It was sad when the news came that Ben Affleck was stepping down as director of THE BATMAN. On the one hand, it was sad to lose Affleck's directorial voice as he had shown himself to be quite the filmmaker; on the other hand, Matt Reeves is a pretty damn good consolation prize. Hell, his upcoming WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES is supposed to be amazing!
Anyway, while promoting the aforementioned WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES, here's what Reeves had to say about his version of Batman in an interview with New Trailer Buzz:
One of the reasons I was drawn to it is I had a similar fascination to Batman when I was younger that I had with the Apes series, which I was obsessed with. I see a parallel emotionally between Caesar and Batman, in that they’re both characters who are tortured and trying to sort of grapple within themselves to find the way to do the right thing in a very imperfect and, to some degree, corrupt world. It’s really that emotionality that I’m interested in. In all of my films, what I try to do, in an almost Hitchcockian sense, is use the camera and use the storytelling so that you become the character, and you emphasize with that point of view. I think there’s a chance to do an almost noir-driven, detective version of Batman that is point-of-view driven in a very, very powerful way, that hopefully is going to connect you to what’s going on inside of his head and inside of his heart
Emphasis mine. And it's about fucking time! I mean, he's the "World's Greatest Detective", right? Well, let's see the films finally prove it! The closest, honestly, was probably THE DARK KNIGHT with that weird bullet-recreation simulation bullshit. Hell, Adam West did more detective work than he has in the last seven films! This is a big part of his character, and it will be cool to see a more stripped-down, noir-take on the hero. It doesn't have to be the end of Gotham (or the world) all the time.
But what do you Schmoes think? You down for this take? Either way, sound off below!
No release date set for Matt Reeves' THE BATMAN yet, but it's expected shooting won't commence until next year. However, you can see Reeves' next film WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES July 14th, and you can also see Ben Affleck as the Caped Crusader next in the JUSTICE LEAGUE coming out November 17th.