Batman leaves Warner Bros

… well the guy that donned the Cowl in the fourth “Batman” flick has anyway.

In a shock move (especially since he’s basically ran the joint over the past couple of years; hell, he even had his own tennis court on the lot at Burbank!) George Clooney has parted ways with Warner Bros.

Clooney’s moving his Smokehouse Pictures shingle – the outfit he runs with Grant Heslov – to Sony. And Amy Pascal as pleased as punch!

“While we have been trimming production deals overall for the last few years, we see real value in opening our doors to producers with their critical and commercial track record and their artistic point of view,” co-chairman Pascal told Variety.

Clooney and Heslov had been based on the WB lot as producers for the past nine years, initially working together at Section Eight, co-founded by Steven Soderbergh, before launching Smokehouse in 2006. Clooney has been closely associated with the studio since he became a breakout star on the WB-produced “ER” in 1994.

At Warner, Clooney starred in such films as “Batman & Robin”, “Syriana”, “Good Night and Good Luck” (which he also directed), and the “Ocean’s” films.

Clooney, whose company are currently developing such projects as “The Innocent Man”, based on the book by John Grisham, says “Warner Bros. has been a great place to work, and I’ve felt like part of a family for almost 20 years,” he said. “So in moving on, I’m leaving a terrific company and a lot of dear friends. They’re a class act.”