Batman BeginsSuperhero movie The Dark Knight,
which Christopher Nolan directed in 2008, was based on a script he and his brother Jonathan wrote.
Batman and the Joker. The Nolans were inspired by 1980s Batman comics and crime drama movies when they wrote the screenplay, and they aimed to maintain Batman Begins’ elevated feeling of realism.
Ledger’s accidental prescription drug overdose death in January 2008 sparked a great deal of media and public attentionmajor industry honors when it was released in July.
The Dark Knight has been rated as one of the best movies ever made, one of the best movies of the 2000s, and one of the best superhero movies ever since it was released. It is regarded as the “blueprint” for many contemporary superhero movies, especially because it eschewed the style of the conventional comic-book movie in favor of a criminal drama with comic-book characters. With varied degrees of success, many filmmakers attempted to replicate its success by imitating its gritty, realistic tone.
Plot
In Gotham City, a group of masked thieves robs a mafia-owned bank, betraying and killing each other until the Joker, the lone survivor, reveals himself as the mastermind and flees with the loot. To eradicate Gotham’s organized crime, the vigilante Batman teams up with the district attorney Harvey Dent and police lieutenant Jim Gordon. The rich Bruce Wayne, who actually is the Batman, publicly backs Dent as Gotham’s legal guardian because he thinks Dent’s success will enable the Batman to retire and then pursue his childhood friend Rachel Dawes in a romantic connection, notwithstanding Dent’s bond with her.
Mafia leaders in Gotham meet to discuss how to defend their groups from the Batman, the Joker, and the police. Before leaving for Hong Kong to avoid extradition, the Joker interrupts the conference and offers to assassinate the Batman in exchange for half of the money their accountant, Lau, hid. The Batman locates Lau in Hong Kong with the aid .The Joker kills prominent trial participants like the judge and police commissioner when the bosses accept his offer. The Joker vows to keep attacking until the Batman exposes himself, even after Gordon saves the mayor.
attacked by the police caravan carrying him after Dent convinces him that he is Batman and releases him. The Joker is captured by the Batman and Gordon, and Gordon is given the position of commissioner. The Joker, when questioned by the Batman at the police station, admitted that he enjoys the comic book character and has no desire to harm him. The Joker says that Rachel and Dent are being imprisoned separately in structures that are set to go off in order to disclose the Batman’s emotions for Rachel. Batman rushes to save Rachel; however, they soon learn that the Joker has exchanged places with them. The Joker breaks free from custody, takes Lau’s location for the fortune, and burns it all down, killing Lau in the process.
Coleman Reese, an accountant for Wayne Enterprises, discovers the identity of the Batman and makes an attempt . The Joker meets with a disillusioned Dent and convinces him to use his own initiative to take the law into his own hands and exact revenge on Rachel while the police evacuate hospitals and Gordon attempts to keep Reese alive. Dent makes decisions based on his two-headed, half-scarred coin, executing the mob-connected mafia and corrupt police officials who were responsible for Rachel’s death. The Joker reveals that two evacuation ferries—one carrying citizens and the other prisoners—are set to go up at midnight unless one group sacrifices the other as panic sweeps the city. The travelers reject the Joker’s demand that they commit mass murder. The Joker is taken down by Batman, but he does not execute him. Before the police detain the Joker, he claims that even if the Batman proved impervious to corruption, his scheme to deceive Dent has been successful.
when the Batman tackles him to save Gordon’s son, Dent loses his footing and dies. The l destroy Gotham. Fox removes the intrusive surveillance system that allowed the Batman to identify the Joker, while Pennyworth burns an undeliverable message from Rachel to Wayne that claimed she had chosen Dent. The police begin a manhunt for the Batman as the city mourns Dent as a hero.
Cast
Bruce Wayne, portrayed by Christian Bale as Batman, is a wealthy socialite who experienced parental murder as a child. Wayne carries out his heroic vigilante missions as Batman in secret.[4] Alfred Pennyworth, played by Michael Caine, is Wayne’s father figure, trusted butler, and confidant.[5][6] Heath Ledger portrays the Joker, anarchist and criminal genius who is seeking to destabilize Gotham.[4][7][8]
James Gordon, played by Gary Oldman, is one of the few trustworthy officers in the Gotham City Police Department (GCPD), assisting Batman in his fight against crime.[7][9]
Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart, is a virtuous district attorney who became a deadly vigilante in Gotham.[7][10][11]
Rachel Dawes, played by Maggie Gyllenhaal, is the assistant district attorney in Gotham and a close friend of Wayne’s from their youth. She struggles with her love for both Wayne and Dent.[12]
Morgan Freeman plays Lucius Fox, the CEO of Wayne Enterprises who provides the machinery and technology for the Batman campaign[13].[14][15]
Additionally, Chin Han plays Lau, a Chinese criminal banker, and Eric Roberts, Michael Jai White, and Ritchie Coster appear as the mob lords Sal Maroni, Gambol, and the Chechen, respectively.[d] Colin McFarlane plays Gillian B. Loeb, commissioner of the GCPD. Keith Szarabajka and Ron Dean play Stephens and Wuertz, respectively, and Monique Gabriela Curnen plays Anna Ramirez, a rookie detective.[2]Philip Bulcock plays Murphy, as do [21] [22].[2]
Joshua Harto, who plays Coleman Reese, a worker at Wayne Enterprises, is also a part of the cast.Anthony Michael Hall as newsman Mike Engel in [23][24][25] Nydia Rodriguez Terracina as Judge Surrillo, Néstor Carbonell as Mayor Anthony Garcia, William Fichtner as a bank manager,[2] Beatrice Rosen played Wayne’s Russian ballerina date, Tom “Tiny” Lister Jr. played a prisoner, and David Dastmalchian played Thomas Schiff, the Joker’s crazy, schizophrenic henchman.[2][25][26] Gordon’s wife Barbara, son James Jr., and daughter are portrayed by Melinda McGraw, Nathan Gamble, and Hannah Gunn, respectively.[2][27] artist Matt Skiba, [30] and United States Senator and lifelong all make cameo appearances in The Dark Knight.[31]
Production Improvement
Warner Bros. Pictures gave a sequel a priority after Batman Begins (2005) achieved both critical and commercial success.[32] Despite the fact that Batman Begins closes with a sequence in which Batman is given a joker playing card, hinting at the appearance of the Joker, Christopher Nolan did not plan to film a sequel and was dubious that Batman Begins would be popular enough to support one.[33][34] While filming, Christopher and co-writer David Goyer considered potential sequel plotlines. Christopher, along with Christopher was interested in using the Joker in Batman Begins’ grounded, realistic approach, but he was unclear how to carry on the Batman Begins story while keeping it coherent and up to date. Goyer created an outline for two sequels.[32][34][35] once Batman Begins’s theatrical debut, Warner Bros. Pictures and Christopher started talking, and once Christopher’s 2006 film The Prestige was finished, development got underway.[32]
Writing
The main plot points of The Dark Knight were developed over a three-month period of time by Goyer and Christopher.[35] They intended to investigate the idea of escalation and the notion that the Joker, who uses terrorism as a weapon, would be drawn in by the criminals’ retaliatory escalation in response to Batman’s extraordinary efforts to fight everyday crimes. The joker playing card scene in Batman Begins was meant to illustrate how erroneous it was for Batman to think his crusade against crime would only last a short while.[34][36] Because they thought blatantly political remarks would detract from the plot, Goyer and Christopher did not purposefully insert analogies to terrorism, the war on terror, or laws implemented by the US government to combat terrorists. They desired for it to speak to and reflect audiences in the present.[35] Christopher said Joker symbolizes “someone who just wants to tear down the world around him,” while The Dark Knight represents his own “fear of anarchy.”[37]
Goyer like Batman (1989), which starred Jack Nicholson as the Joker, but he didn’t find Nicholson’s portrayal frightening. Instead, he wanted the Joker in The Dark Knight to be an enigmatic, fully formed character, like the shark in Jaws (1975), without a “cliché” origin narrative.[e] Christopher and Goyer avoided giving their Joker a backstory or a plot because they thought it would make the figure scarier; Christopher referred to their movie as the “rise of the Joker”. They believed that later movies that showed the origins of iconic villains like Darth Vader and Hannibal Lecter had diminished their threat.[f]
CastingChristian Bale explained how Wayne has matured since Batman Begins, saying he went from being a young, naive, and furious guy looking for a purpose to a hero who is burdened by the knowledge that his fight against crime is essentially never-ending.[48][49][50] Bale did not put on as much muscle as he had for Batman Begins since the new Batsuit allowed him to move more quickly. In the last movie, Christopher had purposefully hid the action to show Batman from the perspective of the bad guys. He was able to display more of Bale’s Keysi-fighting method training thanks to the upgraded Batsuit design.[51]
Christopher needed an actor who could handle the scrutiny that would come with Nicholson’s widely recognized interpretation of the Joker.[k] Ledger was chosen for the role in August 2006, despite objections from some industry insiders and members of the public who thought he was unsuitable. Executive producer Charles Roven insisted that Ledger was the only candidate given serious consideration and that Batman Begins’s positive reviews would allay any worries.[l] Because conversations between himself and Ledger had shown that they had similar viewpoints on how the Joker should be portrayed, Christopher felt confident in the casting.[34][52] Ledger acknowledged that he was apprehensive about taking over Nicholson’s role, but that he was also eager for the challenge.[34][55] He avoided humanizing his interpretation, describing him as a “psychopathic, mass-murdering, schizophrenic clown with zero empathy.” Alex from the 1971 crime movie A Clockwork Orange and British bands JohPre-production had an impact on him.
Location scouting for Gotham City took done in many U.S. cities as well as Liverpool, Glasgow, London, and sections of Yorkshire in the UK in October 2006.[75][76] Christopher picked Chicago as his destination because he liked the neighborhood and thought it had intriguing architectural elements without being as prominent as spots in more well-known cities like New York City.Authorities in Chicago were helpful when Batman Begins was being filmed, allowing the production to close down sections of highways, freeways, and bridges.[78] Christopher wished to replace Batman Begins’ more picturesque, natural settings—such as the Himalayas and caverns—with a more contemporary, orderly setting that the Joker might destroy. The sleek, orderly lines of Chicagoan architecture, according to production designer Nathan Crowley, suited the urban-crime scenario they sought to produce, and the Batman had improved the city. Wayne was given the chance to relocate to a contemporary, austere penthouse in Batman Begins, which better reflected his loneliness.[79] For other interiors, including as the Bat Bunker, the city’s counterpart for the Batcave, sets were still employed. The production team thought about putting it in the penthouse basement but rejected the idea as being overly idealistic.[80]
Sid Vicious and nny Rotten.[Chicago filming m]On April 18, 2007, Chicago saw the start of principal photography, which had a $185 million budget.[s][t] In order to remedy the overly dark moments in Batman Begins, Pfister chose to merge the “rust-style” aesthetics of Batman Begins with the “dusk”-like color scheme of The Prestige for The Dark Knight.[81][94] Filming in Chicago was done under the working title Rory’s First Kiss in order to avoid notice, but media outlets soon learned the true purpose of the production.[95] Ledger shot and primarily directed the home movies of The Joker. Caine claimed that Ledger’s “stunning” performance caused him to forget his lines during a sequence featuring one video.[34]
The bank heist was the first sequence to be filmed, and it took place over the course of five days in the Old Chicago Main Post Office.[81][96] It was scheduled early to test the IMAX process, allowing for a possible reshoot using conventional cameras, and it was meant to be made available to the general public as part of the marketing effort.[97] Due to the four-day delay for the IMAX film to be processed, Pfister said it was a week of patience and learning.[89] Throughout May, filming took place in England; it returned to Chicago in June.[81][98]
The lobby of One Illinois Center functioned as Wayne’s penthouse apartment during filming; bookcases were constructed to conceal the elevators. Wayne’s fundraiser was decorated on one of the floors of Two Illinois Center. The team was said to be enthusiastic because this scene showed the first encounter between Batman and the Joker. Green screen material was used to cover the windows in both settings, allowing Gotham City graphics to be added afterwards.[81][99] The truck pursuit scene was filmed over the course of three weeks in July, mostly on Wacker Drive, a multi-level thoroughfare that had to be closed nightly.[100][101] Christopher added a set-piece of a SWAT van slamming through a concrete barricade during filming.[102] A realistic truck-flip stunt and a helicopter sequence followed on LaSalle Street, which was also used for the GCPD funeral procession.[103] Additional scenes were captured at Randolph Street Station, on Monroe Street, and on Randolph Street.[101][104][105]
filming in Hong Kong and England
The Bat Bunker, which took six weeks to construct in a Cardington hangar, is among the numerous interior scenes for The Dark Knight that were filmed on sets at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire and Cardington Airfield in Bedfordshire. The Bat Bunker utilised the 200-foot (61 m) long, 8 ft (2.4 m) tall ceiling to create a panoramic perspective and was based on 1960s Chicago skyscraper designs. It was merged into an existing concrete floor. The bunker roof could not be suspended from the 49-meter (160-foot) high hangar, therefore an enclosing gantry was constructed to support it as well as the illumination.[81][117] After relocating from Chicago in May, more scenes were shot in the UK, including a Gotham News scene that was shot at the University of Westminster and the dinner scene between Rachel, Dent, and Wayne at the Criterion Restaurant. The Farmiloe Building served as the new home of the GCPD. Although Bale declined to physically strike Ledger during the questioning scene, Ledger threw himself against the walls, causing them to damage and break.[117][118]
The interiors of the ferry, hospital, and Gotham Prewitt building were filmed after the cast arrived back in England in the middle of September.[119] By the middle of October, Battersea Power Station had been used to film both interior and outdoor shots of Rachel being held prisoner while being encircled by gasoline barrels. A artificial wall lined with explosives was constructed in front of the power station to prevent damage to the listed structure.Emergency services were called by nearby citizens who thought the explosion was a terrorist strike.[121] The truck pursuit action was filmed using a variety of green-screen shots, and shots of Rachel being flung from a window were captured during post-production. Filming in England came to a close at the end of October.
When Ledger, then 28 years old, passed away in January 2008 from an unintentional prescription drug overdose, editing was already in progress. There was a myth that his dedication to playing the Joker had harmed his mental health, but this was eventually debunked.[v] According to Christopher, finishing the film was entrusted to him and that editing it became “tremendously emotional, right when he passed, having to go back in and look at him every day [during editing]… but the truth is, I feel very lucky to have something productive to do.”[58] Christopher did not alter the Joker’s story in response to Ledger’s passing since he wanted to record sound while filming rather than re-recording dialogue in post-production.[61]Conway Wickliffe, a stuntman who passed away while practicing for a Tumbler (Batmobile) stunt, and Heath Ledger were both given dedications by Christopher [131].[132][133][134]
The Dark Knight’s 152-minute running length was achieved by “aggressive editorial approach” used by lead editor Lee Smith and Christopher.[w] Christopher said that no sequences were edited because he considered every scene to be crucial and that all extraneous material had been removed before shooting. The Nolans struggled to cut the script’s length, but after eliminating so much information that they thought it was confusing, they added more scenes.[135][35]
Spectacular effects and style
The Dark Knight’s special effects, in general
The audience’s acceptance of The Dark Knight’s realistic setting allowed for more creative license than the requirement to reflect Batman iconography did for Batman Begins.[138] Chris Corbould, the movie’s special effects supervisor,[139] was in charge of the 700 effect shots that Double Negative and Framestore created. Compared to similar movies, there weren’t as many effects since Christopher only employed computer-generated imagery when real effects weren’t enough.[140] Nathan Crowley, a production designer, created the Batpod (Batcycle) since Christopher did not want to reuse the Tumbler frequently. The Batpod was created by Corbould’s crew and is based on a prototype that Crowley and Christopher created by fusing parts from various commercial model vehicles.[141][142] Only after months of practice could stuntman Jean Pierre Goy ride the awkward, wide-tired vehicle.[114]The Gotham General Hospital explosion was created during production because Corbould thought it could be done, even though it was not in the original script.a set at Cardington, [144].Christopher felt it was crucial to close the musical-narrative gap between the two films, so he hired Batman Begins composers James Newton Howard and Hans Zimmer to score The Dark Knight. The score was recorded in London’s Air Studios. Because Christopher wanted them to be influenced by the characters and plot rather than having to fit specific on-screen aspects, Howard and Zimmer wrote the music without having seen the movie.[154][155] Howard and Zimmer divided their tasks according to the characters they were playing; Howard concentrated on Dent, and Zimmer on Batman and the Joker. Zimmer wrote the theme to not sound “super” and did not think of the Batman as strictly virtuous.[156][157] In order to portray Dent as an American who represents promise but goes through an emotional extreme and moral degeneration, Howard composed around 10 minutes of music for him. In order to achieve both moral goals, he chose brass instruments, but Dent’s corruption twisted the sound.[154][156]
Context
see also the movie from 2008
At The Dark Knight’s European premiere in London, the cast and crew
Lower box office receipts were anticipated in 2008 compared to 2007’s $9.7 billion total because of the high number of comedies that were released at the same time and the release of movies with darker themes, including The Dark Knight, at a time when living costs were rising and Americans were weary of elections. Only four sequels—The Dark Knight, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull—were expected to be blockbusters. Fewer sequels, which normally did well, were planned. Only Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was anticipated to easily surpass $300 million in box office receipts.[174]
Based on strong pre-release buzz, enthusiastic audience expectation, and a record-breaking $3.5 million in IMAX pre-sales, The Dark Knight was predicted to perform well at the box office. Its opening-weekend gross was predicted to surpass that of Iron Man ($102.1 million) but fall short of Spider-Man 3’s ($151.1 million) record. Analysts predicted that the film’s success would be influenced by its extended running time, which limited the number of screenings each day, and by the presence of the family comedy Space Chimps and the romantic comedy Mamma Mia!, which did well with female audiences. The 1989 chapter remained the franchise’s highest-grossing release, adding to the perception that the commercial success of Batman movies was limited.[175][176] The Dark Knight’s IMAX debut took place in New York City on July 14. For the occasion, which featured a live performance of the movie music by Howard and Zimmer, a block of Broadway was shut down. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Ledger earned numerous standing ovations. At the after-party, executives at Warner Bros. reportedly found it difficult to strike a balance between honoring Ledger and acknowledging the film’s positive reception.[177]
