Batman: Mask of the Phantasm [4K Ultra HD] [1993] [Blu-ray] [Region Free]

Great Batman animated feature and it looks great in 4K.

What a great movie

Still till this day, it's one of the best Batman animated films. The video and audio quality is top notch!

Pure peak. Genuine bat perfection

If you like Batman The Animated Series, you’ll like Batman Mask of the Phantasm.

Brilliant animation for its time. Genuinely intriguing story, great script, written in a gumshoe detective noir style and with a great twist. Recommended.

Masterpiece

Looks great in 4k

People who argue over which actor has turned in the best performance as Batman often overlook Kevin Conroy, who was the voice of Batman for a generation of Nineties kids who have never been satisfied with any cinematic Batman before or since. And people who argue whether Nicholson or Ledger was the best Joker . . . have probably never seen this movie. I am spoiling the fact that The Joker is in it, but I don't care. Mark Hamill's portrayal of the Joker, even as a voice actor, is simply fantastic and at least as good as Jack Nicholson's. Dana Delaney (who played Lois Lane in the contemporary Superman cartoon) is terrific as the female lead, and Abe Vigoda and Stacy Keach deliver very good performances that sound more like an A-list actor doing a Disney villain than someone "phoning it in." Top-notch voice acting is one thing the Bruce Timm cartoons are known for, and this movie is no exception. Writer Paul Dini tells the origin story of Batman in a novel way by NOT focusing on the way Bruce Wayne lost his parents, but rather how it changed him as a person and why he actually decided to do something about it. Like Batman Begins, the story is non-linear. There is a main storyline that follows a very seasoned, resolute Batman at the top of his game, solving a murder mystery for which he is the main suspect while staying one step ahead of the police and a corrupt city official; and then there is an origin story, told in flashbacks, that explores the very early days of Bruce Wayne's crime-fighting career as an angsty, conflicted young man. The stories converge in the final act, when "Present Bruce" uncovers something about his past and "Past Bruce" finally creates the persona of Batman. In other words, it's a story about the "World's Greatest Detective," and it finds that winning formula of action and intrigue that a lot of live-action portrayals have gotten wrong. This is a cartoon for kids, but it tells a very grown-up story with some dark themes about betrayal, lost love, and obsession. You get a sense of just how tragic and self-destructive Bruce Wayne's decision to become Batman really was, and there several cold blooded murders that add weight to the story and make the villains feel genuinely evil. In this reviewer's opinion, this really is the best Batman STORY ever done in a movie, as well as the best incarnation of Batman. This is not some hasty direct-to-video release, either. The animation was done in-house at Warner Bros. and is every bit as good as the highly-acclaimed cartoon it was based on, with plenty of action and adventure and a slick Film Noir atmosphere. Shirley Walker's orchestral score is also excellent and worthy of being compared to Danny Elfman's score for the '89 Tim Burton movie. If you liked Batman Begins, but haven't seen this movie, you are missing out. If you're a Batman fan, you'll love it and watch it over and over. Highly recommended.

原作の展開よりかはファミリー向けだけど、テーマその物は非常に重い

One of the best

This was the first of the Warner Brothers DC Universe full-length movies, released in 1993 (according to IMDB), more than 20 years ago. It still holds up very well, although the studio has definitely gotten better at animation in the past 20 years. And the reason it holds up so well is the quality of the writing. The animation team really knew what they were doing: get the story right and everything else will follow, something that all too many of the live-action comic-book movies have forgotten. As I note in the title of this review, I think that a live-action version of this movie would work very well. The movie begins with a mob boss, Chuckie Sol, gloating over the quality of a batch of counterfeit bills. His celebration is short-lived, as Batman crashes through a window. Chuckie escapes during the melee, only to run into someone new as he runs to his car, a caped and masked figure with one hand in a gauntlet capped by a razor-sharp scythe blade: the Phantasm of the title. The figure appears to be able to appear and disappear in a cloud of mist. Chuckie is killed in the confrontation, driving his car off the roof of the parking garage as he tries to run down the Phantasm. We segue to an airplane, where Andrea Beaumont is returning to Gotham City after an absence of ten years. In a flashback, we learn that she and Bruce Wayne had met during her earlier time in Gotham City. These two story lines run side-by-side throughout the movie, as we learn what the Phantasm is after and we learn more about the rise and fall of the relationship between Bruce Wayne and Andrea Beaumont, a relationship that occurred concurrently with Bruce's early efforts at crimefighting, before he had even adopted the persona of Batman. In the present day, these two story lines intersect in ways that I can't reveal without giving away too much. Suffice to say that there are some very interesting, not to mention surprising, plot twists before all is said and done, including the appearance of another well-known Batman antagonist. I really liked that the movie kept me guessing. Some of it I got right; some of it I was way off. There really is a genuine mystery (actually, more than one) and the way that Bruce solves it is believable. I also like that they focus on Bruce Wayne as much as they do on Batman, and that this Bruce Wayne, at the start of his career, is vulnerable, as we see in some genuinely moving scenes. There is also the occasional touch of humor, with lines like: Arthur Reeves: [on TV] What kind of city are we running when we depend on the support of a potential madman! Alfred: What rot, sir! Why you're the very model of sanity. Oh by the way, I pressed your tights and put away your exploding gas balls. The voice acting is superb, with the ever-reliable Kevin Conroy as Batman, Dana Delaney (better known to fans as the voice of Lois Lane in the Superman television series) as Andrea Beaumont, Hart Bochner as Arthur Reeves, Stacy Keach as the Phantasm, among others. The animation, as I noted above, is a bit dated, so be aware of that. I can still wholeheartedly recommend this movie, though, as one of the best in the DC Universe canon.

名シリーズ『Batman The Animated Series』の映画作品。ダークな作風はテレビシリーズから続く鉄板スタイルなので言わずもがな。だが、単体としても独立しているのでバットマン初心者でもバットマンの基礎設定とジョーカーとの関係性程度のかるーい知識さえあればＯＫ。というか、バットマン関連の入門編としてはちょうど良いかも。 まず、シャーリー・ウォーカーの楽曲が非常に良い。暗く淀んだ夜のゴッサム・シティの景観を巡るアバンクレジットで流れるグレードアップしたメインタイトルの重厚なコーラスが素敵！アニメシリーズ初見の人はここで方向性が分かるかと思う。 次に、演出の数々が素晴らしい。例えば、本作は現行シーンの所々にバットマン=ブルースとヒロインのアンドレアの回想シーンが挿入される形で進行するのだが、個人的にここで注目してほしいのは各シーンの空模様だ。若きブルースがバットマン化していくにつれて気持ちの良い晴れた空が徐々に陰り始め、時として雷鳴が轟き、最後には土砂降りの雨がウェイン邸の窓ガラスを打つようになる。そして、ブルースが幸福な人生を歩むことを認めんがごとくコウモリの群れが飛び立つ後ろに広がるのは日暮れ空である…。その果てに、バットマンとなった今では晴れ間は殆ど見られない。代わりに闇の中で降る夜雨がバットマンを濡らす。 さらに本作の特出すべき点はそれだけでなく、自警活動初心者のブルースがマントを纏いコウモリを模した我々の知るバットマンの姿に着地する過程が極めて現実的且つ合理的に描かれているということだ。 敵も含めて『イヤー・ワン』や『イヤー・ツー』に影響を受けているのだろうか。 以上のことはこの映画の数ある魅力的な要素のほんの一部分でしかない。アニメシリーズの映画版でありながらも独自の道を行く本作は、過去と現在が入り乱れる様や時としてオペラ調の過敏なまでのドラマチックな演出で観る者をタイトル通りの幻想的な世界へと誘い込む。 あと、日本語吹き替えは玄田哲章と青野武のおなじみの黄金コンビ。