Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm feat. Evan MacDonald
Added 2022-11-23 19:31:12 +0000 UTCHost of Kino Lefter Evan MacDonald returns to the show to discuss the 1993 animated Batman adventure 'Mask Of The Phantasm', a gorgeous, noirish take on the caped crusader that marks a mature, novel-for-its-time approach to the interiority of the tragic character.
We discuss the film's place within the feature canon (is this the best Batman movie of all time?), riff on the tired criticisms of the character in the age of social media, and pay our respects to the recently departed Kevin Conroy whose commanding voice gave life to one of the best iterations of this classic character. RIP.
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Our theme song is "Mirror" by Chris Fish.
Comments
..I remember this movie being "a real movie, but for kids, in the Oscar-sense of being a real movie", and while I haven't seen it since I was twelve or so, I trust that it is still solid. It was also the first movie I encountered that used "O fortuna" (when the amusement park is burning), and being unfamiliar with the piece, I just experienced it as an incredibly dramatic and powerful piece of music, ostensibly written for this animated Batman-movie. ...it's probably the case that any media-production someone encounters that uses "O Fortuna" is going to leave a groove in your brain as "wow, that was so spectacular and haunting, and I can't believe they made that music specifically for this media product I just saw!" It's a pretty sweet child-memory of mine. Beyond that...I dunno....uhm... "art-deco Batman" is canon Batman, along with topsy-turvy Batman Returns german-expressionist visuals (and the canon Catwoman, who made gay boys give a forever-pass to whatever Michelle Pfeiffer ended up doing afterwards). //this movie - and the series - is also probably responsible for teaching a lot of children about the concept of discrete art-styles. It was definitely my introduction to the idea that things can have a coherent "style", art-wise, and Art Deco is probably the easiest for children to recognize as something very distinct, stylized, but also a real thing, that did (and does) exist in the real world in both print-art and major architecture.
Jesper Ohlsson
2022-11-24 18:12:49 +0000 UTC
