When he was approached about making a follow-up to the Warner Bros. action hit Batman Begins, director/ screenwriter/ producer Christopher Nolan wouldn’t even entertain the idea unless he could come up with a concept to make the sequel even better than the first film. Intertwining the stories of arch-villain The Joker (played by the late Academy Award nominee Heath Ledger) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) with that of billionaire industrialist Bruce Wayne/Batman (Christian Bale), The Dark Knight quickly took shape.

Interview Undercut.. Read On

This time around, Batman has joined forces with Lieutenant Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) and Dent, in an effort to destroy organized crime in Gotham City for good. The triumvirate initially proves to be effective, but they soon find themselves prey to a rising criminal mastermind — the maniacal, remorseless fiend known as The Joker. With a new home, a new Batsuit and a new Batmobile, the Caped Crusader quickly realizes that, if he is to defeat this purposeless criminal, he just may have to break his one rule, never to kill.

The Welch-born 34-year-old Bale recently spoke to MediaBlvd Magazine about fighting in the new Batsuit, working with the late Heath Ledger and the possibility of returning for a third film.

MediaBlvd Magazine: How much darker do you think Bruce Wayne is in this film?

Christian Bale: I don’t know about darker. I just think he’s more mature. It’s always the Dark Knight with Batman. He’s never a White Knight. Yes, he has altruism. He wants to affect good. That’s the Knight. But, he’s not a White Knight because you look at him and he looks demonic. Bats are not associated with anything angelic. They’re associated with the devil and with Hell. And, that’s his whole point. He wants to overcome his own fears and use those fears against his opponents. And, he has this extreme shadow side of great capability and great love of violence, and this rage and this desire for revenge, countered by his inherited philanthropy and altruism for his parents, which he wants to uphold and be true to as well.

MediaBlvd: Why do you think he is so taunted by the Joker?

Christian: He’s provoked, more than ever, by the Joker, into the temptation of breaking his one cardinal rule, that he will not kill. I think it’s wonderful the way that Chris Nolan has managed to make a spectacular roller-coaster movie, which also raises a great deal of ethical questions, having to do with power and the nature of terrorism. As filmmakers, I don’t think we want to be telling people what it should be correlating to, nowadays, but people can find that, if they wish. And, with the Joker, you have the arrival of the ultimate freak. Many people are accusing Batman of attracting that kind of persona to the city. He’s a formidable foe because he doesn’t seek money. He seeks no reward, other than the pleasure, and being in the moment, of chaos and destruction, even if that means self-destruction. He’s a very intelligent character. Clearly, Batman has the dilemma of, if he can break his one cardinal rule and potentially save many more lives, what is the right choice to make?

MediaBlvd: Were you surprised by the way Heath Ledger played the role?

Christian: I wasn’t surprised by it. I worked on a movie with Heath called I’m Not There, about a year before. I had spoken with him, before we started Batman. I had spoken with Chris about Heath’s ideas and their collaboration on how the Joker was going to be portrayed, so I knew we were going to be getting this very different portrayal. And, also, the tone of our movies and our Gotham is not, in any way, looking for caricatures. We’re not looking for actors to be giving a nod and a wink to the audience, and showing how much the actor is enjoying portraying this caricature. We want people to just stay underneath it and disappear inside of the role. I can’t help but be impressed, beyond belief, with what Heath did because it’s such an iconic villain. I have no idea how, if Chris chooses to make a third movie, he’s going to improve and make a better villain than what Heath came up with here. He’s this wonderful punk, Clockwork Orange-style anarchist, who’s fiercely intelligent as well, and despises hypocrisy and is holding up a mirror to Gotham and declaring it to be utterly hypocritical.

MediaBlvd: Do you remember the first time you saw Heath as the Joker? What was the first scene you shot with him?

Christian: The first scene we shot was in the interrogation room with the two of us, and that was great because we were allowed to be by ourselves, without any crew inside of the room. It was just the two of us, inside there with just mirrors, all the way around us. Everywhere we looked, there were these two freaks, sitting at a table, eyeballing each other. I felt that I was seeing, in Heath, somebody who got the same enjoyment from acting that I do, and just recognized the ridiculousness of what we do as grown men, pretending to be other people, but loving that ridiculousness and loving the job all the more for that, and taking it all the more seriously, precisely because of that, and staying in character whilst we were inside of the garb. It was wonderful. You get to see, clearly, what an opponent this is going to be, when Batman beats the Joker and recognizes that, with every punch that he’s landing, the Joker’s smile is getting bigger and bigger. How are you going to defeat somebody whose absolute nirvana would be being destroyed himself?

MediaBlvd: When you play a dark character, is there a fine line where you could almost fall into being dark yourself and become too much of that character?

Christian: Personally, I don’t find that. The point I was making about recognizing the ridiculousness gives me the ability just to step away from it, but truly enjoy it and embrace it whilst I’m in it.

MediaBlvd: When you look at The Dark Knight, what is your last thought about Heath Ledger? Does something stand out for you? Was there anything that you did together?

Christian: There is an awful lot of that, but that’s stuff which I don’t want to talk about publicly. But, I view this movie as an incredible celebration of his talent. It is absolutely tragic that it is the last complete work that he did. I have wonderful memories of working with him, and of the great company that the man was, himself.

MediaBlvd: Can you talk about returning to Chicago and filming there?

Christian: They gave us the key to the city. We were racing up and down LaSalle, the business district, with helicopters flying just a matter of feet above the ground. We were blowing up trucks and flipping them. We were standing on the edge of the Sears Tower, jumping off of it. They gave us real freedom.

MediaBlvd: What was it like, on top of the Sears Tower?

Christian: Fantastic. That was not a stunt, but that was an experience. There was no way that they were going to put me up there and allow me to plummet 110 stories. I had a cable. I could have fallen a short way and then banged against the side and gotten pulled up again. When am I going to get an opportunity to stand on the top of the Sears Tower, looking down and out over Chicago, again? So, I was going to take advantage of that.

MediaBlvd: Do you keep your Batsuits?

Christian: I keep the cowls. I don’t have room for the whole thing.

MediaBlvd: You found the first Batsuit claustrophobic. Was this one more comfortable?

Christian: It was so much better, yeah. I don’t like whiners and complainers. I’m playing Batman, for God’s sake. Just put up with it. But, this was so much more of an advanced suit. In the way that the story has evolved, the suit should evolve as well. There were 110 parts to this suit versus three with the last one. I could take the cowl off. I could move my head. In the previous one, for the fight sequences, I was having to fight against the Batsuit because the fighting style that we used (the Keysi Fighting Method), the Batsuit was not conducive to, whatsoever. This one was designed to actually aid with the fighting style. It was heavier, but didn’t feel that way at all. I had so much more energy, and it was so much easier to breathe inside of this one than the previous one.

MediaBlvd: Would you still like to see an R-rated Batman?

Christian: When I said that, I was often misunderstood, in that some people seem to think that I was suggesting that we should see Batman having sex. I was never suggesting that. I was talking about, if you look at the graphic novels, they’re very dark. They’re extremely violent as well. If it was to be portrayed on film, in exactly that manner, then it would be nothing but an R. Chris has managed to make a superb movie, by any genre’s standards, and so, to me, that’s irrelevant. If you can make a better movie by making it an R, then fine, go ahead and do it. But, if you can achieve it and still have a PG-13, and you haven’t been considering that whilst you’re working on it, then of course, go with that. You don’t need to add in a few swear words just for the hell of making it an R.

MediaBlvd: Have you talked about making a third film, and would you be up for that, since you are signed for it?

Christian: I think that will very much depend upon Chris. That will really be his decision.

MediaBlvd: Have you thrown any ideas back and forth with him?

Christian: In a very casual manner. Chris needs to finish this one completely first. I don’t know. Maybe he wants to go make something else. We did The Prestige in between the first and second ones. Maybe he needs to take a break from it. I have no idea. I cannot speak for him about whether he has any interest in returning for a third. Clearly, I would hope that he would. I find that it’s a very intriguing ending, and I like the idea of the challenge of a third. There have been a number of sequels which have surpassed the original movie, but even with my limited movie knowledge, I can’t think of many times that the third in a trilogy has ended up being the best of the three movies.

MediaBlvd: What would you like to see happen, if there is another film?

Christian: Chris is the mind behind what will happen, and I trust him implicitly on that. I trust that his answer will be leaps and bounds better than any answer that I’d be able to give you.

MediaBlvd: When you do a movie like this, does it put you into a place where you get offered tons of horror and fantasy projects because you’ve been successful in the genre and you have a pre-sold audience?

Christian: I don’t believe I ever have a pre-sold audience waiting for me. I don’t buy that for a second, ever. I feel like I’m having to prove myself for the first time, every time I’m making a movie.

MediaBlvd: What made you want to step into the Terminator franchise?

Christian: With Batman Begins, we were reinventing and breathing new life into the storyline. The difference, however, is that, with Batman Begins, we were giving an origin story and actually separating ourselves from the previous movies. We were not giving any concessions to them, or recognizing them, whatsoever. With Terminator, you have to recognize the mythology that has gone ahead of it, with the first one and the second one, and maybe the third one. But, we have an opportunity, and I believe a responsibility, to do the same thing, in terms of reinvention, revitalizing and breathing new life. Otherwise, there is no point in making it. That is my aim, and anything less will be a failure.

MediaBlvd: You’re playing John Connor?

Christian: Yeah.

MediaBlvd: Are you still involved in the Pablo Escobar movie, Killing Pablo?

Christian: Joe [Carnahan] and I are still talking about it. There are a lot of complications in getting any movie off the ground. It’s a wonderful script. He’s done a fantastic job with that. It’s a great story, and I hope that we can find the time to do that.

MediaBlvd: Do you have anything else coming out?

Christian: I just finished doing another movie in Chicago, called Public Enemies. That was the Michael Mann movie. It is the origin story of the FBI and the hunt for John Dillinger. Johnny Depp is John Dillinger. I play Melvin Purvis, who was the Special Agent in charge.

Source: Media Blvd

RELATED POSTS:
•  New Bale Interview on The Dark Knight *Spoiler Alert*
I was recently thinking how amazing it actually is to...

•  Christian Bale Interview on The Dark Knight
We had a chance to sit down with Batman himself,...

•  New Reel Comix Interview on Christian Bale
Warner Brothers were nice enough to include us in the...

•  Ace in the pack – Christian Bale interview
Christian Bale has been hailed for his brooding reinvention of...

•  Playing the Whole Spectrum: Christian Interview
Only a few years ago, the name Batman had returned...