The Wild World of Batwoman (1966) - Comic to Movie #13

"We the girls who are dedicated to Batwoman fight against evil with all sincerity."

Director

Jerry Warren

Cast

Katherine Victor - Batwoman 

Richard Banks - Rat Fink

George Andre - Prof. G. Octavius Neon

Steve Brodie - Jim Flanagan

Steve Conte - Bruno

Lloyd Nelson - Heathcliff

I thought I had seen most Batman related movies out there, excluding the Batman serial from 1943 starring Lewis Wilson as Bruce Wayne/ Batman and Douglas Croft as Dick Grayson/ Robin. I haven't seen those yet, nor its 1949 sequel The New Adventures of Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder. That stars Robert Lowery as Bruce Wayne/ Batman and Johnny Duncan as Dick Grayson/ Robin. Otherwise, I thought I had seen or heard of the majority of other Batman related movies. I was wrong. I hadn't seen nor ever heard of the obscure shlockfest that is The Wild World of Batwoman until recently.

Oh, by the way, fun fact for fans of the 1989 Tim Burton film Batman, Jane Adams plays Vicki Vale in the 1949 series - the character Kim Basinger played in Burton's movie.

Anyways, no doubt when most audiences out there think of "Batman and Robin," the TV series from the 1960s with Adam West and Burt Ward surely comes to mind.  

It goes without saying that this series was quite an influential show, and helped establish the "Dynamic Duo" into pop culture. During the show's final season, Batgirl (played by Yvonne Craig) is introduced to audiences. Her real name is Barbara Gordon - a librarian and the daughter of Commissioner Gordon.

It was so influential, in fact, that it made some kind of impression on director Jerry Warren. So, he made his own bat film called The Wild World of Batwoman. 

Warren is now known for being a cult cinema director.

I don't honestly know what the true definition of a "cult film" is. Regardless, I feel very comfortable in labeling The Wild World of Batwoman one of them.

Warren directed several other barely remembered films such as Teenage Zombies (1960) and Attack of the Mayan Mummy (1963) which is an Americanized version of an earlier movie from Mexico called The Aztec Mummy. He also directed The Face of the Screaming Werewolf  (1965), Creature of the Walking Dead (1965), and House of the Black Death (1965). 

The Wild World of Batwoman was his last movie until he wrote, produced, composed, edited, and directed Frankenstein Island in 1981 which stars John Carradine.  

I searched quite a bit for this Batwoman movie. I heard it was once featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000. I'll have to check that out!

A YouTube channel I subscribed to aptly called "Cult Cinema Classics" uploaded this truly obscure movie onto their channel recently. And I watched it out of pure curiosity.  

It's worth mentioning there's another Batwoman film I never heard of until researching this movie. The 1968 movie, produced in Mexico, La Mujer Murcielego (The Batwoman) seems more like a superhero movie than Warren's film. 

According to imdb.com, in that Mexican superhero film, Batwoman (Maura Monti) investigates a mad scientist who is kidnapping wrestlers for the sake of stealing their spinal fluid so he can create a "gill-man." 

Honestly, that sounds so much more captivating than what I was fed while watching The Wild World of Batwoman. 

Warren's movie opens with a trio of young women (normally I would say that's a great start to a movie, but here, it's not) performing a ritual to swear allegiance to Batwoman and become "Bat-girls." Two of the women are novices while the third is leading them. The make an oath to obey all rules and orders handed to them "through the channels."

The lead woman then gives them something to drink as a way to seal their vow.

"Now that you're one of us, I can tell we're vampires alright, but only in a synthetic sense. Drinking the real stuff went out with Count Dracula," the lead girl says.

This opening makes no sense as nothing alluding to vampires ever comes up again. There's nothing vampire related, let alone horror related in the rest of the story. Maybe I'm just reading too much into this opening scene. It was lost on me.

One of them asks what's in the drink. 

Katherine Victor as "the Batwoman."

"Honey, mint, cherry, and strawberry yogurt," the leader says. And they all chug down their nutritious fruit smoothie in allegiance to the Batwoman. 

Then the title spins onto the screen breaking their joyous health kick.

"The Wild World of Batwoman" the title reads against a backdrop of a guy chatting it up with a masked woman dawning a crazy hair-do (Batwoman). There's a small group of young women with them, and they're all in what looks like a comfy living room. 

Batwoman maintains a group of women, who call themselves "Batgirls," to act as agents in her pursuit to stop crime around the city. 

These Batgirls hide around the city and keep an eye out for crime. 

Her arch-nemesis, Rat Fink (Richard Banks) has employed the President and Vice-President of a company called Ayjax Development Corporation to create a powerful hearing aid that uses plutonium as its power source in order to acquire unlimited and supreme eavesdropping capabilities.   

With the help of a mad scientist named Prof. G. Octavius Neon (George Andre) and his lame-brained sidekick, Heathcliff (Lloyd Nelson), they want to sell this device to the U.S. Government. 

As it has unstable power, the government orders them to destroy it. But all involved refuse to do so.

The Ayjax VP requests Batwoman to protect this ultimate hearing aid.

Rat Fink, however, uses a mind altering drug on the Batgirls that makes them dance uncontrollably. 

In one scene when Batwoman is having lunch at a restaurant with the VP, Rat Rink's goons spike bowls of soup to get her, the president, and the Batgirls to start dancing so as to slow them down while he steals the hearing aid.

But they're not slowed down for long. The Batgirls ambush Rat Fink's lair in an effort to retrieve it. 

The movie is as dumb as it sounds. 

I wasn't even interested nor invested in the story accidentally.

First, Batwoman's appearance is certainly the worst look that the 1960s could offer.

She wears a low-cut top with a bat emblem painted directly on her chest just about her cleavage. She dresses in black with one arm in a shaggy covering. She wears a mask, and has a hair style that's one incomprehensible mess of hair pointing in all locations.  

Aside from the bat emblem on her skin, and the word "bat" in her name, there's no other connection to anything truly Batman or DC Comics that publishes Batman comic books. The story doesn't take place in Gotham City. In fact, a shot of the Bay Bridge in San Francisco is used in the backdrop during the opening credits. There's no actual Batman villains. There's no reference to Batman. Batwoman isn't actually Barbara Gordon. Well, the audience never finds out who she really is. We never see her unmasked. Nothing. It's a full-on Batman rip off.

The one thing any superhero movie has, whether humorous or dark, is fighting. In the very least, intimidation. This movie has none of that. Even in the final "climatic" scene, I really don't recall any fighting. I do remember a lot of slapstick shoving, chasing, running around tables, and a complete lack of direction. That's literally what takes place. 

When she's not actually investigating, Batwoman and her crew of gorgeous and unmasked batgirls sit around the living room of her comfortable mid-century home. Or they take the party outside and hang out around the swimming pool. Where ever they decide to chill, they enjoy a few drinks while chatting on their wrist radio watches. 

I suppose back then it may have been considered uncouth or implausible for a woman to brawl against on a bunch of men in a fight and win? I'm just speculating here. Batgirl certainly kicked some villainous male backside on the TV series. I don't know what was stopping Warren's Batwoman. 

Otherwise, Rat Fink, Dr. Neon and all the other men in the movie simply try to outsmart Batwoman, but she outsmarts them back. Woo-hoo! If any young girls looked up to this Batwoman as a model of strength and girl power back in 1966, I feel really sorry for them. They were cheated. 

Dancing! Lots and lots of dancing!

Aside from making a comical sexy flick with a lot of girls and Go-Go dancing, I honestly don't know what Warren is trying to accomplish. It's clearly a rip-off of the worst kind. Again, there's lots and lots of dancing. And Warren makes sure the audience is "treated" to several back-side shots of women Go-Go dancing, or whatever they called it back then. Thanks, but no thanks. 

Stock footage from various films are used in the movie. One scene is taken from the 1950s Sci-Fi film The Mole People. Knowing that makes this already stupid faux Batwoman movie even more pathetic. By the way, English actor Alan Napier stars in The Mole People. He also plays Alfred, Bruce Wayne's butler, in the Batman TV series. All these Bat-connections are coming full Bat-circle!  

The acting is blatantly terrible. Lines are clearly scripted. Too much of them are regurgitated with no influx or emotion. 

Other performances, particularly from Lloyd Nelson, is ridiculous and embarrassing to watch. Heathcliff, who's a mindless dimwitted sidekick, is supposed to be the comic relief. I seriously wonder if anyone in 1966 found his performance comical. 

One scene depicts Batwoman and the Ayjax presidents consulting spirits from beyond to tell them where the hearing aid is.

As a deep monotone voice answers back from somewhere unseen, it suddenly breaks into loud, obnoxious Chinese. Again, this is supposed to be the comedy. 

As I mentioned earlier, the 1960s series Batman is what inspired Warren to make his own bat-movie. 

He was supposedly sued for copyright infringement, leading him to change the title to She was a Hippy Vampire.  

The television series' film adaptation, Batman: The Movie was released the same year as this. Miraculously The Wild World of Batman manages to be campier than that. Regardless, this worst of 1966 Bat movies still lingers in the dark, less explored recesses of movie history. 

To quote the real Batman in Batman: The Movie, "Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."