No actor has enjoyed a career quite like Michael Keaton. In the ‘80s, he got his start in standup comedy alongside the likes of Larry David, before giving it up to focus on his true passion of acting. True to most ex-standups, Keaton’s earliest starring roles were in comedies, like Mr. Mom.
But his career changed forever when Tim Burton cast him as Batman, and despite initial doubts, he turned out to be possibly the definitive on-screen Caped Crusader. He’s since received an Oscar nomination and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. So, here are Michael Keaton’s 10 Best Movies, According To Rotten Tomatoes.
TIE: Live from Baghdad (88%)
Michael Keaton starred alongside Helena Bonham Carter in this HBO original movie. The plot is about the U.S.-sanctioned bombing of Baghdad, Iraq, during the Persian Gulf War in 1991, but Live from Baghdad is really a study of the ethics and consequences of 24-hour journalism, simply using those events as a prism through which to explore those themes and ideas. Keaton plays Robert Wiener, an on-location producer working for CNN, and it’s through his eyes that this story is presented to us. Made-for-TV movies often get a bad name, because they’re a lesser form of cinema, but HBO’s movies are often right on the money.
TIE: The Paper (88%)
Ron Howard directed this ‘80s dramedy with an A-list cast to die for: Michael Keaton, Glenn Close, Marisa Tomei (who would go on to appear with Keaton, although not in any of the same scenes, in Spider-Man: Homecoming), Randy Quaid at the top of his game, and The Godfather’s Robert Duvall. The film depicts a day in the life of a newspaper editor as he works with his team to uncover a police conspiracy surrounding the murder of a couple of businessmen from out of town. Keaton would later star in a Best Picture-winning movie about journalism, but this was his debut in that world.
Much Ado About Nothing (90%)
Along with Keanu Reeves, Michael Keaton’s casting in Much Ado About Nothing was met with a negative reception from theater snobs. Since the two actors were, at least back then, known for their comedic roles, some critics immediately wrote off their performances as Shakespearean characters.
But if you go into Kenneth Branagh’s acclaimed adaptation of the Bard’s iconic play without those prejudices, then you’ll find that each actor does a fine job with their character. And the movie as a whole is an entertaining, accessible adaptation of the source material, proving once again that no one does cinematic Shakespeare quite like Branagh does.
Birdman (91%)
There’s a meta element to Michael Keaton’s character in Birdman, Riggan Thomson. It’s a movie starring Michael Keaton, a past-his-prime actor who once played a superhero and is now appearing in an arthouse movie that will revitalize his career, as Riggan Thomson, a past-his-prime actor who once played a superhero and is now appearing in a Broadway play that he hopes will revitalize his career. Alejandro González Iñárritu’s darkly comic, Oscar-winning masterwork is a contemplative study of the dizzying effects of fame, the dark side of celebrity, and the downfall of the human condition, all shot and edited to look like one continuous take.
TIE: Night Shift (92%)
Like a lot of Michael Keaton’s early starring vehicles (in fact, this was the actor’s very first starring role in a movie), Night Shift is a comedy, and a really good one at that. Ron Howard directed the film, in which his Happy Days co-star Henry Winkler appears alongside Keaton. It’s about a morgue employee stuck on the night shift whose life is turned upside down by his freewheeling new co-worker. Keaton gives a star-making turn in the film – some critics even singled out his performance as the best part of the movie. The film hasn’t aged particularly gracefully, but it’s still enjoyable.
TIE: Spider-Man: Homecoming (92%)
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is often criticized for having a “villain problem,” but that’s certainly not the case with Spider-Man: Homecoming. The movie revolves around Peter Parker’s attempts to bring an ominous supervillain called the Vulture to justice. Michael Keaton plays Adrian Toomes, a.k.a. the Vulture, as a relatable average joe. Sure, he’s selling alien weapons to criminals on the black market, but he’s only doing it to support his family after his construction business was shafted by a government initiative. Toomes also has a personal grudge against Peter’s surrogate father figure Tony Stark, which only adds to the rising tensions between the two.
Out of Sight (93%)
Long before Marvel gave us a vast, interconnected universe featuring recurring characters appearing in each other’s stories on the big screen, Elmore Leonard gave us the same thing on the page. Leonard wrote crime stories, so whenever a detective or an attorney or a crook was required in a supporting role, he would sometimes just dig out a character he featured in a different story and use them.
An interesting thing happened with Steven Soderbergh’s adaptation of Out of Sight. Although fellow Leonard adaptation Jackie Brown – which featured Michael Keaton as Ray Nicolette, a character who appears in both Rum Punch, the basis of Jackie Brown, and Out of Sight – was made by different producers, the makers of Out of Sight still decided to bring back Keaton as Ray.
Porco Rosso (95%)
This animated adventure comedy centers around an ace fighter pilot from World War I who is now operating as a freelance bounty hunter who tracks down “air pirates” terrorizing the Adriatic Sea. When he’s cursed to live his life as a talking pig, he starts going by “Porco Rosso,” which is Italian for “Red Pig.” It’s a Japanese movie, and the title character was played by Shūichirō Moriyama in the original and Patrick Harlan in an English dub that was created for JAL flights, but when Disney dubbed the movie in English for an American release, they got Michael Keaton to play him.
Spotlight (97%)
This powerful retelling of the team of Boston Globe reporters who broke the Catholic Church’s child sex abuse scandal was rightly awarded the Academy Award for Best Picture a couple of years ago. When the investigating is done by the end of the second act, the climax is basically just the journalists typing up their findings and publishing it in the newspaper, which is about as visually interesting as it sounds. But the great thing about the movie is that by then, we care so much about the characters and the tragedies they’re revealing to the public that it’s still a riveting conclusion to the film.
Toy Story 3 (98%)
After Toy Story 2 gave us a delightfully satirical incarnation of a Barbie doll, it was a refreshing surprise when the belated sequel, Toy Story 3, gave us a delightfully satirical incarnation of a Ken doll to go with her – and even more refreshing that Pixar got Michael Keaton to play him. The role might not immediately seem like it’s in Keaton’s wheelhouse, but given the glee with which he delivers Ken’s ridiculous lines, it’s clear that he was perfect for the part. Keaton tapped into his comic talents to play scenes like Ken’s dismay over the destruction of his wardrobe with a hilariously over-the-top performance style.
