Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (also known as Batman: The Animated Movie) is a 1993 American animated superhero mystery film featuring the DC Comics character Batman, and is based on the 1990s Batman: The Animated Series. As with The Animated Series, the film stars Kevin Conroy as the voice of Batman, as well as the voices of Mark Hamill, Dana Delany, Hart Bochner, Stacy Keach, Abe Vigoda and Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. The film's storyline introduces Andrea Beaumont, an old love interest of Bruce Wayne's, who returns to Gotham City, restarting their romance. At the same time, a new mysterious vigilante begins systematically eliminating Gotham's crime bosses, and due to the person's dark appearance, he is mistaken for Batman. Now on the run from the police, the Dark Knight must apprehend the killer, clear his name, and deal with the romance between himself and Andrea.

The film was distributed by Warner Bros., directed by Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski (the creators of The Animated Series) and written by Alan Burnett, Paul Dini, Michael Reaves and Martin Pasko. The original idea was to release the film as Direct-to-video, but the studio decided for a theatrical release, giving the filmmakers a strenuous eight-month schedule. Mask of the Phantasm received widespread acclaim from critics, who praised the film for its animation style, dialogue and acting, but it was a Box office bomb due to the decision to release the film in theaters on such short notice. The film has since found cult success through its various VHS and DVD releases.

The film's success spawned two direct-to-video sequels, Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero and Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman.

Plot
During a conference of crime bosses held in a Gotham City skyscraper, gangster Chuckie Sol is killed by a mysterious cloaked figure, shortly after Batman bursts in on the meeting. Due to the killer's resemblance to Batman, the Dark Knight is blamed for Sol's death. Councilman Arthur Reeves tells the media that Batman is a public menace (despite Commissioner Gordon's protests), attends a party at the mansion of billionaire Bruce Wayne, Batman's alter ego. Reeves teases Bruce about his bad luck with women and for having allowed an old girlfriend, Andrea Beaumont, to get away.

In a flashback to 10 years before, Bruce meets Andrea in a cemetery while visiting his parents' grave. That night, in one of his first crime-fighting attempts, Bruce foils an armored car robbery while disguised in a black ski-mask and leather jacket. Though he succeeds, he is discouraged that the criminals did not fear him. Around the same time, he begins a romance with Andrea. Eventually, Bruce decides to abandon his plan to become a crime-fighting vigilante and proposes marriage to Andrea. Soon afterward, however, Andrea mysteriously leaves Gotham with her father, Carl Beaumont, ending her engagement to Bruce in a Dear John letter. Believing that he has lost his only chance of having a normal life, Bruce dons the mask of Batman for the first time.

The killer finds and murders another gangster, Buzz Bronski. Around the same time, Batman discovers that Andrea has returned to Gotham for the first time in 10 years. Batman soon finds evidence linking Andrea's father with gangster Salvatore Valestra, for whom both Sol and Bronski once worked as enforcers. The killer later targets Valestra, who turns to the Joker for help. The killer arrives at Valestra's house, and finds the gangster already dead at the Joker's hands; the house explodes, with the killer barely escaping. Batman pursues the killer, but is interrupted by the police, who believe that Batman is responsible for the murders. Andrea rescues Batman in her car, and they spend the night together at Wayne Manor. Andrea explains to Bruce that she and her father had been hiding in Europe from the Valestra mob, to whom he owed a lot of money. Batman comes to suspect that Andrea's father may be the killer, but later gets Reeves (who now knows of Batman's innocence but has been poisoned by the Joker, who believed him to be the mastermind behind the murders) to confess that he told the Valestra mob where Beaumont was hiding in return for campaign contributions, and that the mob ordered Beaumont's death.

The killer tracks the Joker to his hideout — an abandoned world's fair amusement park — and removes its ominous costume: the killer is Andrea, intent on avenging her father's death at the hands of the Joker, who is revealed to be the last surviving member and professional hitman of the Valestra mob. Batman arrives and saves Andrea from the Joker, and begs Andrea to give up her quest for revenge. She refuses, stating that the mob ruined her life by taking away her future with him; she tells Batman that he himself is driven by revenge before disappearing. Batman battles with the Joker, a struggle that ends in stalemate. Moments later, Andrea returns and seizes the Joker, bidding Batman goodbye before vanishing with the maniacally laughing clown in a cloud of smoke as the entire amusement park erupts in a series of rigged explosions. Batman barely escapes by falling into a waterway and being swept away to safety by the current.

Alfred later consoles a heartbroken Bruce, telling him that no one could have helped Andrea. Bruce finds a locket containing a picture of himself and Andrea left behind in the Batcave. Meanwhile, Andrea is shown standing alone on the deck of a departing ocean liner. In the final scene, Batman stands alone on the top of a Gotham building; when the W:C:DC:Bat-SignalBat-Signal appears in the sky, he swings off into the night to continue his war on crime.

Cast

 * Kevin Conroy as Bruce Wayne/Batman; a billionaire industrialist whose parents were killed by a mugger when he was eight years old. After traveling the world for several years to seek the means to fight injustice, he returns to Gotham. At night, Bruce becomes Batman, Gotham City's secret vigilante protector.
 * Dana Delany as Andrea Beaumont; a woman Bruce meets in the early years of his return to Gotham after traveling the world. The decision to propose to her in marriage leads to him abandoning his plans for becoming a vigilante. However, after she unexpectedly and mysteriously leaves, Bruce's frustration leads to his becoming Batman. Delany's voice performance in the film impressed the filmmakers, leading to her casting as Lois Lane in Superman: The Animated Series. thumb|200px|right|The killer, identified in the end credits as the Phantasm
 * Hart Bochner as City Councilman Arthur Reeves; a corrupt city official who was once an intern for Carl Beaumont. He later becomes involved with Valestra's gang in order to gain the influence to enter City Council, and told them where his former boss was hiding in return for campaign funds. Years later, the Joker tracks him down and poisons him with his laughing gas. He last appears in the Gotham City Mental Hospital, having been driven insane by the Joker's chemicals. Bochner's father was the voice of Mayor Hamilton Hill in Batman: The Animated Series.
 * Stacy Keach as Carl Beaumont; Andrea's father, who was secretly in business with the Valestra gang. He goes in debt to Valestra and flees to Europe with Andrea, but is later murdered by Valestra's personal hitman, who would become the Joker. Keach also provided the voice for the "Phantasm" killer.
 * Abe Vigoda as Salvatore Valestra; a powerful crime boss who goes into business with Carl Beaumont, and threatens to kill him for embezzling money. Once Andrea returns, he is an old, decrepit man, dependent on an oxygen tank to live due to years of smoking. He hires the Joker to kill Batman, but the Joker double-crosses him and kills him with Joker venom. Vigoda previously portrayed gangster Salvatore Tessio in The Godfather, though his character was a caporegime for Marlon Brando's Don Vito Coleone rather than the boss.
 * Mark Hamill as The Joker; Batman's nemesis, who was once an assassin for Valestra (and is implied to be responsible for the murder of Carl Beaumont). Valestra hires him to kill Batman, but the Joker kills Valestra instead. Hamill claims he took the opportunity of reprising his role from Batman: The Animated Series by way of creating new "laughing vocabularies."
 * Efrem Zimbalist as Alfred Pennyworth; once the trusted butler to Bruce Wayne's parents, he continues his loyal service to their son after their deaths. He is Batman's closest confidante.
 * Robert Costanzo as Detective Harvey Bullock; a detective with the Gotham City Police Department who distrusts Batman and is put in charge of the police task force assigned to hunt down the Dark Knight after he is framed for the gangster murders.
 * Bob Hastings as Commissioner James Gordon; the police commissioner of Gotham City and Batman's closest ally. He refuses to capture Batman, believing the Dark Knight is not responsible for any of the gangster murders.
 * Dick Miller as Charles "Chuckie" Sol; a crime boss and the Phantasm's first victim.
 * John P. Ryan as Buzz Bronski; a crime boss who seems to have had a brief partnership with Chuckie Sol. He is later killed by the Phantasm at the graveyard while visiting Sol's grave.

Additional voices: Jeff Bennett, Ed Gilbert, Marilu Henner, Charles Howerton, Pat Musick, Thom Pinto, Neil Ross, Arleen Sorkin, and Vernee Watson-Johnson

Production
Impressed by the success of the first season of Batman: The Animated Series on the Fox Network, Warner Bros. assigned Alan Burnett to write a story for a full-length animated film. Although the Joker does play a pivotal role in the film, it was Burnett's intention to tell a story far removed from the television show's regular rogues gallery. Burnett also cited he "wanted to do a love story with Bruce because no one had really done it on the TV show. I wanted a story that got into his head." The writers were highly cautious of placing the Joker in the film as they did not want any connection to Tim Burton's 1989 film Batman, but writer Michael Reaves said, "We then realized that we could make his appearance serve the story in a way that we never could in live-action." Aiding Burnett in writing the script were: Martin Pasko, who handled most of the flashback segments; Michael Reaves, who wrote the climax; and Paul Dini, who claims he "filled in holes here and there." Orson Welles' 1941 classic Citizen Kane served as an influence for the flashbacks, a story about loss and the passage of time.

Early in production, Warner Brothers decided to release Phantasm with a theatrical release, rather than straight to video. That left less than a year for production time (most animated features take well over two years from finished story to final release). Due to this decision, the animators went over the scenes once more in order to accommodate widescreen theatrical aspect ratio. The studio did cooperate well, granting the filmmakers a large amount of creative control.

In addition to the creative control, the studio increased the production budget to $6 million, which gave the filmmakers opportunities for more elaborate set pieces. The opening title sequence featured a flight through an entirely computer-generated Gotham City. As a visual joke, sequence director Kevin Altieri set the climax of the film inside a miniature automated model of Gotham City, where Batman and the Joker were giants. This was an homage to a mainstay of Batman comic books of the Dick Sprang era, often featuring the hero fighting against a backdrop of gigantic props (they would later do another homage to Sprang's works in The New Batman Adventures episode "Legends of the Dark Knight"). From start to finish, the film was completed within eight months. Composer Shirley Walker cited the score of Phantasm as a favorite among her own compositions.

Themes
Paul Dini intended each of the flashbacks into Batman's love life to "have a tendency to get worse, when you hope things will get better." Bruce's relationship with Andrea, which at first shows promise, eventually turns into turmoil. At first, Bruce and Andrea are set for marriage, but then Bruce is given a farewell note from Andrea cutting off their relationship. This eventually leads into Bruce's decision to become Batman. Richard Corliss of Time felt this scene paralleled Andrea's decision to avenge her own parents and reject love, when she finds her own father murdered. Both events transform the two people (Bruce becomes Batman, Andrea becomes the Phantasm).

One scene depicts Bruce Wayne at his parents' tombstone saying "I didn't count on being happy." According to writer Michael Reaves, this scene was to be a pivotal moment in Bruce's tragic life, as he is denied the opportunity to live a normal life. Reaves also stated: "When Bruce puts on the mask for the first time, [after Andrea breaks their engagement], and Alfred says 'My God!' he's reacting in horror, because he's watching this man he's helped raise from childhood, this man who has let the desire for vengeance and retribution consume his life, at last embrace the unspeakable."

Critical response
Based on 23 reviews collected by Rotten Tomatoes, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm received an average 81% overall approval rating with the consensus stating, "Stylish and admirably respectful of the source material, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm succeeds where many of the live-action Batman adaptations have failed."

Empire cited it as the best animated film of 1993, and felt it contained better storylines than Tim Burton's Batman and Batman Returns. TV Guide was impressed with the art deco noir design that was presented. In addition the film's climax and Batman's close call with the Gotham City Police Department were considered to be elaborate action sequences. Richard Harrington of The Washington Post agreed with overall aspects that included the animation, design, dialogue. and storyline, as well as Shirley Walker's film score. Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert regretted not having viewed the film in its theatrical release. They did give a positive reaction, with Siskel feeling that Phantasm was better than Batman Returns and Joel Schumacher's Batman Forever, and only slightly below Batman. In October 2012, WhatCulture also praised the film, saying it was at the same level as Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight Trilogy, if not slightly higher.

Stephen Holden of The New York Times thought the voice performances were "flat and one-dimensional". Chris Hicks of the Deseret News felt "the picture didn't come alive until the third act" feeling that the animators sacrificed the visuals for the storyline. In addition, he felt Mark Hamill "stole the show." Leonard Klady of Variety had mixed reactions towards the film, but his review was negative overall. He felt the overall themes and morals were clichéd and cited the animation to be to the "point of self-parody".

IGN ranked Mask of the Phantasm as the 25th best animated film of all time in a list published in 2010. Additionally, Total Film named Mask of the Phantasm the 47th greatest animated film out of 50 in 2011. In 2011, Time Magazine ranked Phantasm the 8th best superhero movie.

Box office
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm opened on Christmas Day 1993 in the United States in 1,506 theaters, accumulating $1,189,975 over its opening weekend. The film went on to gross $5,617,391 in the domestic total box office intake. The filmmakers blamed Warner Bros. for the unsuccessful marketing campaign. Mask of the Phantasm did eventually pass its $6 million budget with its various home video releases.

Awards
Alongside The Lion King and The Nightmare Before Christmas, Mask of the Phantasm was nominated for an Annie Award in the category of Best Animated Feature, but lost out to The Lion King.

Tie-ins
In December 1993, two novelizations were released. One was written by Alan Burnett, Paul Dini, and Andrew Helfer with the other authored by Geary Gravel. DC Comics released a comic book adaptation written by Kelley Puckett and drawings by Mike Parobeck. The comic book adaptation was later included with the VHS release.

Kenner, who had already released toys for the regular Batman cartoon series, produced several tie in figures for the film, including the Joker and the Phantasm (packaged unmasked, spoiling a pivotal plot point in the film)

Home media
The film was released on Laserdisc in April 1994 and on VHS in May of the same year. The VHS was reissued in April 2003, though this time, part of a three-tape pack with Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero and Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker. Mask of the Phantasm was first released on DVD in December 1999 as a snap case and in October 2005 as a keep case with the insert. The film was released in April 2004 as a three disc DVD box set that included SubZero and Return of the Joker, but it is currently out of print. Warner Home Video released the film once more in February 2008, but as a double feature DVD with SubZero.