Director Matt Reeves Talks Inspirations Behind 'The Batman' and His Decision To Cast Robert Pattinson

As the release of The Batman is around the corner, director Matt Reeves has revealed his inspirations for the film and his choice to cast Robert Pattinson as the titular Dark Knight.

When Reeves was called to take on the monster film, Ben Affleck was still cast as the Caped Crusader in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. In a recent interview, Reeves said, “Ben [Affleck] had been working on a version of the script and I said, ‘Here’s the thing: I respect that the DC Universe has become an extended universe and all the movies were kind of connected. But another Batman film, it shouldn’t have to carry the weight of connecting the characters from all those other movies. I didn’t want them in there.” Reeves was very careful with not wanting to just “reboot Batman,” saying that “It’s been done too much.”

For the upcoming The Batman film, Reeves found influences from new Hollywood classics from 1970s including The French Connection, Chinatown and Taxi Drive. He also cited Kurt Cobain and Nirvana to helping him figure out how he wanted Bruce Wayne to be portrayed. On his decision to cast Pattison, Reeves revealed,

“In the process of writing the movie, I watched [the fantastic 2017 Safdie brothers film] Good Time, and I thought, ‘Okay, he’s got an inner kind of rage that connects with this character and a dangerousness, and I can feel this desperation.’ And I became dead-set on it being Rob. And I had no idea if Rob had any interest! Because, of course, he had done all of these indie movies after he established himself in Twilight.”

Reeves added that any actor announced to take on the role of Batman would ultimately receive backlash, “The people who were excited, I knew it was because they knew Rob’s work post-Twilight. The people who weren’t excited, I knew it was because they didn’t know Rob’s work post-Twilight.”

The Batman is released in theaters on March 4.

In other The Batman news, Robert Pattinson has described how his version of the Dark Knight differs from his predecessors.