Christopher Nolan Has One Regret About The Most Famous Line From ‘The Dark Knight’
“Why so serious?” If anybody should take The Dark Knight seriously it’s the people who put the work in to make it one of the highest-grossing and acclaimed DC films of all time – but especially Christopher Nolan.
It’s as near-perfect a movie as you’re going to get (more so than Jonah Hex), despite some confusing plot holes. However, Nolan is bothered by one thing his movie gave pop culture – that being one of its more quotable lines, and we’re not talking about any of the grim quips that came from The Joker.
Nolan, speaking to Deadline, confessed he is ”plagued” by Harvey Dent’s (Aaron Eckhart’s) iconic line, “You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” And the reason is surprising and simpler than you may think. “I’m plagued by a line from The Dark Knight, and I’m plagued by it because I didn’t write it,” he explained.
“My brother [Jonathan] wrote it,” he revealed. “It kills me, because it’s the line that most resonates. And at the time, I didn’t even understand it. He says, ‘You either die a hero or you live long enough to become the villain.'” Over time, the filmmaker grew to understand what those words meant, and how they apply so well to Harvey Dent.
“I read it in his draft, and I was like, ‘All right, I’ll keep it in there, but I don’t really know what it means. Is that really a thing?’ And then, over the years since that film’s come out, it just seems truer and truer. In this story, it’s absolutely that. Build them up, tear them down. It’s the way we treat people,” Nolan said.
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Aaron Eckhart was not quite an unknown at the time playing the bifurcated one, but he sort of falls into the category – especially now – of that type of actor taking on a major villain unexpectedly. That sort of casting was the calling card for Nolan’s Batman, starting with Cillian Murphy as The Scarecrow.
“I don’t remember having any resistance whatsoever to having a relative unknown take on a big part like that,” Nolan recalled when it came to casting Murphy and Eckhart. “And previously all those villains were played by actors like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Jack Nicholson. They were the biggest stars in the films. But no, [the studio] got it. They were all blown away by the test.”
The entire world and the Academy are appropriately blown away this season by Murphy as Oppenheimer in Nolan’s biopic of the father of the atomic bomb which has a sizable chance of sweeping the award show. (We aren’t assuming you’re interested in that; we’re just pointing it out.)
NEXT: Rumor: Christopher Nolan In Discussions To Direct Pair Of James Bond Movies
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