Robert Pattinson previews The Batman: “It’s a sad movie”

Hollywood is about to unleash a new Batman on the world: this time he’s played by Robert Pattinson, once a Twilight heartthrob turned indie darling turned blockbuster star.

But is this newest take on the Caped Crusader the beginning of a chapter for the actor or a one-off thing? “It all depends,” the actor told GQ in a lengthy interview. “If people like the movie, it’s great. All of it…You never really know until it happens.”

Pattinson seems very committed to the role, at least (and committed to the bizarre photoshoot he did for GQ; I’d describe it but it’s the kind of thing you should really see for yourself). “He doesn’t have a playboy persona at all, so he’s kind of a weirdo as Bruce and a weirdo as Batman, and I kept thinking there’s a more nihilistic slant to it,” Pattinson said of his take on the character. “Cause, normally, in all the other movies, Bruce goes away, trains, and returns to Gotham believing in himself, thinking, I’m gonna change things here. But in this, it’s sort of implied that he’s had a bit of a breakdown.”

"But this thing he’s doing, it’s not even working. Like, it’s two years into it, and the crime has gotten worse since Bruce started being Batman. The people of Gotham think that he’s just another symptom of how shit everything is. There’s this scene where he’s beating everyone up on this train platform, and I just love that there’s a bit in the script where the guy he’s saving is also just like: Ahh! It’s worse! You’re either being mugged by some gang members, or a monster comes and, like, fucking beats everybody up! The guy has no idea that Batman’s come to save him. It just looks like this werewolf."

We can see some of that rage-filled Batman in the trailers:

The Batman has an “emo” feel to it

“And I kept trying to play into that, I kept trying to think, and I’m going to express this so badly, but there’s this thing with addressing trauma,” Pattinson continued. “All the other stories say the death of his parents is why Bruce becomes Batman, but I was trying to break that down in what I thought was a real way, instead of trying to rationalize it. He’s created this intricate construction for years and years and years, which has culminated in this Batman persona. But it’s not like a healthy thing that he’s done…[It’s] almost like a drug addiction.”

There’s a moment he thinks is telling: when Alfred (played by Andy “Gollum” Serkis) asks Bruce what his parents would think of what he’s doing. “And Bruce says: ‘This is my family legacy. If I don’t do this, then there’s nothing else for me.’ I always read that as not like, ‘There’s nothing else,’ like, ‘I don’t have a purpose.’ But like: ‘I’m checking out.’ And I think that makes it a lot sadder. Like, it’s a sad movie. It’s kind of about him trying to find some element of hope, in himself, and not just the city. Normally, Bruce never questions his own ability; he questions the city’s ability to change. But I mean, it’s kind of such an insane thing to do: The only way I can live is to dress up as a bat.”

"DC is the kind of emo comic. There’s a nihilistic side to it. Even the artwork is really, really different. So, hopefully, there are a lot of sad people in the world."

I mean, the movie definitely has my attention. And according to Pattinson, it earns it. “I watched a rough cut of the movie by myself,” he said. “And the first shot is so jarring from any other Batman movie that it’s just kind of a totally different pace. It was what [director Matt Reeves] was saying from the first meeting I had with him: ‘I want to do a ’70s noir detective story, like The Conversation.’ And I kind of assumed that meant the mood board or something, the look of it. But from the first shot, it’s, Oh, this actually is a detective story.”

"And I feel like an idiot, because I didn’t even know that Batman was ‘the world’s greatest detective’; I hadn’t heard that in my life before—but it really plays. Just ’cause there’s a lot of stuff where he’s in amongst the cops. Normally, when you see Batman he arrives and beats people up. But he’s having conversations, and there are emotional scenes between them, which I don’t think have been in any of the other movies."

At this point there have been so many other Bat-movies and Bat-shows that I find it hard to believe that The Batman is doing something no one has done before, but I appreciate the passion I’m getting from Pattinson and company.

The Batman releases in theaters on March 4.

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