You wouldn't think it'd take very much to convince someone to direct the latest installment
in the hugely successful Batman film franchise.
But as it turns out, there was one huge reason Matt Reeves didn't want to take the job — keep
watching to find out what it was.
“And here…we…go.”
The latest reboot featuring DC Comics' famed Caped Crusader, "The Batman," is hitting theaters
worldwide, finally completing a monumental task undertaken by writer-director Matt Reeves.
"The Batman," of course, has undergone different iterations during its arduous production cycle,
which began with filmmaker Zack Snyder's Batman choice, Ben Affleck, not only starring in
the title role but also writing and directing the film.
When Affleck left his "Batman" project behind over personal reasons, the film's studio,
Warner Bros., had to figure out who could take charge of the project next.
Fostered by celebrated filmmaker J.J.
Abrams on the writer-director's WB series "Felicity," Matt Reeves' film breakthrough
came at the helm of the Abrams-produced found-footage monster movie "Cloverfield."
The doors of opportunity swung wide open for Reeves after the success of that film, which
earned $172 million at the worldwide box office against a $25 million budget.
This landed the filmmaker such high-profile gigs as 20th Century Films' "Rise of the Planet
of the Apes" sequels "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" and "War for the Planet of the Apes"
in 2014 and 2017, respectively.
Suddenly, Reeves was calling his own shots as both writer and director of the last two
films in the "Apes" trilogy, which was clearly the right move for the studio to make, seeing
how the entire trilogy is widely considered one of the best in modern cinema.
It also gave Reeves the kind of showbiz juice to make demands on future projects that other
filmmakers might not get to make.
In a new interview with The New York Times, Reeves said he was in post-production on "War
for the Planet of the Apes" when Warner Bros. asked him to direct Affleck's version of "The
Batman."
And while Reeves told the outlet that the iteration of the tale was, quote, "a totally
valid and cool take" on the Dark Knight, it just wasn't the right story for him to direct.
He said,
"I just didn't know how I would direct that."
"Whoa whoa, take it easy, sweetheart!"
That's right — instead of following in the footsteps of such revered "Batman" directors
Tim Burton, Christopher Nolan, and Snyder, Reeves put the studio on ice, declining to
shoot the script they'd sent him.
He recalled to the Times:
"I don't think you're going to want me because I wouldn't do this.
And then they asked me what I would do.
[...] I said, I'm in the middle of making this 'Apes' movie so I can't really tell you."
After finishing "War for the Planet of the Apes," however, Reeves came back to Warner
Bros. with the one condition he needed to direct the film: He needed to write his own
original script.
The writer-director pitched his ideas for "The Batman" and began writing the screenplay
in 2017.
After five years and various pandemic-induced production and release delays, "The Batman,"
starring Robert Pattinson as Batman and Zoe Kravitz as Catwoman, opened in theaters in
March of 2022.
It's clear from the interviews he's given that Matt Reeves has the utmost respect for
the character and mythos of Batman.
He didn't want to just go in and make any old Batman movie.
He wanted to create a definitive Dark Knight story for a new generation.
As he went on to tell the Times, that involved taking a novel approach to the Caped Crusader.
"I wanted to fight against any sense that Batman would remain static.
I wanted the stakes of the story to challenge him in a way that shook him to his core.
He has to change."
To accomplish that, Reeves had to go darker than any live-action, feature-length Batman
had gone before.
As Reeves told TIME Magazine,
"I wanted to play on this idea that Batman is going to unleash on these guys, and there's
a part of you that can't wait to see it."
But Reeves didn't want the same old fight scenes in his film.
He wanted to go bigger and darker, as he went on to explain,
"You go to a Batman movie to see that moment.
And then you see it's having a toxic effect.
It makes you get a little unsettled."
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