Robert Pattinson Says ‘The Batman’ Really Is A ‘Detective Story’
The Batman star Robert Pattinson has given us a more detailed picture of what Matt Reeves’ highly anticipated superhero film is going to be like. Get ready, because according to Pattinson, The Batman is intensely emotional.
“I watched a rough cut of the movie by myself. And the first shot is so jarring from any other Batman movie that it’s just kind of a totally different pace,” Pattinson told GQ in a recent profile. “It was what Matt was saying from the first meeting I had with him: ‘I want to do a ’70s noir detective story, like The Conversation. And I kind of assumed that meant the mood board or something, the look of it. But from the first shot, it’s, oh, this actually is a detective story.”
Pattinson is no stranger to psychologically complex roles — one look at his work in Good Time or The Lighthouse will show you that. So it isn’t surprising that Pattinson’s take on Bruce Wayne won't be like past incarnations of the millionaire playboy. Pattinson describes his version of the Caped Crusader as “kind of a weirdo” with a “nihilistic slant.”
The Gotham City that appears in The Batman will be rife with crime and despair, as it has always been in previous Batman movies. But this time, the moonlighting vigilante is not viewed as a hero. “The people of Gotham think that he’s just another symptom of how s— everything is,” said Pattinson.
Not to mention, Pattinson has concocted an intriguing take on his character's backstory. While every other Bruce Wayne is inspired to become Batman following the death of his parents, Pattinson tried to "break that down in what I thought was a real way, instead of trying to rationalize it." He likened Bruce Wayne's intricate Batman persona to a drug addiction — an unhealthy habit that he's come to rely on over the course of several years.
This makes us even more excited to see the newest DC film, which also stars Jeffrey Wright as James Gordon, Zoë Kravitz as Catwoman, Colin Farrell as Penguin, Paul Dano as Riddler, and Andy Serkis as Alfred Pennyworth. The Batman arrives in theaters on March 4.