The New Batman Film 'The Dark Knight Rises' Begins Shooting, Promises Even More IMAX
by Scott Nye
The Dark Knight Rises"" src="//cfm.yidio.com/images/article/images/bane-the-dark-knight-rises.jpg" style="margin: 5px 10px; float: left; width: 300px; height: 425px;" />Warner Brothers today issued a standard press release announcing the start of filming for a new feature film, finalizing all of the principle talent, both in front of the camera and behind it, and vaguely mentioned some shooting locations.
But this isn't just any Warner Brothers movie - this is "The Dark Knight Rises," the third film in Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy, and more importantly, the follow-up to the record-breaking smash hit, "The Dark Knight." And while we knew most of the information announced, including who everyone's playing (don't worry, Joseph Gordon-Levitt is playing John Blake, not that anyone has ever heard of him; hope that was worth the months of speculation).
There was one detail buried in there that had not yet been confirmed:
"In helming 'The Dark Knight Rises,' Christopher Nolan is utilizing IMAX cameras even more extensively than he did on 'The Dark Knight,' which had marked the first time ever that a major feature film was partially shot with IMAX cameras. The results were so spectacular that the director wanted to expand the use of the large-format cameras for this film."
If you were lucky enough to see those parts of "The Dark Knight" on a true IMAX screen, you'll know this is good news indeed.
As wonderful as 3D can sometimes (sometimes) be, Nolan's work with the IMAX really returned the spectacle to the big screen in a very unique way. I, and many others, had hoped it would usher in a new era of IMAX use in narrative features, but to date I can only recall "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" taking it up to...not terribly great effect. The IMAX shots were pretty stunning, don't get me wrong, but they were very haphazardly inserted. Like everything else in "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen."
I'm not always onboard with Nolan, but I like that he's following his own muse when it comes to the visual aspect of his films (I'm sure Warner brass would have been very pleased if he wanted to shoot in 3D), and am very excited to see the results. He's certainly set the bar high enough.