Like Wayne, Beaumont has lost her parents. Her mother's death occurs before the film begins; like Wayne, she is moved to talk to her gravestone often. As for her father Stacy Keach , a powerful Gotham businessman? We watch his two deaths happen in slow motion throughout the film.
The first? His character, as we and Andrea see him kowtow to vicious criminal bosses, even invoking the name of her late mother in the process. The second? His actual death, rendered in a horrific off-screen sequence that punches you in the stomach by reminding you how casual such moments of violence and pain occur in such a noir-lensed world. Beaumont's response to these traumas, so similar to Wayne's, manifest in somewhat different ways -- but ways that still involve "wearing a mask and punching people.
The Phantasm is walking the well-defined path of corruption and trauma, visiting every single figure responsible for her father's the world's? As his butler and most trusted confidant Alfred Efrem Zimbalist Jr. I always feared you would become that which you fought against.
You walk the edge of that abyss every night. It might feel better. But noir antiheroes aren't wired to "feel better," as tempting as that sounds. The world is so jammed with pain in every corner, that all one can do is play an existential game of whack-a-mole.
Keep fighting, keep reacting, keep moving. Don't rest too long, or the truth will sink into your brain and leave you, like Beaumont in her final moments, despondently alone. The complexity of these inner character grapplings are also reflected in the nuts-and-bolts plot of the film. There's no simple, easily understandable villain Batman is up against.
The city of Gotham is rotten from the core out, and the plot makes sure to follow suit. In his study, while talking to portraits of his parents, Bruce wonders what his parents really want for him; to avenge their deaths as a crimefighter or to continue the Wayne bloodline by marriage and fathering children?
Later, Bruce tells Alfred he has made his choice: he will abandon his crime-fighting career and focus solely on his work at Wayne Enterprises, and has also bought an engagement ring for Andrea. However, Andrea mysteriously leaves Gotham with her father, ending her engagement to Bruce in a Dear John-style letter. Believing that he has lost his only chance of having a normal life, Bruce proceeds with his other choice, to avenge his parents' murder and spare other families his pain.
After seeing a bat fly in the night sky, Bruce realizes he has the perfect image of terror for wrongdoers, and finally dons the mask of Batman. In the present, the killer finds and kills another gangster, Buzz Bronski, who is killed at the graveyard shortly after mourning Chuckie Sol.
Batman discovers evidence linking the two murdered gangsters; they were both lieutenants of retired mob boss Salvatore "Sal" Valestra. Valestra himself, despite already close to dying from old age and lung cancer, fears that the killer has a pattern, and that he is next on the list. He seeks the Joker, with whom he had a prior working relationship, and offers him a large sum of money to assassinate Batman for him.
Unfortunately, he foolishly trades one assassin for another; rather than going after the killer, the Joker kills Valestra with Joker Venom instead.
The Joker then sets up a trap for Batman, planting Valestra's boobytrapped corpse in a chair in Valestra's living room while monitoring via a camera.
He then suddenly realizes Batman is not the killer when he sees a hooded figure with a skull mask triggering the bomb, but the Phantasm survives by jumping out the window.
Batman, who is nearby and is attracted to the scene by the explosion, tries to catch the Phantasm, but is hindered by the Gotham Police who still believe that he is the killer and attempt to apprehend him for the string of assassinations while the Phantasm escapes.
Rescuing Batman in her car, Andrea explains that she and her father had been hiding in Europe, from the Valestra mob, to whom he owed a lot of money. Carl Beaumont eventually repaid them, but that did not satisfy them; they were angered by the fact he skipped town on them and wanted "payment in blood".
Batman believes that Andrea's father may be the killer. The next day, the Joker approaches councilman Reeves at his office, explaining that the killer is someone else than Batman. When Reeves coincidentally mentions that Andrea is back in town, the Joker suddenly realizes who the killer really is, and poisons Reeves with Joker gas before leaving.
At the same time, Bruce Wayne studies an old photo of the Valestra mob together with Carl Beaumont when he recognizes one of the men in the background - it is the Joker prior to his accident who was then Valestra's bodyguard, enforcer and hitman. At the same time, he falls in love with Beaumont and eventually proposes to her.
The writing is delicate and emotionally mature, and we see a vulnerable, sensitive side to Wayne as things take an unexpected turn and he ends up heartbroken. Mask of the Phantasm has everything you want from a Batman story—a great mystery, an appearance from the Joker, fights, car chases, and lots of gorgeously framed shots of the Dark Knight gliding through the shadows of Gotham.
But it works on a deeper level too, inviting us inside Bruce Wayne's mind and revealing the fragile, sensitive soul that his love for Andrea Beaumont managed to uncover. It's simply one of the best Batman movies ever made, and The Batman will have to work really hard to better it. As good as the Christopher Nolan films are, I always felt like the character of Bruce Wayne could have been explored a little more deeply.
This is one area where Mask of the Phantasm really stands out, and I hope The Batman follows suit next year. The Batman is set for release on March 4, , but Mask of the Phantasm is available now on various streaming platforms, as well as on Blu-ray.
So if you haven't seen it, now's the perfect time to witness this tragic and heartbreaking chapter of Batman's storied life.
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