Bedmen Yarasa Adam

aka Turkish Batman

1973, SinemaTurk Link
Directed by Savas Esici

I want a car, chicks dig the car.

Turkish Batman! Turkish Pop Cinema is one of the treasures of the modern world. There are so many gems just waiting to be discovered, and so many lost pearls that you never know what you will run into. Turkish Star Wars? Turkish Star Trek? Turkish Ninjas? Turkish Wizard of Oz? Turkish Super Heroes? These are only some examples of the radical output of bizarre and amazing films from the 1960s to the early 1980s that came out of Turkey. At times, you hear rumor of films, but are unable to establish their existence. This Turkish Batman film, Bedmen Yarasa Adam was known to still survive, but actually getting a copy was a different matter. Batman also appeared in the Turkish film Fantoma Istanbul’da Bulusalim, mentioned in Pete Tombs’s Mondo Macabro but seemingly existing nowhere on the planet. There is also a Turkish Batgirl film called Ucan Kiz, of which I have only seen the poster for. Maybe one day they will show up. This deterioration of Turkish film history is a terrible tragedy.

Holy priceless collection of Etruscan snoods!

Did you know that Batman drives around Turkey as a hired detective, investigating the murder of girls, and nailing every chick in the Ottoman Empire? Because that’s the real Batman. Turkish films are big on masculinity, the men are all manly men, there are big manly mustaches, the women are all supermodel hot and melt like butter on an oven when they get a load of these manly Turkish studs.

	Bedmen (Levent Çakir) – Bedmen strikes fear into the hearts of evil-doers in Turkey. He also strikes the fires of passion in the loins of all women who see them, because Bedmen gets more play than a Tonka truck! Women lines up to lie down for the classy caped crusader, that’s when he isn’t beating the snot out of criminals, or standing around while they commit suicide. The best Batman ever. Actor Levent Çakir played in dozens of Turkish genre films. Check out his resume here.
	Robin (Hüseyin Sayar) – AKA Bedrobin, but we will just call him Robin. The Boy Wonder here likes to flip around. His entire fighting technique is to flip and flip and flip. Imagine the female gymnastics team after downing some cocaine-spiked lattes. Robin can’t get laid, because he’s Robin. I am only 75% sure that this is Hüseyin Sayar.
	Bruce Wayne (Levent Çakir) – Bruce Wayne here might really be named Gordon, but we’ll still call him Bruce Wayne because it is confusing otherwise. He’s a sexy man who the ladies can’t resist, because, he’s freaking Turkish Batman! Everyone knows it, so it is less of a secret identity and more of an alternate identity. By the time you have finished reading this bio, Turkish Bruce Wayne has seduced three women.
	Dick Grayson (Hüseyin Sayar) – Very excited to see naked women. Very excited. Very very excited. Is not see doing much without Bruce Wayne, because I imagine he’s busy with something involving a special sock, lotion, and well-worn magazines.
	Bald Guy (Altan Günbay) – An official guy of some importance. Killed early on, only to return as the evil villain. Spoilers.
	Main Girl (Emel Özden) – The only girl not gunned down or naked, so of course she is the love interest. Despite the fact Bedmen has several love interests prior and during his courtship of her. Better head to the free clinic after a night of passion with Bedmen!
	Cat (???) – A cat. All evil villains need a cat, and this one does. The cat spends all of his time looking off camera at his owner, who the cat is itching to jump over too. This cat knows who feeds him his tuna, and isn’t about to sit in some actor’s lap. All hail the cat!

I’m Batman!

After the long opening credits where the font keeps switching back and forth as epic music plays, the film jumps right in with a girl being chased by two goons with surf music as the backdrop. A minute or so later, she’s gunned down by two other goons who were hiding out. She will be the first of many women killed randomly.

Nobody panics when things go according to plan.

A man in a beret evades some guys in a car who are chasing him, and gets to a phone to call the police. After the call, he is chased into the street, where he becomes the squished meat in a car sandwich. Seriously, people, when caught between two cars, go left or right instead of just standing still in the middle with your hands in the air. But this guy had a beret, so he was obviously French and just surrendered.

The night is darkest just before the dawn. And I promise you, the dawn is coming.

A guy in a suit who I am dubbing Commissioner Gordon talks with bald guy with mustache who is also in a suit. That would be the Bald Guy from the cast listing above. This talking is in Turkish with no subtitles, so I just assume they are discussing how awesome I am. Meanwhile, in a giant structure that looks like a huge college building, the cameraman is walking in and everyone is opening doors for him. Because this is a POV shot. The Director is getting all arty all of a sudden! Bruce Wayne goes to listen to a tape (this being 1973 it is one of those huge magnetic tape deals) where he is addressed at Bedmen and given information and photos. The tape goes on for a while, then finally this scene ends. With no self-destructing tape? Boo! At least we find out Bedmen is a contract player, and not a vigilante doing it as compensation for his parents’ death.

I’m Batman!

Robin walks into a room! Robin steps into a room and instantly takes off his cape! Then he and a capless Bedmen start practicing their fighting techniques by flipping around for a while! Flip-tastic! At least they were aware in 1973 that capes get in the way when you need to be hopping around a bit. Robin has weird bumps down his back like he is trying to emphasize his vertebrae for some reason. After the faux battle, the two talk a bit, and now we go to the strip club.

The STRIP CLUB?!?!?!

You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

This ain’t your mama’s Batman! This topless stripper is dancing to a live saxophone player while using a toy snake in her act. Which is rubbed around her genital region. You don’t have to be Freud… Bedmen and Robin (as Bruce and Dick) are there for…research. Or something. The dance goes on for a while, Robin is way more interested than Bruce (due to his early-thirties teenage hormones…) and there is also a guitar player on stage with the saxophone guy. Do strippers have their own band in Turkey? The set ends, she tosses the snake to the audience, Robin gives a standing ovation, and now we cut to backstage where two goons are strangling a naked girl. She’s dead, but Bedmen and Robin interrupt their escape, so a fist fight breaks out! All while a dead naked woman lies in the foreground making screencaps difficult due to me not wanting this site to venture into rated R territory. One goon is beaten and interrogated, but he quickly takes poison and instantly dies. That’s a pretty loyal dude. And stupid.

This town deserves a better class of criminal… and I’m gonna give it to them.

Bruce and Robin go talk with the Bald Guy from before, but he doesn’t like them meddling around. They leave just as Bald Guy’s hot girlfriend walks in, so you know she’s either soon dead or going to get some Batdork before this movie is over. As Bedmen and Robin talk outside Bald Guy’s apartment, the James Bond theme begins to play. Seriously. That must be the most stolen music in movie history.

Why so serious?

Afterwards, another girl in white, knee-high laced-up boots is being stalked by a goon while funky tunes play. I like this song, hopefully I can find out where it was stolen from. She’s stalked for a while, then we cut to Bedmen and Robin driving in their crappy car…I mean, the Bedmobile (some Euro-mini car) and they happen upon the girl struggling against three guys. They hop out of the car to help her, somehow instantly changing into costume. It’s magic!

Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?

Bedmen and Robin fight the thugs for a bit, and then…Bedmen shoots all three of them! The girl is grateful, and is given a ride home, while Bedmen and Robin have both changed back into their civilian clothes and thus have no masks. Some men discuss some stuff, and now Bedmen and Robin go and pick up the girl, except she doesn’t get in the car and the two then speed away. Huh? I don’t think this would make sense with subtitles!

Bald Guy’s wife is listening to records, being drunk, and getting horny. And Baldy is nowhere to be found. So let’s strip to our underwear! Yes! Off comes the bra….Four goons break into the house???? Dammit! They punch her to the floor, and prepare to blow her away, when Bedmen and Robin burst in and begin to fight! No one bothers to shoot them, and Bedmen and Robin’s patented “flip around a lot then throw Robin on some bad guys” attack works wonders. The evil ones are defeated, the girl is grateful, and Bedmen sends Robin to wait in the car and Bedmen and the girl embrace for off-camera sex.

The evil mastermind makes an appearance. Not his face, but just an arm with a huge diamond ring and a lap. But, he does have a cat on said lap, which he strokes. One of the goons tries to explain why they keep failing to kill all these random girls, but Evil Mastermind is sick of it. He tosses off the cat (who has been staring at the camera the entire time) and invites over a random bikini babe who also hangs out at his house. Evil masterminds have both sides of pussy covered.

I’m Batman!

Bedmen goes to visit the first girl he saved, and starts putting the moves on her. Keep in mind his privates have probably not even dried off at this point. They take a walk by the docks, then he drops her back off at home. Hmmm.. he didn’t sex her up, which means she is probably going to survive now. Bald Guy’s wife gets a knock on the door, it is the Random Bikini Girl, who is invited in and then shoots the other girl dead! Where was Bedmen when you needed him?

Riddle me this, riddle me that, who’s afraid of the big, black bat?

But don’t mind that, as Bedmen is out and about in his car trolling for more hot Turkish poontang, and starts whistling at some random girl at the bus stop. He is slipping her his batarang in the very next scene (complete with more nudity) and even pretends to be sick when the girl he was dating calls to try to see him again. So back to the sex scene, which lasts a disturbingly long time considering this film is only 1 hour long. Another interruption as the First Girl and a doctor stop by to check on Bedmen, so Bedmen whips out a nurse’s uniform for the Bus Stop Girl to wear, and dresses himself up to be sick. The doctor figures out the ruse because the nurse’s uniform doesn’t close in the back and were have bare Turkish butt walking around, so Bedmen threatens him to not talk. A prescription is written, and Bedmen appears to have pulled this off.

Just the pussy I’ve been lookin’ for!

Bedrobin calls, for they have found the Bald Guy’s dead wife dead. Bedmen leaps to the scene of the crime, where Bedrobin and First Girl are. Bald Guy is dead as well. This just got personal. Maybe, I’m not sure. Whoever that guy was, he was bald. And now he is dead.

I’m gonna make this pencil disappear.

Meanwhile, the Criminal Mastermind with A Cat strokes his pussy while diabolically plotting. His mustached Goon is there and is dismissed, while Random Bikini Girl is given a new assignment (and she’s in a bikini again during this, because, why not?) The new assignment finds her at the door of Main Girl, who invites her in. Bikini Girl drugs her drinks, so Main Girl becomes Rohypnol Girl. An ambulance rushes through the streets (the old Ecto-1 type ambulance), the ambulance is driven by mustache goon and another goon, they take Main Girl away.

Some men just want to watch the world burn.

Bikini Girl and Evil Mastermind celebrate over drinks, and Bikini Girl’s next assignment is to take down Bedmen. By him coming into his apartment to find her naked in his bed. Bedmen is such a player that this doesn’t set off any of his alarm bells, and he gets to putting the moves on her. She tries to knife him in the back, so he slaps her around, and then Mustache Goon and three other goons emerge to try to beat the Bedmen. They fail, and Bedmen kicks all their butts. Then, Mustache Goon claims to surrender, pulls out a cigarette, uses it, and dies, because it was poisoned. Yes, another guy kills himself in front of Bedmen, who does nothing to stop it. Again. Bedmen, stop thinking with the wrong head!

I’m Batman!

You think now, maybe Bedmen will interrogate the other three goons, or the Bikini Girl. Well, you are WRONG! Idiot! The correct course of action for Bedmen and Robin is to hit the strip club again! What the Frak? A nude girl named Galaxy grinding on a pole to Van Halen is not my idea of a Batman movie. It is still better than Batman and Robin. These strip club sequences are surprisingly boring, but at least they have a full band playing for each stripper, so it is kind of classy. This sequence gets cut off, which may be an edit or may be the actual end of the segment. The world will never know.

Swear to me!

Bedmen and Robin are just hanging out in front of their car one day when they notice a hot babe strolling past, who is immediately gunned down by four guys crowded into a tiny car. Bedmen and Robin spring into action, and a car chase eats up several minutes. After a while, they cut off the bad guys, and everyone gets out of the cars to fist fight. This all takes place to a song that sounds like “A Whole Lotta Love” done in instrumental style. I am more interested in the song than the fighting. All the goons but one drive off, the guy left behind manages to eat poison before answering any of Bedmen’s questions. That’s THREE guys who have killed themselves, when will Defective Comic’s own Bedmen figure out the pattern?

You killed Captain Clown! You killed Captain Clown!

Bedmen and Robin call the Commissioner, then are suddenly in their costumes and head off to James Bond music. Could no one steal the Batman theme? Back at the evil lair, the Main Girl is brought into a room to meet the Evil Mastermind, who turns out to be the Bald Guy! He faked his death, see, because bald people can do that. Never trust a bald person. His entire criminal plan seems to be to try to rape her! WTF? He killed countless women just so he could rape one of them? If I had a nickel for everything in this movie that made no sense, I’d be richer than Bruce Wayne.

Bedmen and Robin arrive outside the compound and start beating up guards with karate chops. They fight their way inside and foil the rape, all while prancing around like crazed acrobats on crystal meth. Bedmen snaps Bald Guy’s neck (!!!!) while Robin gets beat down by many thugs. Now Bedmen has to save Robin. They fight and flip and fight, and soon win, so Bedmen and Main Girl can kiss. Then the cops arrive and arrest all the bad dudes, and Commissioner Gordon says good job.