circuits. You stop resisting. You just... surrender.

That's the only sensible way to watch this film.

I'll be upfront: I have a soft spot for it. Not an enormous one, not nearly enough to call it good, but enough to understand why it exists as a cultural artefact. It's a neon-soaked fever dream trapped inside a snowglobe. Glittery, frozen in time, and completely, gloriously unhinged. The sets look like gothic theme park rides that someone has attacked with a UV lamp. The costumes appear to have been sewn from Christmas tinsel and pure hubris. George Clooney wears rubber nipples on his batsuit with the quiet dignity of a man who has already mentally moved on to his next project. Chris O'Donnell says some variation of "holy something" every five minutes. Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy vamps so hard she practically chews through the scenery and out the other side of the cinema wall.

And the dialogue. Oh, the dialogue. "Ice to meet you." "Everybody, freeze." On and on, relentless, shameless, delivered with total commitment. That commitment is actually the film's one genuine quality. It is not subtle, it is not embarrassed, and it does not want to be. It commits fully to its own absurdity, and there's something almost admirable about that, in the way that watching someone confidently walk the wrong way down a one-way street is almost admirable.

Here's where my soft spot runs out, though: none of this is actually clever camp. Camp done well, like the best of it, has wit underneath the excess. Think of something like From Dusk Till Dawn, which also goes completely off the rails but does so with a kind of controlled, knowing energy. Batman & Robin just flings everything at the screen and hopes the neon obscures the emptiness behind it. The product placement is brazen, the pacing is a mess, and the plot is barely a plot at all so much as a series of excuses to build another ridiculous set piece.

The thing that genuinely bothers me, even now, is how unnecessary it all was. Batman: The Animated Series was already out there doing something remarkable with the same characters. Darker, smarter, emotionally intelligent, treating kids like they could handle genuine complexity and moral weight. Then along comes this live-action version, apparently determined to prove that none of that matters as long as you've got enough neon and rubber. It's baffling. It's a step backwards dressed up in a silver onesie.

But look, I'm not going to pretend I had a miserable time watching it. Watched with the right crowd, ready to shout puns back at the screen and argue over whether Schwarzenegger's performance counts as acting or performance art, it works as a kind of communal comedy experience. It's a perfect lazy Sunday film when you want zero stakes and maximum silliness. Put it on, pour something cold, and let the chaos wash over you. Just don't go in expecting a film.

One and a half stars, and I'm being generous because Thurman is clearly having the time of her life, and that counts for something.

Rating: ★½  | Year: 1997  | Watched: 2025-11-02

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Where to watch

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