‘The Dark Knight Rises’ scene that Marion Cotillard hated
Superhero movies get a pretty tough ride in contemporary cinema, with films from Marvel and DC being some of the highest-grossing releases of the century, even if they lack proper critical respect. Sure, such movies as Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok and Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther received love at the time, but neither has been remembered with the same cinematic verve as the Christopher Nolan Batman movie The Dark Knight.
Released in 2008, the very same year Marvel kicked off its cinematic universe in style with Iron Man, The Dark Knight was a revolutionary superhero movie that took the genre to new heights of respect. Starring Christian Bale as the titular gothic hero and the late Heath Ledger as his manic counterpart, Joker, the film tells the story of the villain’s rise to criminal power and the individuals he manipulates to get to the top.
Four years later, The Dark Knight Rises followed, a film that was supposed to end Nolan’s superhero trilogy in true style, bringing Tom Hardy onboard as the sinister villain Bane as well as Marion Cotillard’s Talia al Ghul. Sadly, the 2012 movie was never respected in the same light as The Dark Knight, failing largely due to a number of questionable narrative decisions and a handful of weird scenes.
One such scene was the death of Talia al Ghul, which was long-criticised by fans due to its anti-climatic nature, with many pointing to Cotillard’s over-acted performance as the reason the moment fails.
Well, it turned out that fans weren’t alone in this, with Cotillard herself coming out in an interview with the French publication Allociné in criticism of the particular take that was chosen for the scene.
“We’re all in the same boat, and if sometimes it gets out of control, then everyone is involved,” the Oscar-winning actor started, “Sometimes there are failures, and when you see this on screen, you’re thinking: ‘Why? Why did they keep that take?’ But either you blame everyone or nobody. But I thought people overreacted, because it was tough to be identified just with this scene. When I’m doing the best I can to find the authenticity in every character that I’m playing, it’s tough to be known just for this scene”.
Continuing, she added: “Yes, it’s important to know how to laugh about this, and also, there are worse things in life… Even if there are things that can hurt you. But I wasn’t really affected by this. I just thought the reaction was disproportionate, and it helps to laugh about it”.
Clearly taking the mistake in her stride, Cotillard doesn’t blame Nolan and his team for choosing the cut, even if fans of superhero cinema across the globe do.
Despite critical indifference, the film still made good money at the box office, earning Warner Bros $1.081billion from a budget of $250–300million. Nolan doesn’t seem too keen on returning to the series, however, with the director rejecting the idea of taking on another superhero project during a press conference for his 2023 biopic Oppenheimer, which stars Cillian Murphy as the father of the atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer.
