And all of that is present in Batman Returns too. So much so that Burton gilded the lily by naming the one original character in the film after Max Schreck, the silent film star who played the cadaverous vampire in Murnau’s 1922 triumph of depravity, Nosferatu. Thus it is fitting that Twitter user IhlaLaLaLa-LaLaLaLa has recut Batman Returns as a silent film every bit as expressionistic as the Schreck film that inspired Christopher Walken’s antagonist. While we would never condone downloading a new cut of the film, fans will at least be pleased to know it exists (and how to find it) in the below Tweet. Many of the film’s best sequences are often wordless, in any case. It is arguable that there is no scene in film or comic book that better articulates the loneliness, despair, and almost maniacal drive in Batman’s soul than how Burton frames a deadened Bruce Wayne coming to life upon the Bat Signal being lit. At last, a razor-sharp purpose has been restored to his hidden and often conspiratorial existence.
