The tiger pit's provenance

[bat-rss]

Joel Eisner's Official Batbook says of the Robin/tiger pit scene: "Despite stories to the contrary [gee, I wonder who could possibly be telling such stories???] there was actually only one live tiger used in [The Purrfect Crime]; the others (in the pit) were stock footage from an old Fox feature film."

Has anyone tracked down what movie the tiger pit shot came from?

[Scott Sebring]

Oh man. This one would require a phone call as I dug into this big time and don't currently have the time to try and sort it out in a typed response complete with images as evidence and trying to explain it all. Let's just say that in my opinion and from personal research, the claim of the pit being stock footage is incorrect. Burt was actually above the pit for the filmed sequence and the Viewmaster slide. It was shot at a different soundstage from the one where he talks to Catwoman and is eventually rescued by Batman and where the fight takes place. Hit me up if you want to hear more on this. This theory supports both Julie's and Burt's opposing claims as to whether or not he was placed above tigers. Trust me.

[dell]

Thanks Scott. Now that you mention that this shot was done separately from the scenes with Julie, I looked at the pits. The opening to the pit in the photo above looks to be about as long as Burt is tall or slightly longer, let's say 6 feet. And it appears to be narrower than it is tall, say 5 feet.

I went back and looked at the scene where Julie enters the scene with Burt already on the board suspended over the pit. That opening is considerably larger in width and length than 6X5. I'm guessing maybe 10 long and 8 feet wide. They clearly are not the same opening. That also explains why there is a red board supporting the plank underneath Burt in the closeup. It is positioned near his hips. In the long shot with Julie the plank is resting on a red pipe that is close to Burt's ankles. Two completely different setups.

[Scott Sebring]

Exactly, Dell. Also there are perspective changes to the pit below Burt that line up exactly to a real set as opposed a rear projection of stock footage for example. One of the biggest eye openers for me was looking at the Viewmaster frame that shows the other wall below and matches perspective again to a completely different camera angle. Even the angle of the tigers shift to match this perspective. The depth of field and angles become more apparent in one of the shots of the tigers where the camera is moving and zoomed in from above rather than the more static ones. The depth and angles of the tigers legs shift as the camera moves with genuine 3D perspective in relation to the camera. Not a flat rear projection of stock footage to my eyes. It's better to watch the moving footage rather than screencaps to see this more clearly.

Viewmaster

14.jpg (66.57 KiB) Viewed 6990 times

And
then
Shot scene

Between these two frames that are about a second apart, note the tiger on the right's rear leg reveals from under their body more as the camera shifts and the edge of the pit set is in the foreground. Paralax that matches the two of them being in the same world together.

[Chuck Williams]

Great detective work!!
Yep, red plank versus red pipe just jumps out at ya!