Zimmer explains that each of the characters were so distinct, clearly defined and powerful that each could have musical identities that were very separate. In fact, the collaborators often split the work — Newton tackled the music for Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart, while Zimmer created the Joker’s theme.

“I kept churning around…how do you describe anarchy, how do you describe a villian and not do it in a way that’s been done before? One of the things I got very much from the character was a fearlessness, and an evenness in a way. The Joker is the only person you can trust in the movie. The Joker is the only one who will never lie to you because he is consistent about his philosophy,” said Zimmer.

“I really wanted to do the whole thing just with one note. I had this idea that rather than what a note is in the context of the notes surrounding it, what could I do emotionally through a performance within one note? How much can I stretch the meaning of a single note and get it down to such minimalism. I failed slightly. I had to use two notes in the end.”

Thanks Rachel!

Time to get some real voices on the sequel to The Dark Knight; Alan Horn, president of Warner Bros. has recently spoken with Collider:

We’ve been talking to Chris Nolan and what we have to do is get him in the right place and have him tell us what he thinks the notion might be for a great story, but Chris did a great job and we’d love to have him come back and do another one.”

As far as the timing of the project, he went onto say: “The story is everything and we are very respectful of Chris. We have a wonderful relationship with him and we are going to be respectful of his timing and we want to get it right. Also, I think the fans expect that – they want us to make a terrific movie – we have to give them another great movie.”

Nolan says he is jotting notes and doing some rough outlines for a third story, but he hasn’t yet found anything he’s willing to commit to film, despite Warner Bros.’ eagerness to get a new film underway.

“It was obvious when the box office was so big ($530 million domestically) that we had underestimated how ready fans were to reboot the franchise,” he says. “The worst thing you could do now that you’ve gotten the plane back in the air is mess up the landing.”

[Talking about sequels and a third movie] “I don’t know why they’re hard to do,” Nolan says. “Maybe there’s so much expectation to them. But I wouldn’t want to do one if it weren’t going to be as good as the first or second. That’s not respectful to the fans.“

Nolan also points out his reasons for not putting outtakes or deleted scenes on the DVD — not a single extra scene involving The Joker:

Nolan says he wasn’t keeping deleted scenes from fans. “For my past three films, I really haven’t had scenes that didn’t make it in the movie,” he says. “If it’s in the final script, I tend put it on screen.”

Any outtakes, however, were intentionally left off the DVD. “I don’t like outtakes or gag reels,” Nolan says. “I don’t think it’s respectful to the actors, who signed on to have their performance on screen, not the takes that didn’t work out. It discourages actors from going all-out if they think every mistake is going on the disc.”

Nolan: I don’t think our Batman, our Gotham, lends itself to that kind of cross-fertilization. It goes back to one of the first things we wrangled with when we first started putting the story together: Is this a world in which comic books already exist? Is this a world in which superheroes already exist? If you think of “Batman Begins” and you think of the philosophy of this character trying to reinvent himself as a symbol, we took the position — we didn’t address it directly in the film, but we did take the position philosophically — that superheroes simply don’t exist. If they did, if Bruce knew of Superman or even of comic books, then that’s a completely different decision that he’s making when he puts on a costume in an attempt to become a symbol. It’s a paradox and a conundrum, but what we did is go back to the very original concept and idea of the character. In his first appearances, he invents himself as a totally original creation.

GB: That doesn’t lend itselt to having him swing on a rope across the Metropolis skyline.

Nolan: No, correct, it’s a different universe. It’s a different way of looking at it. Now, it’s been done successfully, very successfully, in the comics so I don’t dispute it as an approach. It just isn’t the approach we took. We had to make a decision for “Batman Begins.”

GB: A different path…

Nolan: Yes, completely different. It would have given a very, very different meaning to what Bruce Wayne was leaving home to do and coming back home to do and putting on the costume for and all the rest. We dealt with on its own terms: What does Batman mean to Bruce Wayne, what is he trying to achieve? He has not been influenced by other superheroes. Of course, you see what we’re able to do with Joker in this film is that he is able to be quite theatrical because we set up Batman as an example of intense theatricality in Gotham. It starts to grow outward from Batman. But the premise we began with is that Batman was creating a wholly original thing. To be honest, we went even further than the comics on this point. I can’t remember at what point in the comics history the idea came about that he was a fan of Zorro as a kid. I haven’t researched that, but I don’t believe it goes back terribly far.”

The interview continues by discussing Nolan’s next project, his time off and the upcoming Academy Awards:

GB: You’ve said you aren’t sure what you next project will be. But clearly Warner Bros. looks at Batman as a core part of their movie business, perhaps now more than ever, and there are marketplace pressures on them to schedule the next installment of the franchise. Are you getting a lot of pressure to make a decision?

Nolan: They’re being extremely gracious. I have a very good relationship with the studio. They know that I really needed to go on holiday and take some time to figure what I want to do next. They’ve been very respectful of that, which is terrific and one of the reasons I enjoy working with Warner Bros.

GB: The nominations for the 81st Academy Awards will be announced in January. How meaningful would it be for the cast and crew of “The Dark Knight” if the late Heath Ledger is nominated for best supporting actor?

Nolan: I think the thing that has always been important to me in light of Heath’s death is the responsibility I’ve felt to his work. The responsibility of crafting the film in such a way that his performance came across the way he intended. Clearly, that has been the case. That’s one of the reasons I take such pride in the film.

I felt a great wave of relief, really, as people first started to see the performance and it was clear that they were getting the performance. It’s easy to forget with everything that’s happened what an enormous challenge it was for Heath to take on this iconic role. He rose to that challenge so admirably that any expression of people being excited or moved by his performance is a wonderful thing. Whatever form that takes. People coming to see his performance and getting it. It’s been extremely satisfying for all of us already. Anything that adds to that would be wonderful.

In other news,

Below is a 17 video playlist of television features, video interviews and candid shots of the Batmobile, cast and crew. YouTube is playing silly buggers and not letting me edit this playlist so the order of the videos may not be too great for the moment. Enjoy.

Images from outside by Samuel Judge:

Images from inside by Ben30:

I also forgot to mention some of their other exclusive featurettes which are available in standard and high definition. I’ve included links to the high definition versions for ease, streaming was being a bit slow for me earlier.

Filming in Chicago

High Definition

Batman Unmasked

High Definition

Many thanks to the YouTube user falconunderground that has been staying on top of these as best possible.

There are also some candid shots of his Today Show appearance, standing next to the Bat pod and some extra snippets of Bale being interviewed at the premier. The 3 videos are embedded in a playlist below:

Thanks Rockers94 (video mirror)

For a much better and more interesting interview, I advise you watch these next clips from “The View” with Whoopi Goldberg:

More terrible television clips after the break… this time featuring Keith Ledger!