Plot
A young Bruce Wayne, after years of training abroad, vows to fight crime in Gotham City in memory of his murdered parents. While he is initially successful in thwarting robberies, he is disappointed that criminals are unafraid of him and seeks an intimidating disguise. He also begins a relationship with Andrea Beaumont after they meet at the Gotham Cemetery while she pays respects to her mother. Though conflicted about whether to honor his promise to his parents or pursue a happy life with Andrea, Bruce eventually proposes to her. However, Andrea abruptly leaves Gotham with her father, businessman Carl Beaumont, ending the engagement in a Dear John letter. Heartbroken, Bruce commits to a new life as a vigilante crime fighter, converting a cavern under Wayne Manor into a base and assuming the mantle of Batman for ten years.
In the present day, Batman interrupts mobster Chuckie Sol and his associates plotting to launder counterfeit money. Sol escapes but dies after crashing his car during a confrontation with the Phantasm, a masked vigilante resembling the Grim Reaper. Witnesses see Batman at the scene, leading councilman Arthur Reeves to vow to have him arrested. Mobster Buzz Bronski visits Sol's grave at the Gotham Cemetery, where he is murdered by the Phantasm, whom Bronski's bodyguards mistake for Batman. While investigating the scene of Bronski's death, Batman lingers by his parents' grave, where he encounters Andrea, who deduces his identity.
Batman discovers that Sol, Bronski, and another mobster named Salvatore Valestra were bankrolled by Carl Beaumont. He interrogates Andrea, who claims no knowledge of Carl's whereabouts. After learning of Sol's and Bronski's deaths, the elderly and ailing Valestra fears Batman will kill him next. He seeks help from his former ally, Councilman Arthur Reeves, but is rebuffed. In desperation, he turns to the Joker, offering him $5 million to kill Batman, and reminds him that the killer will be after him next. The Phantasm goes to confront Valestra in his penthouse, only to find that he has already been killed by the Joker. Instead of saving Valestra, the Joker rigged a camera to the mob boss's body to identify the mysterious killer. The Joker then remotely triggers rigged explosives, but the Phantasm escapes and avoids capture by Batman. Responding to the blast, the police pursue Batman, who eventually eludes them with last-minute help from Andrea.
Andrea admits to Bruce that her father worked for Valestra and was forced to take her into hiding in Europe because he was unable to repay money that he had embezzled from the mob. Carl later accumulated a fortune and offered to repay the mob, but they refused to lift the hit on him. Andrea says that she returned to Gotham to stop Carl from killing his former partners. Bruce and Andrea consider resuming their relationship, despite Bruce's uncertainty. Bruce later examines an old photograph of the mobsters and recognizes that Valestra's enforcer was the Joker before his disfigurement. The Joker confronts Reeves, accusing him of ordering the murders to hide his mob connections, but a call from Andrea interrupts them and shifts the Joker's suspicion onto her. Reeves is poisoned with Joker's toxin and taken to the hospital, where Batman forces him to confess that he previously worked as the Beaumonts' lawyer and helped them hide from the mob. Carl refused to bankroll Reeves's first struggling election campaign, so Reeves revealed his location to Valestra in exchange for the mob's support. Batman visits Andrea's apartment in her absence and intercepts a message for her from the Joker, who implies that he knows that Andrea is the Phantasm, then survives the Joker's bombing of the apartment. Batman determines that the Joker, the now last surviving former member of Valestra's mob, killed Carl Beaumont on the mob's order and that Andrea has gone after him.
Andrea confronts the Joker at his hideout, the abandoned Gotham World's Fair, where he attempts to trap and kill her, but she is saved by Batman, who unsuccessfully pleads with her to stop. The Joker tries to escape but is incapacitated by Batman and surrenders to Andrea, who bids Bruce farewell before disappearing with the Joker as the fair explodes. Bruce survives and is later consoled in the Batcave by Alfred, who assures him that he could not have stopped Andrea's self-destructive revenge, before discovering that Andrea has left her locket containing an old picture of Bruce and her as a couple. A sorrowful Andrea departs Gotham on an ocean liner, and Batman resumes his watch over the city.
