Starring: Halle Berry, Benjamin Bratt, Sharon Stone, Lambert Wilson, Frances Conroy, and Alex Borstein
After Michelle Pfeiffer's seductive and fiery performance as Catwoman in Batman Returns, there was talk of a spinoff film about the feisty feline starring Pfeiffer and directed by Batman Returns director Tim Burton. With Batman Forever taking a lighter turn and Joel Schumacher taking Burton's place in the director's chair, the chances of the spinoff happening with Burton and Pfeiffer went straight to hell. What did happen was Catwoman sitting in development limbo for more than a decade. Eventually, they found a new woman to wear tight vinyl and a whip—Halle Berry.
Patience Phillips (Berry) is an artist and graphic designer working for a cosmetics company known as Hedare Beauty led by George Hedare (Lambert Wilson). The company is currently preparing to introduce a new product called Beau-Line, a cream that will reduce the effects of aging. When Patience drops off some work at a factory where this new product is being manufactured, she overhears a conversation between the boss's wife Laurel Hedare (Sharon Stone) and a company scientist about how dangerous the product is. They catch Patience listening to the conversation and literally flush her down the sewage system to kill her.
On that fateful night at the factory, Patience dies but is reborn. The goddess Bast uses an Egyptian Mau named Midnight to intervene and grants Patience superhuman, catlike abilities. With her new abilities, Patience decides to confront those who killed her and to put a stop to Hedare Beauty's plans of unleashing the Beau-Line cream out to the masses. Meanwhile, Patience begins dating Detective Tom Lone (Benjamin Bratt), a cop who will soon be getting more acquainted with her alter ego known as Catwoman.
Catwoman might just be the worst comic book film ever. If I had never seen it with my own two eyes, I wouldn't have believed movies could get this bad. Instead of getting impressive special effects, we get cheap and overly computerized graphics. Instead of getting a meaningful origin story with actual character development, we get pointless connections to Egyptian cats. Instead of getting a dark vigilante with her own agenda that embodies bold feminism, we get a pathetic, half-assed girl power statement. Basically, Catwoman sucks.
This tale about the feisty feline is an embarrassment to the comic book film genre. The one thing I don't get is why Halle Berry took on this role. She had nothing to prove. Since she had already portrayed Storm in X-Men and X2: X-Men United, she had already become an established part of a superhero franchise. Instead, she brings her beauty and talent to a film that has no substance. She goes for a film where everything goes wrong. Berry should’ve stuck to just playing Storm.
Watching Catwoman is truly taking one for the team. It's a film that's awful from the start. It's a bad rom com and a crappy action flick combined. It's downright painful to watch. I had to drown out the pain with some shots. I recommend some tequila slammers. Catwoman gets a wasted rating.
