By Nick Setchfield, SFX #123, November 2004
As the ultimate superhero prepares to leap on to our screens once more, Nick Setchfield dons his Batcape, fires up the Batmobile and emerges from Gotham City with a feast of Batfacts...
HOLY DEVELOPMENT HELL, BATMAN!
Rumblings of a screen resurrection for Batman began in the late '90s. Joel Schumacher - who murdered the franchise with 1997's high camp Batman And Robin - promised to atone for his neon-drenched, rubber-nippled sins by directing a faithful adaptation of Frank Miller's Batman Year One, returning the Dark Knight to his gritty roots as an urban vigilante.
Batman And Robin star George Clooney had his own thoughts on how to say sorry: "You do the movie cheap, in film noir style. Make Batman the Dark Knight, something even Tim Burton didn't do. You start at Alfred's burial with a Sam Spade narrator. Go into the first big action scene with Robin and he gets killed..." Hmm. Sunny.
Wolfgang Petersen plotted a rival production, Batman Vs Superman, mashing the two moribund superhero franchises together. Irish hellraiser Colin Farrell and English prettyboy Jude Law were the two unlikely choices pegged as the Dark Knight and the Man Of Steel. The project stalled when Warners wisely decided on separate revamps for their caped properties and Petersen went off to spit in the face of Greek history with Troy. As Warners developed yet another potential spin on the Bat-franchise - a live action, big screen version of futuristic TV toon Batman Beyond - it was Pi director Darren Aronofsky who fought the cause of Batman Year One. "I'd want to bring an independent guerrilla flavour to it," he said in September 2000.
Aronofsky teamed with Frank Miller on the screenplay and claimed he could deliver the flick for $60,000 - but then the scamp also claimed he would cast Meryl Streep as Batman... It's said that the project advanced as far as some damn cool storyboards.
Buffy and firefly mainman Joss Whedon pitched his take in December 2002: "I came up with an idea that I really loved, which was an origin story. After I finished pitching it, they looked at me like I was a video fishbowl. I came out of there thinking, 'How many more lessons do I need that the machine doesn't care about the creative process?' When I got back to my office and found that Firefly was cancelled, I thought, 'Okay, maybe one more lesson.'"
-> Acclaimed Memento and Insomnia director Christopher Nolan signed to helm the movie in January 2003. "All I can say is that I grew up with Batman," says Nolan, who brings genuine A-list clout to the project. "I've been fascinated by him and I'm excited to contribute to the lore surrounding the character. He is the most credible and realistic of the superheroes and has the most complex human psychology. His superhero qualities come from within. He's not a magical character."
-> The movie entered preproduction under the codename Intimidation Game. This was never intended as the final title - Warners simply used it as a ruse to thwart snoopers. The film was officially christened Batman Begins in February 2004.
BATMAN REBOOTED
-> The screenplay is by David Goyer, writer of Dark City and Blade and also an incurable comics junkie. "It's the most faithful to the comic books and it's certainly darker than the Schumacher films," he promises. "It treats the story seriously and it's also quite romantic. We were determined to create a new classic and we treated the subject matter seriously."
-> Batman Begins has no connection to the Burton/ Schumacher movies. It's strictly a reboot, retelling the Dark Knight's origin from the ground up. While Tim Burton had future Joker Jack Napier slaying Bruce Wayne's parents, Goyer's script remains faithful to comic book lore, pinning the Waynes' murder on smalltime hoodlum Joe Chill (played by Richard Brake).
-> The movie will also explore Bruce Wayne's lost years. We'll see him fleeing America as a young man and exiling himself to the East, where he's taken under the wing of the deadly but honourable ninja cult leader known as Ra's al Ghul. Fully trained in the art of combat, he returns to a decaying Gotham City, which is now in the thrall of organised crime and corruption. Bruce will also discover that he's being swindled out of Wayne Industries, his late father's company...
-> "There are definitely elements of our film that have never been addressed even in the comic book," says Goyer, "so we were sort of in uncharted territory."
-> Rumoured candidates to fill the fabled Batsuit included Punk'd's Ashton Kutcher, Memento's Guy Pearce, King Arthur's Hugh Dancy, Dawson's Creek's Joshua Jackson, 28 Days hater's Cillian Murphy, The Count Of Monte Cristo's Henry Cavill, Almost Famous's Billy Crudup and Band Of Brothers' Eion Bailey.
-> Also up for a spot of utility belt action was Donnie Darko, soulful-eyed Jake Gyllenhaal: "It's a character I would have loved to do, and it would have meant working with Christopher Nolan, who is such a genius."
-> Auditions for the role apparently found the bloom of young male Hollywood trying to squeeze itself into Val Kilmer's sweaty old Batsuit... bet that lovingly-crafted Bat-butt chafed.
-> Brooding Welsh thesp Christian Bale finally clinched the gig in September 2003. At 29 he's the youngest of the screen Batmen, a role that's traditionally been the preserve of late thirtysomethings. "What I see in Christian is the ultimate embodiment of Bruce Wayne," says Christopher Nolan. "He has exactly the balance of darkness and light that we were looking for."
-> Bale lost 801bs for his turn in psychological chiller The Machinist and had to quickly bulk up when cast as Batman.
-> "I think Batman is probably more aggressive than anybody I've ever played," says Bale, whose memories of the '90s films swayed his decision to pick up the Bat-gauntlet: "I felt like I hadn't been quite satisfied with what I'd seen in the other movies. Certainly in the last two."
-> Bale is dedicating his turn as Batman to his late father, David, a former RAF pilot who died from a brain tumour just after Bale had discovered he'd landed the role.
HEROES AND VILLAINS
-> Unblinking cockney screen god Michael Caine assumes the role of Batman's trusted butler, confidante and Batmobile duster, Alfred Pennyworth. "We start when Batman is a baby, so I'm more like a father," says the 70 year-old Caine, who won immortality in Zulu, Alfie and The Italian Job. "I'm a father who knows how to lay a table with the knives and the forks in the right places. I'm not very comic book. I'm pretty real."
-> Katie Holmes is playing Rachel, the Caped Crusader's love interest. Best known for her role in small screen teen drama Dawson's Creek, she's also pursued a movie career with turns in The Ice Storm and The Gift.
-> While Cillian Murphy failed to nab the title role, Christopher Nolan
was so impressed with his screentest that he cast him as the sinister Scarecrow,
alias drug-dealing boffin Jonathan Crane. "Scarecrow has this fear toxin
that is his weapon," says Murphy. "Jonathan Crane is not a very physically
imposing character, so this is what
he uses instead."
-> The Scarecrow first stalked the comic book pages in issue three of World's
Finest, way back in 1941. Jonathan Crane was a spindly, academic oddball who
turned to crime to finance his passion for books. His schtick was bringing fear
to the masses: "HAT!
Probably no one has ever yet feared that three letter noun! But the Scarecrow
will teach men to cringe in terror when they read just such tiny words as this!"
HAT! Tremble, dear reader, tremble!
-> Whispers are that the Scarecrow's mask is authentically, bowel-troublingly scary, and far removed from the straw-stuffed sack we've seen in the comics. One report claims it has more in common with the S&M underground scene than the barnyard...
-> "Fear is one of the themes of the whole movie for all of the characters," says screenwriter David Goyer. "It's an opportunity to depict a villain that is truly scary and frightening. Because Chris and I wanted to tell a story about fear and overcoming your fear, it just seemed like a no-brainer."
-> At one point Lord Of The Rings star Viggo Mortensen was rumoured to be in line for Ra's al Ghul, but the part finally went to Japanese actor Ken Watanabe, acclaimed for his performance in The Last Samurai.
-> While Watanabe is Japanese, the comic book Ra's is of Middle Eastern origin. Debuting in Batman 232 in June 1971, this shadowy plotter leads The League Of Assassins and aims to free the world from chaos by enslaving it. He's an immortal who uses his jealously guarded Lazarus Pit to rejuvenate his body. "Ra's al Ghul" is Arabic for "The Demon's Head". Oh, and his beautiful daughter Talia once had the hots for Bats.
-> Rutger Hauer is Earle, a business suit who seeks to take control of the Wayne empire while Bruce is busy elsewhere. Hauer is no stranger to malevolent movers and shakers in the superhero universe - he recently played Metropolis crimelord Morgan Edge in Smallville. He was bowled over by his days on the Batman Begins soundstage: "Big, sensational, grand sets. Moody, Art Deco, impressive."
-> And there's yet another Big Bad in the mix (we told you Gotham City was corrupt - looks like Batman will simply open the phone book and begin with the A's...). Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind's Tom Wilkinson is mob boss Carmine "The Roman" Falcone, established in the comic books as Gotham's last old school gangster before the infamous rogue's gallery of freaks and psychos really brought property values down...
-> We meet the future Commissioner Gordon as a dedicate Gotham City beat cop, Lt Jim Gordon, a force for good in the vice-throttled GPD. Gary Oldman won the role over such rumoured names as Dennis Quaid, Kurt Russell and American Beauty's Chris Cooper. "I'm on a roll with good guys now," says Oldman, whose gallery of grim includes Dracula, Pontius Pilate and Lee Harvey Oswald. "I'm trying to put those nasty people behind me." One day soo: you may even want to ask him home for tea.
-> The Phantom Menace and Schindler's List star Liam Neeson is Henri Ducard, who trains the young Bruce Wayne in the ways of combat.
-> Morgan Freeman is Lucius Fox, Wayne Industries' CEC
-> Linus Roache - once a cert for Paul Anderson's abortivt late '90s Doctor Who movie - is Bruce Wayne's doomed pop Thomas, while Sara Stewart is the equally ill-fated Martha. Gus Lewis will experience the irreversible childhood trauma as young Bruce.
-> Tim Booth from fey '90s rockers James plays a thug.
WAYNE'S WORLD
-> Batman's costume is designed by Lindy Hemming, who looked after the threads in Harry Potter And The Chambi Of Secrets, the Tomb Raider movies and the recent Bonds -> The new Bat-costume is far more flexible than the stiff suits that Keaton, Kilmer and Clooney struggled in. "We knew that it couldn't be a rubber piece of armour," says screenwriter David Goyer, keen to lose the performance-inhibiting rigidity of the previous outfits. "He had to be able to move and turn his head."
-> The Bat-costume is made from neoprene and foam latex.
-> Bruce Wayne is said to build the Bat-suit with help from Wayne Industries designer Lucius Fox. It's rumoured to be hi-tech prototype body armour, developed as part of a military research program.
-> "He's powerful because he does push-ups," says Michael Caine, emphasising that Batman is very much a human superhero, not someone blessed with mutant DNA or sent to us as a saviour from the stars. "Where does he get all his weapons? Because he's a multi-billionaire, and he's in the arms business, so he gets the secret weapons instantly. Why does he wear the bloody suit? To scare the shit out of people, because he doesn't really want to fight."
-> Kiss goodbye to Shark-Repellent Bat Spray. The key to the new Bat-arsenal is credibility. "We approached everything from the standpoint of realism," says Goyer. "If he was going to wear a suit, what would he need to do in it? What would the suit require? If he was going to be using the Batmobile, why would he use it and what would be required of the Batmobile? When we were working on the story, it was all based on existing technology. Our general rule was that this had to be technology that would be shown in the marketplace in the next ten years or so, stuff that was being developed by the Department Of Defense."
-> The chicks dig the car... The new Batmobile is a serious sidestep away from the sleek, finned beauty of old. Seemingly inspired by the tank-like bruiser in Frank Miller's 1986 graphic novel The Dark Knight Returns, it's a chunky, fat-wheeled beast known as The Tumbler. This fully-functional armoured assault vehicle weighs in at two and a half tons tons, has four 44" Humvee tyres at the rear, a jet fuel burner and back-end flaps for sudden stops. It's capable of astonishing stunt jumps and scorches tarmac at 160 mph. The sound you hear is Jeremy Clarkson spasming.
-> The filmmakers built four Batmobiles, at the cost of a cool million apiece.
THE ROAD TO GOTHAM...
-> Batman Begins began filming on location in Iceland, near Vatnajokull,
the largest glacier in Europe. Reports had a bearded Christian Bale going mano
a mano with one of I Ra's al Ghul's ninjas as part of a training exercise.
I In May 2004 the film decamped to London. The city's I Senate House (used for
Ghostbusters' library exteriors) was transformed into the City Of Gotham State
Courts by cunning deployment of fire hydrants and yellow cabs.
-> Christian Bale was spotted in character as Bruce Wayne in London's Canary Wharf, flanked by a pair of lovelies in true billionaire playboy style. The filmmakers hired Canada Square's swank Plateau restaurant for a scene where Bruce Wayne wines and dines Rachel.
-> London's National Institute for Medical Research in Mill Hill is doubling for Gotham nuthouse Arkham Asylum. This location shoot found a crack Gotham City SWAT team descending on the building.
-> Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire stands in for stately Wayne Manor. The house was built between 1852 and 1854 by Baron Mayer de Rothschild; the pinnacled mansion also featured as orgy central in Eyes Wide Shut.
-> Holy avian aphrodisiac! Filming at Shepperton Studios was frequently interrupted by the sound of pigeons rutting in the rafters...
-> In August 2004 the production pitched up in Chicago, where the moviemakers
captured a pulse-pounding
sequence of the Batmobile being pursued by police cars. One eyewitness described
the sound of the Batmobile as like, "Two V8 Mustangs roaring with their
engines side by side." As a police chopper shines a spotlight on the chase,
the Batmobile hurtles through a parking garage then flies on to the sidewalk,
smashing through a bus stop, a bike rack and a couple of newspaper vending machines...
Gotham City citizen? Take out insurance.
-> The entrance to the Bat-Cave is situated in an underground thoroughfare in Chicago named... Lower Wacker. Carry On Batman!
-> The fabled Bat-Signal also features - it was spotted on a rooftop in Chicago.
-> The look of Gotham City's less inviting neighbourhoods is based on the slums of Kowloon in Hong Kong, which were torn down in 1994.
-> The Gotham City Police Force badges reveal that the blighted city was founded in 1820.
HOLY FANTASTIC FACTOIDS, BATMAN!
-> Christian Bale's stunt double is Buster Reeves, who trained Brad Pitt for Troy. His mum Frances says: "When he was four, he was running through the kitchen dressed as Batman, saying, 'Is my cape floating?' Now he's doing it for real."
-> Leyland-based martial arts expert Mark Strange let slip this titbit: "I'm in the role of a Shadow Warrior, part of an elite team sent to combat Batman."
-> Christian Bale's trailer had the name Bruce Wayne on the door.
-> While Gary Oldman calls it "a $200 million art movie, character-driven," Michael Caine pegs the budget at a more conservative $135 million - "It's so nice to be in something like that. I'm usually going around with the guys who say, 'Can you share a car?'"
-> The director of photography is Wally Pfister, who was cinematographer on Nolan's Insomnia and Memento.
-> The soundtrack is scored by David Julyan. His credentials include The Following, Insomnia and Memento.
-> Don't expect Phantom Menace-styled merchandising overkill. "If we narrow the focus, put less product in, it will sustain the brand longer," says Dan Romancelli, WB Consumer Products president. So don't look for Scarecrow plushies infesting the shelves come Chrimbo 2005.
-> And the chances of a sequel? "Christian is on for more than one Batman," says producer Chuck Roven. "All of the seeds are there, even though the next story hasn't been worked out." Word is that Bale has signed for no fewer than two more Dark Knight adventures. SFX
Here's the crucial fact: Batman Begins opens in Blighty on 8 July 2005. Form an orderly queue... No jostling now.
BATMAN'S KINDA TOWN
When the filmmakers needed a real life Gotham City, they turned to Chicago. Brenda Sexton of the Illinois Film Office tells how the Dark Knight spread his wings over the Windy City...
So what sold the filmmakers on Chicago?
"Chris Nolan had actually lived in Chicago for a brief period, and he was
aware of an underground roadway that runs below downtown Chicago - Lower Wacker
Drive. That was the primary factor in choosing Chicago for Gotham. Other locations
were chosen because they fitted the specific requirements of the script as they
explored the city during the scouting process."
How huge a logistical operation was it? How tough was it to mount
a car chase through the streets of Chicago and deal with so much interest from
the media and the public?
"Chicago is a very busy city with a lot going on in the summer. Yes, it's
difficult to keep a high profile film under wraps, but the filming was at night
when the city slows down and allows for street closures. Of course the media
was pretty successful at tracking them down..."
Biggest thrill?
"Having a helicopter hover then land in the middle of our financial
district was quite amazing!"
Gotham City is notorious as an urban blight, populated by freaks and
scuzzballs. Is this really good for the image of Chicago?
"Well, it is just a movie after all - and one conjured from the pages of
a comic book. Most people are able to make a distinction between reality and
a comic book city. And the most noteworthy of Chicago's landmark buildings will
be digitally altered, so the Gotnam you see on film will exist nowhere in reality.
So I think Chicago's reputation for being the most beautiful, clean and livable
big city in the world will not be besmirched by a thrilling action fantasy film
such as Batman Begins. We're actually expecting fans of the film to flock to
our city to explore Gotham for themselves..."
KNIGHT WRITER
Batman Begins screenwriter, David Goyer talks to Nick Setchfield.
Why does Batman still appeal?
"Of all the heavy-hitter superheroes, Batman has the most classic, enduring
origin. There are elements of The Count Of Monte Cristo, Phantom Of The Opera,
even Dracula. It's a very romantic, sweeping revenge story. He's a complex figure
who wrestles with his demons - and I think people can relate to him. On a personal
level, I felt the most affinity for Batman as a child. I think the sense of
loneliness that Bruce Wayne grappled with when he was growing up was a part
of it. I also admired that he remade himself. He disappeared from Gotham and
came back a new man. It's part of the vision quest myth from the American Indians."
What was the spirit that you wanted to capture with this movie? Is
there any period of the comic book that particularly influenced you?
'The moment in Year One when Bruce Wayne is returning to Gotham after a multi-year
absence. I was captivated by that. I wanted to explore what had happened in
those intervening years. And I also wanted to depict the moment when he decides
to leave Gotham - what he would say to Alfred, his foster father, and how that
would take a terrible toll on his heart... And because we were using Ra's al
Ghul, we definitely used some of the Denny O'Neil issues as a point of reference."
Some other superhero movies have been the victim of studio interference
- corporate decisions that have been more about a potential toy line than creativity.
How have you kept this vision of Batman pure?
"Warner Bros took a hands-off approach. They chose Chris, Chris chose me
-and they left us alone. Chris was very focused on staying true to the source
material. Batman has endured as a cultural figure for nearly 70 years. There's
a reason for that."
What elements of the Batman myth translate effortlessly to the screen?
Which ones simply won't work for a modern, mainstream audience?
"Frankly, I think the bulk of Batman's myth is a fairly easy translation.
I think - and always have felt - that Robin was very problematic. Beyond Batman
himself, I think the villains can be tricky. Because we have taken a more naturalistic
approach to the Batman universe, the bar for the ensuing reinterpretations of
Batman's rogues' gallery will have been raised. It'll be harder to take some
of the classic villains and set them in a more realistic world. Not impossible,
just harder. But I think that's a challenge that will help the Batman franchise."
How did Christian Bale nail the part?
"Bale is a serious and very committed actor. He brings credibility and
gravitas to both roles, Bruce and Batman. He's one of the few young actors around
that can play both roles."
Was there trepidation that Ra's al Ghul was too obscure a villain?
'There was no trepidation at all. Ra's is a perfect villain for Batman's maiden
voyage as a hero. He's different from the other villains - more of a paternal
figure, more grounded in reality. And since Bruce lost his father, Ra's' personality
dove-tailed nicely into the themes we were exploring."
Bryan Singer's X-Men and Sam Raimi's Spider-Man movies have raised
the bar on superhero films. What will Batman Begins deliver when it opens in
Summer 2005?
'The thing about Singer's X-Men and Raimi's Spider-Man films is that they stay
true to the source material. The depictions of the key personalities are spot-on.
And I'd like to think that we've done the same thing here. Of all the major
superhero franchises, though, I think ours may be the most naturalistic. But
you have to remember - Spider-Man and the X-Men are outcasts. Even their non-costumed
identities are essentially misfits. Bruce Wayne is different. Bruce is a respected
figure. A public personality. That dynamic leads to a different kind of story..."
STRIP SHOW
Joseph McCabe speaks to comic book creators Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams, two key inspirations for Batman's bis screen resurrection...
DENNY O'NEIL DEFINING THE DARK KNIGHT
From the late '60s, when he teamed with artist Neal Adams to rescue the caped crusader from the campy confines of the Adam West TV show, to the '90s, when he served as editor of the Batman titles for DC Comics, O'Neil became a comic-book legend for putting the "dark" in the Dark Knight detective.
"Batman [was] in a camp phase and, without being judgmental about that, that wasn't my kind of humour, that wasn't my kind of thing. I don't know that the comic book guys, any of them, had a natural affinity for camp, [but] they had sort of half-heartedly been following the lead of the television show. That went away, and Neal Adams and I were the new kids on the block, the flavour of the month. We were asked if we'd like to take a shot at Batman. Obviously they weren't going to cancel the character, but I guess it was at that point without much direction. So I wrote 'The Secret Of The Waiting Graves" [Detective Comics #395] - no gimmicks, no Robin, strong supernatural bent. And Neal did, I think, an extraordinary job on the art. I was taking it back to what Bill Finger and Bob Kane had started with in 1939, and just doing that character with whatever the world had learned about telling comic book stories in the 30 years that had passed."
O'Neil retired from comics several years ago, but he recently agreed to write the movie novelisation of next summer's Batman Begins, featuring the classic Batman villain he created with Adams and editor Julius Schwartz - Ra's al Ghul. O'Neil claims that he's not worried about seeing the character adapted to the silver screen: "Stuff is not set in stone. I had 30 years plus of having it my way; it is somebody else's turn. And I don't think characters should ever be set in stone, because the great principle of the universe is evolution... So of course Ra's is going to evolve - Batman has evolved enormously; Superman has evolved enormously. And I don't think ifs accidental those characters have been in continuous publication for 65 and 66 years respectively."
BATMAN LEGEND NEAL ADAMS TALKS RA'S.
Neal Adams - for many comic-book fans, the definitive Batman artist - vividly remembers the creation of his classic Batman villain, Ra's al Ghul, soon to be brought to the screen by Ken Watanabe:
"Julius Schwartz wanted to have a new character, and Denny O'Neil went
into the precincts of his mind...
"He didn't really go all the way down to that costumed, freaky Joker-type,
Penguin-type character. He went more into international crime and the things
he read in detective books and books about international spies and stuff. So
he came up with a man. He was okay - obviously very smart - but he was just
a guy with an interesting name. I realised that Julius was fishing for a more
interesting character and we really hadn't gotten it.
"Then I thought, 'What about the idea of taking a real man and giving him just enough character to carry him over that edge?' In other words, to turn him Into a slightly visually-stunning character. I thought, 'First of all, I'll give him a receding hairline, because people do respect a nigh forehead. Then, the idea that he's not of a given culture. In other words, he has sort of an Arab name, but the truth of the matter is that there's no reason to think that he's an Arab. There's no reason to think that he's of any given culture. What if we took it all and mixed it all together? An international person represents all cultures, well, what would he look like? He would have high cheekbones, he would have slightly slanted eyes; the eyes would be dark.' I started to design a thick brow and high cheekbones, ana a long face, and very cold eyes under it. And I thought, 'I'm going to take the eyebrows off... And his clothes could be slightly exotic, but not really truly exotic. He'd still wear suits, you know, but maybe would care to wear a cape.'
"I pushed him as far as I could without taking him into some kind of strange costumed character, put him right on the edge, and made Ra's al Ghul that visual that you see of Ra's al Ghul. That's just some impressive son-of-a-gun guy. And you know, it worked, and I can't tell you why."