A version of Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever that has never been publicly released in any form is will hold an extremely rare screening later this month in Los Angeles.
The existence of a 170-minute director’s cut of Batman Forever was first confirmed in the summer of 2020. Differences in this alternate version include “the villain Two-Face (Tommy Lee Jones) escaping from Arkham Asylum” along with more scenes where “the Riddler (Jim Carrey) … invades the Batcave and uses his signature cane as a weapon.” There is also a running thread about Bruce Wayne’s childhood trauma, and a dream sequence where he confronts an enormous bat, that was mostly excised.
That scene has made its way onto home video as a deleted scene. It’s also available online.
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Prior to his death in June of 2020, Schumacher did talk a little about the abundance of material that was cut out prior to its theatrical release. Since then, the so-called “Schumacher Cut” has only been screened privately a handful of times. (Kevin Smith hosted a screening that got some attention back in 2023, for example.)
Batman Forever was the third of four Batman movies released to theaters in the late 1980s and 1990s. Director Tim Burton departed the franchise after Batman Returns and was replaced by Schumacher. He brought in Val Kilmer to replace Michael Keaton as Batman, and hired Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey to play Two-Face and the Riddler, respectively.
Schumacher and Batman Forever also introduced the films’ version of Robin, played by Chris O’Donnell, and gave Kilmer’s Batman a new love interest, psychologist Dr. Chase Meridian, played by Nicole Kidman.
Although the movie got mixed reviews, and its reputation has waned through the years (largely because it was followed by the campy Batman & Robin), Batman Forever was a monstrous hit in 1995. It earned $336 million in theaters worldwide, roughly $70 million more than Batman Returns grossed a few years prior.
The screening of Batman Forever takes place at CineFile Video in L.A. on May 29. The screening is just a few days shy of the film’s 30th anniversary; it was first released in theaters on June 16, 1995.
[H/T World of Reel]
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