Matt Reeves’s Batman is going to see a whole new take on the caped crusader. There is much hype amongst the fans of the character regarding this project. Some of the greatest actors have previously taken this role and proven their worth with the character. While some of these actors are making a return with the character in the upcoming Flash movie. With Michael Keaton and Ben Affleck ready for a return, fans are wondering if Chrisitan Bale would be making a return too. There is a chance that this might not happen considering the Nolan trilogy of the Batman movies is considered completely separate from the other movies. While we might not get Christian Bake to return in character as Batman, let’s take a look at some facts about Batman Begins you might have never heard before.
Unknown Facts About Batman Begins
Bale’s American Accent
Christian Bale is amongst the best of the actors in Hollywood. He is known for his capability to get inside the skin of his character. This served a major purpose in his role as Bruce Wayne since he has a massive capability with accents. He was able to nail the American accent perfectly throughout the film. It was so authentic that many people tend to forget that he was born in Pembrokeshire, Wales.
Christian Bale Too Fat
If there’s one thing Bale is known for, it is his ability to morph himself into the character that he is portraying. Before Batman Begins, Bale played the role of a rather underweight persona for The Machinist. Nolan had asked him to get as bulky as he can be in order to play his role in Batman. Bale went so far in order to get into the role that he actually gained more weight than required. This was also the world record for the most weight gained for a movie role by an actor. He had to lose enough of his weight in order to fit in the costume for his character.
Cillian Murphy Original Choice For Batman
Nolan really wanted to get Cillian Murphy for the role of the protagonist in the movie. The latter didn’t get the role and Nolan couldn’t simply let Murphy go and thus decided to cast him as the antagonist, Jonathan Crane or The Scarecrow. This was a brilliant pick consider Murphy nailed his performance in the role and we got a rather nice antagonist.
Bale and Neeson Almost Drowned
During a major scene where Ra’s Al Ghul played by Liam Neeson trains Bruce Wayne played by Christian Bale, both of them shot the scene on a frozen lake. This could have resulted in massive chaos considering it was discovered that the ice was cracking below them during the shoot. Luckily, Nolan managed to get this scene shot in a single day.
Money For Inception
Christopher Nolan has later confessed that Batman Begins was his means of getting sufficient money in order to make Inception. He was really excited about making this movie about dream stealers. The movie required a lot of money because Nolan has a tendency to depend extensively on practical effects.
Josh Hartnett Regretted Turning Down Batman
Multiple actors were being rounded for the role of Batman in the movie. Everyone tried to nab the role but it seems that Josh Hartnett wasn’t interested in the role. This was the same year that superhero movies weren’t making it big with the critics during that year. Later, Hartnett has confessed that he regrets the decision of not taking the role.
Designing Batmobile
In continuation to the realism that Nolan likes putting in his projects, it was no surprise to see the effort that was put into the Batmobile. It was intended to appear less cartoony and more unique and practical. The end result was a monstrous automobile called the Tumbler. Fans thought that it was rather average-sized and visual effects were being employed in order to make it look massive.
Batman Voice Issue
Even though Bale was able to nail the accent to absolute perfection there was an issue with the voice of the caped crusader. This was often criticized in comparison to everything else that was given praise. Apparently, Bale lost his gravelly voice about three times during the shooting in the movie.
Hate For The Batsuit
Bale had mentioned that he “felt like an idiot” when he donned the costume for the audition for the role. He was actually quite surprised when he found out that he had won the role. He continued to have a certain hatred towards the costume when he continued to play the character in the movie.
Sleepy Christian Bale
During an interview, Bale said that he actually fell asleep in the very first scene that he was shooting for the movie. The scene involves him being woken up by Michael Caine’s Alfred after his first confrontation with The Scarecrow. The scene actually involved him to be genuinely appearing asleep and hence we can accept that in no way is Bale an unprofessional actor.
Ra’s Al Ghul = Osama Bin Laden
The primary antagonist of Batman Begins is eco-terrorist Ra’s Al Ghul. His character was based on the nemesis of Sherlock Holmes in the comic. David S. Goyer has said that he has based the character on something more than the comics in order to give a perfect starting to the Dark Knight trilogy. In his own words, Goyer has said that the character is based on a modern figure like Osama Bin Laden. This comes out on the basis of the idea that he believes that he is doing the right thing.
Victor Zsasz
An essential Batman villain who makes an appearance in Batman Begins is Victor Zsasz. This was quite a sneak cameo as Tim Booth appeared in the role. Another essential detail hinted at in the movie includes the mark on his neck which appears to be a nod to the number of tally marks in his body in the comic books. He is put into the rehabilitation center based on the argument presented by Jonathan Crane. This was a fun little cameo that though didn’t have many purposes ended up being something that comic fans ended up appreciating.
Joker Card
Around the ending of Batman Begins, we see Gordon handing Batman a calling card that was left at a crime scene by some new murderer in town. Batman flips it over only to realize that it’s a Joker Card which only confirms that the next big antagonist was gonna be Clown Prince of Crime. This was picked from Frank Miller’s Batman: Year One wherein we get a similar nod to Joker’s arrival.
Original Inspiration From Blade Runner
The story for the movie had various inspirations. While comics had a major influence on the storyline. One particular example could be the shot-for-shot remake of the scene from the lesser-known comic called The Man Who Falls. Nolan has mentioned that movies also played a rather massive impression on the movie with him asking the entire crew to watch Blade Runner before starting with it. Rutger Hauer also makes an appearance in the movie.
Darren Aronofsky Could Have Directed It
Other directors were being considered for the role of the director for the movie. Darren Aronofsky was being strongly considered for this role. His rendition of the movie would have seen Joaquin Phoenix play the titular character of Batman. But another interesting fact is that Joel Schumacher was actually much interested in directing the film.
Ashton Kutcher For Batman
Warner Bros. in a much surprising twist actually wanted Ashton Kutcher to portray the role of Bruce Wayne and subsequently Batman. DC fans actually hated the idea since Kutcher was in no way suitable for the role. They really had a major interest in this actor, so much so that he was being pushed to play the lead role in Superman Returns.
Michael Caine’s History With The Batcave
Due to Nolan’s tendency to make his movies as realistic as possible, the Batcave in Batman Begins was constructed on a full-scale set. This was not actually something that was done in the previous movies. Michael Caine, upon entering the set for the Batcave discovered that he has been there before. The Batcave was constructed at Shepperton Studios in London where Caine had previously worked in his very first movie.
Nolan Was Not A Big Batman Fan
Often it is seen that the directors behind these massive projects that involved comic book-based characters are themselves big fans of comic books or the previous interpretations of the characters. Surprisingly, Christopher Nolan wasn’t actually very much aware of Batman before taking the ropes as the director. It’s a major shock to realize that Nolan took a dark interpretation of the character because he was a big fan of the cheesy 1966 series, Batman.
Tech In Batman Begins
Batman is the only character amongst the superheroes with the most realistic gadgets. These gadgets include the Bat-Sled, Bat-Harpoon, and whatnot. There was one particular weapon that Lucius Fox provides Bruce Wayne called the memory-cloth. This cloth acts like a cape but when current is passed through it, it can take on any shape. This is actually based on a real technology called electrostatic flocking.
Another Batman Reboot
Nolan’s treatment of Batman is one of the most interesting treatments we have gotten for the character in live-action. But the producers had other plans that were luckily scrapped considering the sequel that we got for Batman Begins couldn’t have been topped. The original plans involved a story 30 years into the future. Sylvester Stallone was supposed to play the superhero now in his 50s and having abandoned his crusade.
I’m sure that if you’re a fan of Bale’s Batman, you’d be happy knowing these facts about Batman Begins.
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Source: WhatCulture.com
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