Christopher Nolan owes a lot to the things that have formed his reputation in Hollywood- he's now known as the mind-bender, with Memento and Inception becoming cult-classics, and he's known as the comic-book movie king with The Dark Knight- likewise becoming a cult- classic- but is there another distinction that will possibly define him further? For Your Consideration, we present Christopher Nolan: Master of the Supporting Actor.
Heath Ledger's legendary turn in The Dark Knight contributed greatly (ha! Understatement.) to the overall success of the movie. Buzz from his death added to a projected marketing budget already at $180 million and the movie skyrocketed in success, both critically and commercially. It took in a total haul of over $533 million, making it, at the time, one of the highest grossing movies of all time. Ledger's performance became more and more noted, cast members including Christian Bale and Maggie Gyllenhaal predicting an Oscar nomination for the actor. He went on to win nearly every award in that year's circuit, the second actor to win an Academy Award posthumously. His performance went hand-in-hand with Christopher Nolan's acclaimed directing in what became known to fanboys across the earth as the best superhero movie of all time, featuring arguably (the smallest room possible for such an argument) the greatest performance in a comic book film ever, and one of the greatest supporting performances of all time.
That's when you have to think back.
Do you really remember Heath Ledger? Patrick from 10 Things I Hate About You? He was decent in A Knight's Tale but he didn't really establish himself as a notable actor until Brokeback Mountain. What I'm trying to say is that until Christopher Nolan and co. got to Ledger, he was known as a pretty-boy actor with a few great roles. When we learned of how he became to be the Joker, we admired his dedication. He spent hours in a dark room just practicing voices, and played with the character by himself. The performance that eventually went on to become The Dark Knight's Joker was all Ledger's. But who created this interpretation of the character? Nolan.
And this is the point of my article. Can Christopher Nolan do for Tom Hardy what he did for Heath Ledger? Looking at Ledger's incredible performance, you'd say it's impossible. It is impossible. But remember that before Nolan came to Ledger, he had pretty much the same record that Hardy has now. The biggest roles he's had have been in Inception and Warrior, the first in which he played a charismatic, easygoing character, and the latter which affirmed his ability for mainstream acting. Besides an Academy Award nomination being the difference, at this point he's done pretty much the same things Ledger has done. Up until now, the lack of Joker has been mourned among fans everywhere. But then the trailer came out.
I know, I know. We all hate the indistinguishable voice. He's like Hulk with cotton in his mouth. But besides that, look at the transformation. The amount of sheer dedication to the character is what makes Ledger and Hardy similar in this way. Could you really picture Inception Eames as the hulking, masterminded Bane? Oh, I know, you're probably still on the voice. They fixed that with the ease of magical movie editing, but you have to remember, we weren't too pleased with the original promotional pictures that came out, remember?
What we can fairly conclude from this is that Warner Bros. sucks at marketing.
But then the full trailer (followed, of course, by the movie) came out and we got a full realization of the transformation Joker underwent. In the original Batman comics, Joker was, at best, a scary clown (remember the lips? Creepy). He was a narcissist, driven by his own genius, trying to see just how much evil he could accomplished with his own massive intelligence.
And that shows you just how much Nolan can change a character. He turned Joker into this warped, psychopathic criminal mastermind. Of course, Joker was already like this, but his motives changed. He didn't just want to test the limits of genius (in fact, he didn't act very arrogant at all). He wanted to see how far he could push people (Batman! His favorite play toy), to see if he could test and corrupt their humanity, show that people aren't as good as they are (to make them as screwed up as he is? We never did get a Joker origin story ((perhaps that's scarier?))) We saw in the scene where the passengers were on one ship and where the criminals were on the other. Joker wanted to see who would blow up the other first, to get the people to see how bad they really were on the inside. This is real motive. Not comic-bookish. If Nolan could do such things with his characters, who's to say he can't do it with his actors?
Think about the Bane in the comics. He's considered the characteristic opposite of Batman. Bane was born into prison, Bruce Wayne born into higher society; Bane choose bad, Batman chose good. Bane is supposed to be this criminal mastermind in the comics, but after a while, his intellect is played down. They took so much advantage of his brute strength, he infamously became "The Man Who Broke the Bat." This is where I have trust in Nolan: if he treat's Bane's character like Joker's, he'll twist his mythology in a way that can give Hardy the kind of material Ledger had to work with- becoming a great, transformed villain. The same element that Ledger added to The Dark Knight just may be the same Hardy adds to Rises. He has the opportunity to turn Bane into the kind of a tortured, frightening villain we've been dreaming of. To increase your hopes, we looks to Nolan's trademark storytelling ability- his supporting characters are so prominent in his stories that it's why I argue he has a flare for creating them.
Of course, there's an obstacle standing in the way: Bane's lack of color. Of course, to construe that the there is a deficiency in this is ignorant, so perhaps it would more accurate to say It lacks Joker's color. To be fair, the Joker character gave Ledger more to work with; psychopaths give the most room for character, Joker the most psychopathic psychopath in comic book history. So what exactly is there that Nolan could do to add the needed layers to Bane's character?
Well, first off, he needs to pull a strategy that counter-programs Joker. The first thing we think of? Vulnerability. Ledger's Joker is unhinged, deranged, and never shows weakness. Bane is probably the last Batman villain you'd expect to see vulnerable which is why it works. From an acting perspective, showing Bane as human or morally conflicted will provide a suitable outlet for Hardy. The other option is taking a complete 180-turn on the aforementioned- show Bane as angry. Joker's never seen as angry, which made him scarier. I don't mean make Bane in a typical, villainous, retribution-filled anger, but again, a human anger. Nolan's best trait is infusing humanity into all his stories, so this would be another great route. In the stories, Bane becomes increasingly obsessed with Batman (like, different than the creepy Joker obsessed…). Perhaps that's what could drive him to insanity. My last prediction is sociopathic. This is the route Nolan is most likely to go with, from what we've seen in the trailers so far. Brilliant people have a tendency to be unfeeling, according to one out of every five Hollywood movies.
Mostly this article serves as a plea not to worry. Because "In Nolan We Trust," we believe any character he creates to be amazing, whether it be obsessive magician or a psychopathic clown. The rest is up to Hardy- he can't top Ledger's performance- but can he challenge it?
