In this FandomWire Video Essay, we explore why Catwoman became DC’s biggest embarrassment.
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Catwoman Was A Disaster
THIS……. is Catwoman. Well… sort of. Despite being among DC’s most popular characters, her only live-action solo outing has become infamous for all the wrong reasons. It’s a movie so bad that it essentially de-railed the career of a prominent A-List movie star, wracked up seven Razzie nominations, and is responsible for the most bewildering, and incomprehensible basketball scene ever put to film. And all of this while sharing ties to Tim Burton’s beloved Batman films.
Carrying an abysmal 8% on Rotten Tomatoes; with the Associated Press’ Christy Lemire slamming it as “a soulless amalgamation of quick edits, computer images, and swooping, nausea-inducing dolly shots” the question that has to be asked is… how did this get made? And… why? Can it really be as bad as its reputation? To understand how the movie became such an epic failure, both at the box office and with audiences, we need to examine this in pieces. So sharpen your claws and break out the whip as we dive headfirst into what makes Catwoman the WORST live-action DC film ever.
Ideas for a Catwoman solo film date back as early as 1993. Due to the popularity of Michelle Pfeiffer’s portrayal of the character in Batman Returns, Warner Bros. began development of a spin-off film centered on her almost immediately, alongside a third Batman film. Pfeiffer was originally slated to reprise her role as Selina Kyle’s Catwoman, with Tim Burton returning to the director’s chair. Even after Warner replaced Burton with Joel Schumacher for what became Batman Forever, a Pfeiffer-starring Catwoman film was still seemingly in the cards, with screenwriter Daniel Waters turning in his script for the film the same day Forever premiered in theaters.
There are a number of reasons this version ultimately didn’t pan out. The box office success of the family-friendly Batman Forever likely would’ve made Warner Bros. hesitant to move forward on the “definitely not a fun-for-the-whole-family script” Waters wrote for Burton’s Catwoman. Moreover, both Tim Burton and Michelle Pfeiffer would become preoccupied with other commitments over the next few years, both in terms of other projects and in Pfeiffer’s case, becoming a mother. Catwoman would wind up lambasting in development hell for years, with everyone from Ashley Judd to Nicole Kidman being considered for the lead at some point. Warner Bros. would only end up fast-tracking the film due to needing a last-minute replacement for a scrapped Batman vs. Superman movie in 2004; and Halle Berry only signed on as the lead because Jinx, a proposed James Bond spin-off centered on her Die Another Day character, was canceled. It was through this continuously shifting dynamic, both behind the camera and in front of it, that the Catwoman movie came to be the disastrous presentation that it was.
This movie, to put it nicely, is difficult to watch. Even the most basic transitions are fraught with jarring pans and awkward camera angles that make the whole thing literally uncomfortable to endure. And its more complex moments are even worse, from an out-of-nowhere fast-forward montage early in the film to the bizarre implementation of what can only be described as cat vision. But totality of the film’s absurd cinematography and editing style can be summed up to a single scene. The infamous basketball scene. A scene so filled to the brim with distracting quick cuts, stunningly awful physical choreography, and subpar CGI that it needs to be seen to be believed. Brian Gill of the Mad About Movies Podcast said of this moment, “I loved basketball more than anything in the world until I watched the basketball scene in Catwoman. Now I hate basketball.”
If you’re not getting headaches from the CGI in that scene, the CGI cats and birds that look straight out of a mid-budget PlayStation 2 game, or from trying to follow the nonsensical villain subplot where beauty cream makes you invincible but also turns you to stone because… well, the reasoning is never really explained, you’ll get them from trying to figure out how Halle Berry’s Catwoman costume is even supposed to work. Clawed-up leather pants and a mostly backless bra both only supported by a set of crossed backless straps and presumably the weight of Halle Berry’s own cleavage. There is no way she isn’t suffocating just walking around in that thing, let alone having to do action scenes in it. Oh, and she has to do all of this while wearing heels because of course she does. Sexiness clearly took priority over function here and she’s not even the sexiest Catwoman. Michelle Pfeiffer for the win, any day of the week.
Catwoman director, simply known as Pitof, infamously stated when making the film that he “didn’t want to be too influenced by the comic book.” Perhaps he took that philosophy a bit too literally as it’s easier to list the things Catwoman DOES lift from its source material than the other way around, specifically the Catwoman name, the black color scheme, and presence of cat ears on the costume, and cat burglary, which happens in exactly one scene and then never comes up again. The Catwoman of the comics, Selina Kyle, is a strong, confident cat burglar that takes what she wants with a blatant disregard for the law. She understands the rot of Gotham City firsthand and will take advantage of it any way she can. And despite possessing no superpowers, nor a particularly powerful position in the criminal underworld, she still more than holds her own and frequently outsmarts the Dark Knight himself. At least when she’s not teaming up with him in more ways than one.
The Catwoman of the film is……not that. In fact, she’s not even Selina Kyle. Here, she’s Patience Phillips, a meek and timid graphic designer who only obtains some semblance of her comic counterpart’s confidence after she’s resurrected by the servants of an Egyptian cat goddess. And even then, said confidence is treated as a split personality that Patience has no memory of afterwards; meaning that the MAIN CHARACTER OF THE MOVIE has zero agency in her own story.
Furthermore, the Catwoman of the comics does NOT have cat vision or cat parkour or any other cat-based superpowers. She does not hiss at dogs, nor does she succumb to insatiable cravings for cream or canned tuna. Further distancing itself from the character’s origins and roots, none of the film’s supporting characters exist in the comics at all and while the city it takes place in is never specified, it doesn’t seem to be Gotham. Though Gotham does apparently exist in this universe given that there’s a newspaper clipping of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman from Batman Returns. This single photograph, a mere easter egg among a cavalcade of nonsense, is the only real connection present to the world built by Burton, and honestly, that’s a good thing.
Catwoman was, and is, a resounding failure on every level. Its abysmal box office performance and universally negative reception, alongside similarly performing films like Jennifer Garner’s Elektra, would set back female-led superhero films by about a decade; with the stigma only being broken more recently by films like Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. Needless to say, this is not remembered as the best work of anyone involved, who have all understandably attempted to distance themselves from the film over the years.
Pitof only directed one more film, 2008’s Fire and Ice: The Dragon Chronicles, before returning to his roots in visual effects. And while smaller players like Sharon Stone and Benjamin Bratt escaped relatively unscathed; Halle Berry, the film’s lead and a genuinely talented actress outside of this, wasn’t so lucky. She went from winning the Academy Award for Best Actress in Monster’s Ball just three years earlier; to starring in a string of critical and financial failures like 2007’s Perfect Stranger, 2010’s Frankie & Alice, and 2013’s Movie 43.
However, things aren’t all doom and gloom for Berry. She had a memorable and well-received turn as Sofia in 2019’s John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum and made her directorial debut with Bruised in 2020. Even at the time, Halle Berry approached Catwoman’s failure with a sense of humor. In 2005, she attended that year’s Razzie Awards ceremony in order to accept her Worst Actress award in person, one of only six people and two women to ever do so. Sandra Bullock also accepted her Razzie award, for her performance All About Steve. However, the sting of her Worst Actress win was likely dulled by winning the Oscar for Best actress that same year, for her part in The Blind Side. In Berry’s infamous and humorous acceptance speech, she personally thanked Warner Bros. for “putting me in a god-awful, piece-of-sh*t movie.”
Luckily, the character of Catwoman has endured in popularity, rising above the lowest moment in her long history. She still frequently appears in comics, cartoons, video games, and even live-action films; being portrayed by Anne Hathaway in The Dark Knight Rises and Zoe Kravitz in The Batman. Kravitz’s take on the character was received particularly positively and is even rumored to get her own solo movie, proving that the 2004 film cast a shadow so dark and jolting as to ruin the general audience’s appetite for it altogether. Even if it did take a long LONG time to wash off the stink of said film.
In the end, the director’s inexperience and lack of interest in the character, the breakneck editing, and the worst performances of both Halle Berry and Sharon Stone’s illustrious careers add up to Catwoman being arguably the WORST live-action DC movie.
Now, we want to hear what you think. Do you agree that Catwoman is the worst live-action DC movie? Or did you see something good in it that we just couldn’t? And would you like to see Catwoman get another shot at a solo film? Let us know in the comments below and be sure to give this video a like, subscribe, and hit that bell so you can see future videos like this as soon as they go up. Until next time, thanks for watching.
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