This is one of two comedy films made by Leeds Mercury Movie Makers, and one of its main inspiring forces, Alan Sidi.  The other being Too Many Cooks (1966).  For more on Mercury Movie Makers see the Context for A Vision Fulfilled (1982).  Alan’s son Paul plays the midget sidekick of the Fiddler, and also plays himself in Too Many Cooks.  Esholt of course, rather than being a fictional city, is the real village in West Yorkshire, which become the scene for more fictional filming when the TV...

This is one of two comedy films made by Leeds Mercury Movie Makers, and one of its main inspiring forces, Alan Sidi.  The other being Too Many Cooks (1966).  For more on Mercury Movie Makers see the Context for A Vision Fulfilled (1982).  Alan’s son Paul plays the midget sidekick of the Fiddler, and also plays himself in Too Many Cooks.  Esholt of course, rather than being a fictional city, is the real village in West Yorkshire, which become the scene for more fictional filming when the TV soap Emmerdale Farm was set there from 1976.  It was also the home for Mercury Movie Makers, who located themselves in Sexton Lodge next to the Church of St Paul, and who made a documentary on the filming of Emmerdale Farm in the 1980s, From Esholt to Beckindale. 

This film is of course a spoof on the original Batman TV series which aired in the US on the ABC network for three seasons from January 12, 1966 to March 14, 1968. The show was aired twice weekly for its first two seasons, resulting in the production of a total of 120 episodes.  The series started in the UK on the 21st May, with a movie version being released the following day.  The show aired on the various ITV channels across the UK on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, usually late afternoon or early evening depending on region.   Episodes were then repeated by the individual independent channels for the next few years in no specific order.  There cannot be many who haven’t seen at least one of these episodes: it has been repeated several times since for any who hadn’t yet been born.  It has of course become a massive ‘franchise’, spawning many films, animated TV series and much much more.

Originally of course Batman started out in Harry Donenfield’s Detective Comics in May 1939, issue 27 (at that time named National Periodical Publications, later DC Comics). It was the brainchild of artist Bob Kane and scripter Bill Finger, with Robin not appearing until the following April.  There followed movie serials in 1943 and 1949.  Batman followed hard on the heels of Superman, who appeared in Action Comics in June the previous year, who might be regarded as the first comic book superhero.  Batman was possibly the second, followed by a string of others for various publications in the next few years, including Green Lantern, Captain Marvel and Flash in 1940, and Wonder Woman and Captain America in 1941.

Originally the Batman comics were very dark, with the definite influence of German Expressionism which was to shape film noir.  The darkness had diminished significantly though during the 1950s, and the TV series, with Adam West as Batman and Burt Ward as Robin, was of course pure slapstick, making much of the comedy potential of the ‘Pow-Wow’ speech bubbles.  It is this humour that Fatman exploits: something of a parody of a parody.  Although this film looks as if it might reflect the comedy seen on TV in the mid 1960s, this type of slapstick parody wasn’t that common at that time.  The nearest to it might be found in Benny Hill, before his show later switched from BBC to ITV in 1969.  In fact TV humour had become more sophisticated, as with the At Last the 1948 Show, which started in February 1967 – see too the Context for Justice on Wheels (1968) – although slapstick parody returned when Marty Feldman started his own show the following year.

Less in evidence, as one might expect, is the campness that the original TV was noted for.   As early as 1954 psychiatrist Fredric Wertham claimed, in his book Seduction of the Innocent, that the relationship between Batman and Robin is homoerotic.  George Clooney has stated that he made Batman a gay character when he played him in the 1997 film Batman & Robin.  The idea to camp it up came from William Dozier at Greenway Productions (the company employed to make the show) who apparently hated comic books. In his eyes, the only way to make the show was to camp it up – it was nominated for an Emmy in the category of "Outstanding Comedy Series".  It became very popular in Britain, even spawning a British version with the short-lived the World Adventure Library Batman stories.  The writer of the series, Lorenzo Semple Jr, later went on to script some fine thrillers, including The Parallax View in 1974, as well as the 1980 comic strip film Flash Gordon, which was also heavy on camp humour.

The comic criminal, the Fiddler, is obviously a pun on the Riddler; with the person playing the character even having a passing resemblance to Frank Gorshin who played the Riddler, and who appears in the first of the Batman TV series, as well as the 1966 film – although he doesn’t appear until 1948 in the comic books, and rarely thereafter.  However, the Riddler always provided a riddle as a clue to his crime.

By and large, both with the more recent comic book portrayals and in the more recent films, Batman has gone back to its darker, detective routes.   The reliance now on large-scale action and special effects make it much less easy now for any would be amateur cine club to send up the genre – although Alan Arkin managed it in the excellent The Return of Captain Invincible (1983).  Such considerations are less of problem for children though, as evidenced in a similar parody by members of the Phoenix Youth Club in Holmfirth, Dudey Movie (2006-08)   There will always be a place for parody and for slapstick, and we can still share the fun that was clearly had in the making of Fatman.

References

Will Brooker, Batman Unmasked: Analysing a Cultural Icon, Continuum, 2001.

Bat-Mania: History of Batman TV Series