Poison Ivy (Uma Thurman) is a femme fatale with a killer’s kiss. Such as how a disturbed, antisocial millionaire, previously impervious to affection, could have effortlessly maintained a year-long relationship.
And why he spends his spare time playing dressing-up games with a spunky young motorcycle enthusiast. Has the independent wealth of his daylight alter-ego Bruce Wayne finally bought happiness? We aren’t told, though when his girlfriend suggests marriage, he protests: “There are things about me you wouldn’t understand.” Indeed. This is a Batman without ambiguity or intensity; even the news that his butler, Alfred (Michael Gough), is dying prompts cosy flashbacks rather than existential dread.

Now he is as sane and well-adjusted as any man who spends his evenings wearing pointed ears and a rubber cod-piece can hope to be. Fans of the television series ER will be saddened to learn that George Clooney was required to turn in his mercurial charms before being allowed anywhere near the Batmobile. Relieved of anything resembling charisma, he fits the lead role as snugly as the Bat-suit fits him. It seems even Batman himself has exorcised the demons that once hounded him into fighting crime. When Joel Schumacher stepped in as director on the third instalment, Batman Forever, he gave the franchise a thorough spring-cleaning and dusted away the cobwebs.

As you watch Batman & Robin, you may pine for those cobwebs – they lent the place a hint of gothic menace, a dash of personality. The first two Batman films, both directed by Tim Burton, were solemn character studies in which the characters concerned just happened to be superheroes or grotesque megalomaniacs. Radon gas can be a risk factor as can working with such chemicals such as uranium or asbestos.How to minimise the risks: Stop smoking.Survival: Lung cancers accounts for a quarter of all cancer deaths On average one person dies of lung cancer every 15 minutes. Five year survival rates are 8 per cent for men and 7 per cent for women.Trends: The Macmillan report says that lung cancer is set to drop sharply in men from 13 per cent to 4.4 per cent while it will double in women reflecting the later stage in which women took up smoking.The CRC says that important recent developments – the US tobacco companies’ admission that their product is addictive and the Government’s plans to ban tobacco advertising could mean that smoking-related cancers will fall among women as well as men..