Christopher Nolan Discuses The Genres of His DARK KNIGHT Trilogy and How They Were Defined By The Villains

Over the weekend at the Cannes Film Festival, director Christopher Nolan spoke at a panel, and talked about his beloved Dark Knight trilogy. He talked about the genres that each of the films in the trilogy represents and explained that 2005’s Batman Begins is a "hero’s journey", 2008’s The Dark Knight, is a "crime movie", and 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises, is a "war film." Nolan went on to talk about how the genres are defined by each film’s villain.

“To me, each film is a different genre. They tend to be defined by the villain… We hadn’t planned on doing a sequel. So shifting genres and the nature of the antagonist felt the way to take the audience on a journey and tell them something different about Bruce Wayne.”

In Batman Begins, it is the hero’s mentor, Ra’s al Ghul (Liam Neeson) who is the villain. "The villain is an appropriate adversary. He’s a mentor-turned-enemy." In The Dark Knight, it is the terrorist Joker (Heath Ledger). "The Dark Knight for me was always a crime drama in the mold of a Michael Mann film. The Joker was a terrorist, an agent of chaos set loose." In The Dark Knight Rises, it is the militaristic Bane (Tom Hardy). "This historical epic. Bane as a militarist foe helped that."

He went on to say James Bond was a huge influence on this franchise explaining that, "We mercilessly pillaged from the James Bond films for certain aspects. But I think if I made my version of James Bond, Inception is far more guilty of that than The Dark Knight."

He just wanted to make Batman as compelling as 007. He also noted how Gotham’s chief inventor Lucius Fox is similar to Bond’s Agent Q, who has a closet full of gadgets.

I loved Nolan's Dark Knight Trilogy! He made three incredible Batman films and I really liked this little new bit of insight that he offered on how he approached the creation of these films. 

Source: Variety