Every Thursday, an older film released on this opening weekend years ago will be reviewed. They can be classics, or simply popular films that happened to be released to the world on the same date.

For June 20th, we are going to have a look at Batman and Robin.

Jingle bells, Batman smells…

That’s it. That’s the entire song.

For a number of years, thanks to Joel Schumacher’s titanically abysmal film Batman and Robin, Batman was the biggest loser around. His honourable effort to mix the campiness of Adam West’s television series with the modern dark iteration (spawned cinematically by Tim Burton, and influenced by many graphic novels) was annoying yet tolerable with Batman Forever. We didn’t know that the title of this film was a warning for what was to come. We could shrug off that film. What we couldn’t get rid of is the pustulant stench of this two-hour toy commercial, with ten thousand one-liners hammered in (does that make them ten-thousand-liners then?). Batman and Robin was one of the films responsible for nearly killing (yes, killing) the superhero film. It’s hard to think of this reality, since Spider-Man swooped in to save the day five years later, and Marvel films (and other franchises) show no signs of disappearing ever; the film industry is basically being kept alive by them.

I sometimes use the “acting vehicle” label with a tongue-in-cheek mentality, and today is no exception. This is the five car pileup of five different careers, who all somehow got out of this film relatively unscathed. Arnold Schwarzenegger was the action hero, turned into the villain Mr. Freeze; he’s a catchphrase spewing idiot that looks like a frozen Turbo Man. George Clooney is Bruce Wayne himself, resorted to a puppy dog eyed plank of wood. Chris O’Donnell is the overly whiney Robin, who sounds like every brat that dragged their parent to see this fiasco. Uma Thurman is the over-acting Poison Ivy, whose thirstiness in this film is enough to drive anyone away. Alicia Silverstone is Batgirl, whose performance is perfectly described by her breakout film: Clueless. It’s actually astonishing how five people can have five differently terrible performances all at once; like if the Planeteers were trash thespians trying to summon Captain Ham-It (the hero that brings acting talent down to a zero).

Five scared performers, wondering what will be of their careers post 1997.

So the performers suffer, but we, too, suffer. If we’re not hearing one of the many single-lined duds, we’re subjected to stupidity (why does Mr. Freeze have a choir of henchmen that sing?), horrible filmmaking (the green screens are vomit inducing), plot holes (why wouldn’t Mr. Freeze kill Batman at his most vulnerable state? Why does he leave?), and many other head scratching flaws. It becomes hilarious. It turns into a delirium of insanity. How much worse could the film get? And then, the henchmen play hockey with the gem, and the dynamic duo just so happen to have skates equipped to their suits. And then, the duo get rocketed off into the sky, and they surf down onto the rooftops below as the shuttle explodes. This is just how this thing starts, folks. I think we have all decided that this film is impossible to watch twenty years later with a serious mindset. You must only watch it for unintentional laughs and befuddlement galore. Trying to take this film seriously is like a scientist trying to study a fart and hoping to get a Nobel Prize.

For every annoying moment where Robin just won’t shut up, you have hilariously unnecessary explosions. For every ice related joke Mr. Freeze has to say, you have Poison Ivy sounding like an alien trying to learn how humans flirt. When there’s George Clooney being forgettable (which takes a lot for that to happen, I might add), there’s the amount of Bat-related inventions and items being impossible to scrub from your mind. Joel Schumacher tried to blend the mythology of the classics (hence the sculpted bodies with nipples, buttocks and groins) with the fun comic books that were missing from film now. Instead, we got the cinematic equivalent of being a five year old that stayed up until three in the morning reading comics, on the verge of puking your brains out after drinking your seventeenth grape juice tetra pack.

George Clooney has vowed to refund anyone that has seen it. Joel Schumacher has devoted DVD space to apologizing for Batman and Robin’s existence. Superheroes in films took a hit bigger than when Thanos snapped. No one else involved even wants to discuss that this film exists (and Schwarzenegger starred in many questionable films before and after this, I might add). The only people who want to remember this film are sickos like myself, who despise the existence of this film, but enjoy it in the same way we enjoy seeing Gordon Ramsay yelling at poor schmucks, or the new generation adore cringe videos. Some disasters are impossible to turn away from, and there is joy to be found within the catastrophe.

I’m also going on record to say I love the gel-light colours, and I’m not even ashamed. So, there’s that, at least.

Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Ryerson University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.

Batman and Robin: On-This-Day Thursday