Batman Forever: Red Book Edition - The 15th Anniversary Enhanced Edition

While my narrative gripes of the original "Red Book Edition" remain–

"I've always been a nostalgic fan of the original Batman Forever, but also a fan of darker takes on Batman. I think this edit did an admirable job of trying to darken it up, but just didn't measure up to my enjoyment of the original version. The addition of the deleted Arkham Asylum beginning, the "red book" subplot, and the alternate ending was excellent, but removing the exciting Batmobile sequence for a decidedly boring deleted scene between Bruce and Dick just took me right out of the movie."

–the difference is the superior audio/visual quality and editing. "Batman Forever: The Red Book Edition–The 15th Anniversary Edition" may not replace the original "Batman Forever" for me, but it is a very good alternative.

Batman Forever has always been an underrated Batman movie in my opinion, on par with Batman Returns in regards to the Burton-Schumacher universe. It's not perfect by any means, but the mix of Burton's gothic world with the 60's Batman's wackiness made for an interesting blend, all held together by an incredibly somber and almost foreboding story for Bruce Wayne himself. Though it would have been great to see Michael Keaton wrap up his tenure as Batman with this third film, clearly meant to be a resolution to his multi-film character arc, Val Kilmer does an excellent job filling in his shoes.

To get to the edit itself, what I was most excited for is seeing a bit of a darker take on this film, for as much as I enjoy the silliness, it is clear that Schumacher's original intention was to create something more akin to Burton's work, until studio interference intervened. Right off the bat, I can safely say that this cut of the film does accomplish that; everything from the darker opening to the further exploration of Bruce's repressed memories to the general "Sin City-esque" color palette makes for a more emotionally dark and contemplative product than what we originally had.

At the same time, I did have some issues with the edit that detracted from my experience as a whole. Firstly, the obvious issue is all of the deleted scenes; this is just something that's unavoidable until we (hopefully) get an official Schumacher cut. The quality of the deleted scenes is just completely different from the rest of the film, and it does become distracting, especially when it's hard to actually make out certain character's faces.

Secondly, though I appreciated the change in color style, there were certain points in the film, namely the action scenes, where it was a little hard to tell what was actually happening on screen. The best example in my opinion was actually the opening on Arkham; I really had no idea what was going on (if the inmate was Harvey or the other security guard, or how he was even taken out of the cell). I do know this is a deleted scene, so maybe it was unfinished, but I think the black and white color made it especially hard to figure out.

Finally, my last issue was the decision to remove certain comedic moments over others. Certain scenes, like Chase's over the top flirting, Batman's "drive-thru" line, and Batman's thumbs up have been removed, yet most of the Riddler's gags, Dick's laundry scene, and the "Oh my god, it's boiling acid" line are still present. I guess I was just confused by some of the choices made, because I couldn't tell which tone the film was trying to go for by keeping certain aspects in the film. I think, either all of the comedic scenes should have been removed (except for the Riddler) or none of them (except for the butt-shots and opening).

Overall, despite these issues, I still very much enjoyed this edit. It was a different experience from my other times watching this movie, and though I can't say I liked it more than the original version, it's certainly an entertaining and thought-provoking experiment.

Thanks to Scaperat for coming up with this edit and to INIGHTMARES for providing the HD translation! The editing was pretty seamless.

This is, in fact, the first fanedit I've ever watched, and I'm glad it was this one. INIGHTMARES has done a phenomenal job at touching up and recreating Scaperat's original edit.

The noir-like colour grading reminiscent of Sin City was something I was a great fan of, and it made me realise how strangely well this movie works in B&W. The inclusion and touching-up of the deleted scenes was incredible and strengthened the movie's story a LOT. The removal of certain parts helped tighten up the pacing.

However, a problem I have with this edit overall is that it attempts to transform the movie into something that's just impossible: a darker, less campy take on Batman. I admire Scaperat's attempts a lot, but the colourful goofiness is just something that was always permanently a part of Batman Forever's identity. I also just plainly prefer that the embracing of the camp in general, to be fairly honest.

In conclusion, I think that this is a phenomenal fanedit of one of my favourite Batman movies that, while I don't personally agree with in some parts, is still just an incredible piece of work that Scaperat and INIGHTMARES should receive praise for. I still wouldn't call it the ideal way to watch Batman Forever, but it IS an improvement.

Amazing edit, feels very seamless in terms of deleted-scene integration! I give it a very high approval rating, would like to say though that it's a bit too black and white, I missed the Burton Blues...

But still a solid edit

I must confess from the start that Batman Forever is one of my biggest guilty pleasures. I'm aware that it's a big step down from the Burton-era Batman movies, but I can't lie when I say that it gave me plenty of good laughs, even if it was for all the wrong reasons.

Still, I think it's safe to say that this film needed a good FanFix. I haven't seen the original SD version this edit was based on, but I did get to see this HD upgrade of it. If anything has been changed from the previous edit, look for a different review. I'm just reviewing "this" version of the edit.

Overall, I can't call the Red Book Edition a major improvement, but I can call it an improvement. The reason I can't go into a crazed Joker level of happiness over this is because Music-ed's Batman & Robin: Deep Freeze has spoiled me too much, and between those two, I like Deep Freeze a lot more.

I'll start with the good for this edit. The first thing anyone watching will notice immediately is the color grading. It's quite a wonderful sight to behold. The mostly black-and-white-and-red color grading gives this edit some much welcomed Frank Miller vibes, and it's a nice change of pace from the overly colorful neon infused color palette the movie is known for. If I were forced to choose one thing to remember from this edit, it has to be the color grading. Even if it would never be seen in a theatre in 1995.

Of course, there's more to this edit than just pretty colors. The addition of the Bruce Wayne retirement subplot (a.k.a. the one where this edit got its name from) is a revelation, and one that will make you want to find a Warner Bros. employee to strangle for cutting it out. I also like a lot of the improvements made to Robin, as they do a lot to flesh him out as a person. In the original, Robin was pretty much a jerk who wanted revenge for his family without thinking it over. This version did a great job at making his motive for revenge more understandable and relatable.

However, in spite of its advantages, the Red Book Edition is still filled with a lot of that Adam West level silliness that bothered so many back in '95. And while I guess this version isn't as campy as the original, there's still so much of it remaining that I would be wary of recommending this edit to someone hoping for a darker, grittier Batman Forever. The biggest examples are the villains, played by Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey. They're still as silly and as ridiculous as they were before and if you had a problem with the Saturday morning cartoon treatment they were given, consider this review my warning, because none of that has changed here. Hated the villains in this movie? Don't watch this. You're gonna be disappointed.

So, as you can imagine, the Red Book edition is not a dark, gritty re-imagining of the Schumacher era some might be hoping for. Rather, it's more of a compromise between the Burton-esque Batman and the Adam West-ian Batman. Think Skyfall, but with Bruce Wayne instead of James Bond. If that sounds like your thing, then you'll probably enjoy it.

Batman Forever: The Red Book Edition is not one of my favorite edits, and if I were to compare this edit to the first two Tim Burton films, I would still call this the weakest of the three. But with that said, this is better than the theatrical, and if all you're looking for is a better version of Batman Forever, this is worth seeing. As for me, you know my thoughts about the original. So of course I liked this one too.