Batman Returns makes a strong visual assertion that the next movie SHOULD be about Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman since she takes over Batman’s perch over Gotham. I needed Tim Burton to step up to the plate because THAT would have been a good movie. Everyone knows that Catwoman is not a good movie, but how bad is it? Is it so bad that it is good? Sadly no. It is just bad. Certainly not the worst movie that I’ve ever seen, but disappointing because clearly a lot of money and manpower were dumped into Catwoman so it wasn’t like they were hoping to make a bad movie.
I think that they were going for the campy style that we are used to in Gotham, but this is the way NOT to do it. The characters are annoying. Halle Berry’s character pre-transformation is like Michael Jackson giving an interview to Oprah-all breathy, vulnerable and shy. Sure Pfeiffer’s Selina Kyle was initially nervous and naive, but she would not have tripped in her own apartment over her feet. Catwoman became too animalistic and CGI. Sure she is supernatural, but her bones didn’t change. Also when Selina transformed, she became stronger as a person whereas Patience is still annoying, but with powers and occasional flashes of attitude with amnesia, which is so insulting to women; however this movie is not worth my particular rant about women as victims even when they are agents of power.
The soundtrack was a little racist. They were aware that this Catwoman wasn’t the FIRST black Catwoman, right? Every time Halle’s soundtrack came on, it wasn’t just a soundtrack, but an easy listening version of soul music matched with vocals doing runs and humming because soul sister was Catwoman. Oh, and there is a basketball scene. I’m not lying.
At one point, as Catwoman, Berry takes a sexy leather jacket and pants out of her closet, which she plausibly had (it was a present) and easily could have been her costume for the whole movie. It is at the exact moment that her outfit randomly and inexplicably switches to the one that we see on the poster art that Catwoman becomes almost unwatchable. The outfit is actually worst than it looks in the poster because there appear to be lacy cutouts to show more skin on the butt and thighs. Aren’t her breasts enough? She doesn’t have to be Prince too. I was not horrified when Xena fought people naked because she was jumped after taking a bath in a local pond. I need plausibility people! What is most disappointing is that Benjamin Bratt, a handsome man if there ever was one, has no chemistry with Halle Berry? How can this be a hard thing to accomplish?
The editing needs Ritalin. It doesn’t cut too much, but too often- like dialogue’s punctuation needs to be accompanied by a different shot. The best thing that can be said about Catwoman is that it features some really good actors who give it to pay their mortgage: Lambert Wilson and Frances Conroy. If anyone gained the most out of Catwoman, it is Alex Borstein from MADtv. She looked fabulous, and she was actually my favorite character in the entire movie. I didn’t realize how pretty she is!