Batman Returns

Batman Returns is a 1992 American action comic book film that pits the Batman against the Penguin and Catwoman, both of whom have their own agendas and a past to resolve.

"You don't really think you'll win, do you?"
"Things change."

Directed by: Tim Burton Written by: Daniel Waters

The Penguin/Oswald Cobblepot

• [to Max Shreck, after kidnapping him] Hi. I believe the word you're looking for is AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! Actually, this is all just a bad dream. You're at home in bed, heavily sedated, resting comfortably... dying from the carcinogens you personally spewed in a lifetime of profiteering. Tragic irony, or poetic justice? You tell me.
• [to Shreck] I wasn't born in the sewer, you know. I come from... [indicates to a broken skylight, then turns to Max] Like you. And like you, I want some respect. A recognition of my basic humanity. But most of all... I wanna find out who I am. By finding my parents, learning my human name. Simple stuff that the good people of Gotham take for granted!
• [addressing his penguin army] My dear penguins, we stand on a great threshold! It's okay to be scared; many of you won't be coming back. Thanks to Batman, the time has come to punish all God's children! First, second, third and fourth-born! Why be biased?! Male and female! Hell, the sexes are equal, with their erogenous zones BLOWN SKY-HIGH!!! FORWAAAARD MARCH!!! THE LIBERATION OF GOTHAM HAS BEGUN!!!!! [the penguins start deploying]
• [Fighting Batman] You're just jealous because I'm a genuine freak and you have to wear a mask!
• Ah, shit... I picked a cute one. [hurls away the umbrella] The heat's getting to me... I'll murder you momentarily... but first, I need a cold drink of ice water... [he keels over on the edge of the bank and dies. Six emperor penguins waddle up to him and slide his body into the water]

Catwoman/Selina Kyle

• I'm Catwoman. Hear me roar.
• [Falls into the back of a dump truck filled with gravel.] Saved by kitty litter...[Looks at the burn mark left by Batman] Bastard.
• [To Penguin, rejecting his advances] I wouldn't touch you to scratch you.
• [When she and Bruce Wayne realize each other's secret identities] Oh my God...does this mean we have to start fighting?

Dialogue

[One of Penguin's men hands him a grimy Christmas stocking as he and Shreck start talking about what they can do together]

Penguin: Ah, what have we here?... [takes out a flask, opening it and pouring an eerie green liquid out that dissolves a slab of stone] A batch of toxic waste, from your "clean textile plant". There's a whole lagoon of this crud in the back! [sets aside flask]

Max: [slightly nervous] That could've come from anywhere.

Penguin: What about the documents that prove you own half the firetraps in Gotham City?

Max: If there were such documents, that's not an admission. I would have seen to it they were shredded.

Penguin: [grins] Good idea... [shows shredded papers stuck back together] A lot of tape and a little patience make all the difference. By the way, how's Fred Adkins, your old partner?

Max: [rattled] Fred? Fred's actually... I believe he's on extended vacation. He's, uh, he's good.

Penguin: [chuckles sinisterly] "Good"... [pulls out a severed hand, goes into scary voice] "HIYA, MAX! REMEMBER ME?! I'M FRED'S HAND! YEAH, YOU WANNA GREET ANY OTHER BODY PARTS?!" [normal] Remember, Max: you flush it, I flaunt it.

Max: [reconsiders] You know what, Mr... Penguin... Sir? I think perhaps I could help orchestrate a little welcome-home scenario for you. And once we're both back home, perhaps we can help each other out.

Penguin: You won't regret this, Mr. Shreck. [shakes Max's hand with Fred's severed one and leaves Max holding it]

---

[After escaping from a botched rally, Penguin returns to his underground lair. The place is packed with penguins, who rush to greet him]

Penguin: My babies... did you miss me?

Red Triangle Thin Clown; Great speech, Oswald!

Penguin: [punches him aside with his umbrella] MY NAME IS NOT OSWALD! IT'S PENGUIN!! I AM NOT A HUMAN BEING!!! I AM AN ANIMAL!!! COLD-BLOODED!!! CRANK THE AC!!! WHERE ARE MY LISTS?! BRING ME THE NAMES!!! [a henchman passes him some papers, which he gives to everyone] Ah! It's time... These are the names of the firstborn sons of Gotham City, just like I was. And like me, a terrible fate waits for them: tonight, while their parents party, they'll be dreaming away in their safe cribs, their soft beds. And WE WILL SNATCH THEM, CARRY THEM INTO THE SEWER, AND TOSS THEM INTO A DEEP, DARK WATERY GRAVE...!

Red Triangle Fat Clown: Ermm... Penguin? I mean, killing sleeping children... isn't that a little, uh...?

Penguin: [shoots clown with gun umbrella] No! It's a LOT "uh"! [Kicks the dead henchman into the sewage river]

---

[Bruce Wayne has come to Max Shreck's fancy-dress Christmas ball without a costume]

Max Shreck: Ingenious costume, let me guess. Trust-fund goody-goody.

Bruce Wayne: Feeling good, huh? Yeah, well, you almost made a monster of the Mayor of Gotham City.

Shreck: I am the light of this city...and I am its mean, twisted soul. Does it matter who's Mayor?

Wayne: It does to me.

Shreck: Yawn.

---

[Penguin has crashed Max Shreck's Christmas ball]

Penguin: You didn't invite me, so I crashed! [laughs]

Gotham Mayor: What do you want?

Penguin: Right now, my troops are fanning out across town - for your children! [crowd gasps] Yes! For your first-born sons! The ones you left helpless at home, so you could dress up like jerks, get juiced, and dance... BADLY! [alights from duck vehicle and hits mayor on the arm to force him aside] I've personally come for Gotham's favorite son, Mr Chip Shreck! [fires gun umbrella at wall when Chip tries to cover his father. points umbrella] You're coming with me, you great white dope, to die way down in the sewer!!

Max: Not Chip! If you have an iota of human feeling, take me instead!

Penguin: [hesitates] I don't. So no!

Max: I'm the one you want! Ask yourself. Isn't it Max Shreck who manipulated and betrayed you, eh? Isn't it Max, not Chip, who you want to see immersed to his eyeballs in raw sewage?

Penguin: [hesitates again] Okay, you've got a point. I'll let the little prince live for now. [hits Chip and gestures to Max] Now, in the duck!

---

[Batman saves Shreck from Catwoman]

Max: You're not just saving a life, you're saving...

Batman: Shut up. You're going to jail.

Catwoman: Don't be naīve! The law doesn't apply to people like him or us!

Batman: Wrong on both counts.

---

[Batman has just ripped off his cowl, revealing himself as Bruce Wayne, as he tries to appeal to Catwoman to spare Max Shreck and let him be arrested]

Catwoman: Bruce... I would - I would love to live with you in your castle... forever, just like in a fairy tale. [Batman caresses the back of her head and she claws Batman on the cheek] I just couldn't live with myself, so don't pretend this is a happy ending!

Max: [having heard the exchange] Selina?! [Catwoman faces him and takes off her mask] Selina Kyle. [pointedly] You're fired! [to Batman] And Bruce Wayne. Why are you dressed up like Batman?

Catwoman: Because he is Batman, you moron!

Max: [produces a gun] Was. [Shoots Batman in the chest, knocking him down. Catwoman reacts to the shooting] Don't!

Catwoman: You killed me. The Penguin killed me. Batman killed me. That's three lives down - you got enough in there to finish me off?!

Max: One way to find out.[shoots Catwoman twice]

Catwoman: Four... five... [swings whip around, then cracks it loudly] Still alive! [hit twice again; limps toward Max] Six... seven... all good girls go to heaven... [Max fires the gun again, but it is empty; laughs] Two lives left. I think I'll save one for next Christmas. But in the meantime... How about a kiss, Santy Claus? [kisses Schreck in the lips with a stun gun in between them while holding a live power line]

---

[Saddened over Selina Kyle's apparent death, Bruce Wayne finds a stray cat in the street and decides to adopt it out of homage for Catwoman]

Alfred Pennyworth: Well, come what may. Merry Christmas, Mr. Wayne.

Bruce Wayne: [sadly] Merry Christmas, Alfred. Good will toward men... and women.

[As they leave, the Bat-Signal appears in sky, which is then seen by Catwoman]

Taglines

• The Bat. The Cat. The Penguin.

Cast

• Michael Keaton - Batman/Bruce Wayne
• Danny DeVito - The Penguin/Oswald Cobblepot
• Michelle Pfeiffer - Catwoman/Selina Kyle
• Christopher Walken - Max Shreck
• Michael Gough - Alfred Pennyworth
• Pat Hingle - Commissioner James Gordon
• Michael Murphy - the Mayor
• Vincent Schiavelli - the Organ Grinder
• Andrew Bryniarski - Charles "Chip" Shreck
• Cristi Conaway - the Ice Princess

About Batman Returns

• I just have all these memories of her — letting a live bird fly out of her mouth and learning to use the whip and jumping around rooftop sets in high heels,” Burton said. “The work and just the performance were very, very impressive.
  • Tim Burton, Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman was purr-fection, LA Times, 13 August 2012
• I think I upset McDonald’s. [They asked] ‘What’s that black stuff coming out of the Penguin’s mouth? We can’t sell Happy Meals with that!'
• I think the studio just thought it was too weird — they wanted to go with something more child or family-friendly. In other words, they didn’t want me to do another one.
  • Tim Burton, 'I Think I Upset McDonald's With 'Batman Returns', The Inquisitr New, 25 December 2014
• We got to be back home [filming in Burbank] so that made me happy. It was quite the cast with Michelle Pfeiffer and Danny DeVito and everyone. It wasn’t as satisfying to me when I saw it, but maybe that’s because the bar was set so high on the first one. I think I only watched it one time. I knew we were in trouble in talks for the third one when certain people started the conversation with ‘Why does it have to be so dark?’ ‘Why does he have to be so depressed?’ ‘Shouldn’t there be more color in this thing?’ I knew I was headed for trouble and that it wasn’t a road I was going to go down.
  • Michael Keaton, Dark memories of ‘Batman’ and shining love for ‘Beetlejuice’, HeroComplex.latimes, 12 May 2011
• Remember, I came in when the audience was disturbed by Danny DeVito as the Penguin, and then Michelle Pfeiffer — which was still fabulous and maybe a little too S&M for some people.

• Joel Shumacher Talks 'Batman Forever' Legacy In Exclusive Interview, Forbes, 26 June 2015

External links

• Encyclopedic article on Batman Returns on Wikipedia
• Batman Returns quotes at the Internet Movie Database