Last week Warner Bros. made it a point to send out a press release confirming that yes, indeed, The Dark Knight will be heading back to the big screen on January 23, one day after the Oscar nominees are announced and one month in advance of the actual show.
Next we learn via Ain’t It Cool News there will be a Warner Bros. BD-Live event for all Blu-ray owners of The Dark Knight in which Christopher Nolan will hold a live commentary with 100,000 Blu-ray owners on December 18. That shouldn’t be a networking traffic jam or anything. In the same report the following snippets were reported via AllThingsFanGirl from a Dark Knight Blu-ray event of which Nolan attended:
If he made a third film, it would be for no reason but the continuation of story. He is currently looking into where the story would go and if it needs to go there. He maintained that it’s very hard to make a movie of this scale (and specified he wasn’t asking for our sympathy, drawing a laugh from the crowd) – it’s two hard years and you gotta love it. One of his biggest fears is getting halfway through making a film and realizing it’s unnecessary and he doesn’t want to make it anymore. If there is a third story that needs to be told, there will be a third film, but nothing is set in stone or a given.
The videos shot by the Joker were in fact shot and mostly directed by Heath Ledger. For the first video, Wally Pfister came in and checked the lights, the sound guys set up a few extra mics, everyone hid around the corner and they let Heath play. Ledger had been planning to direct and was an incredible collaborator with a great mind. Nolan trusted him implicitly. Ledger’s work on the first video was so fantastic that Nolan wasn’t even there for the second video shoot with Anthony Michael Hall. He gave Ledger the camera and said “do whatever you want.” Apparently every take Ledger did was different, but always in line with the story and always fantastic. Where are those on the dvd, Mr. Nolan?!!
Following that up, USA Today posts a new story regarding the film and its Blu-ray release this Tuesday (my review here) saying Nolan is jotting notes and doing some rough outlines for a third story, but he hasn’t yet found anything he’s willing to commit to film, despite Warner Bros.’ eagerness to get a new film underway.
“I don’t know why they’re hard to do,” Nolan says. “Maybe there’s so much expectation to them. But I wouldn’t want to do one if it weren’t going to be as good as the first or second. That’s not respectful to the fans.”
