This year’s Oppenheimer star Cillian Murphy, in a conversation with Vulture in 2016, shared his thoughts on Christopher Nolan’s $2.4 billion The Dark Knight franchise and how it was peak cinema when he looked at the comic book adaptations that made big money.
Murphy, who played Scarecrow in the trilogy, felt that Nolan intricately planned the films and that they did not rely on superpowers at all. He noted that those films were very relatable for the general audience.
Marvel Studios, with 2008’s Iron Man, launched a thoroughly connected universe that has introduced certain characters that were earlier not known. Weighing in on that, Murphy felt that filmmakers are probably running out of “caped crusader stories” to tell.
Cillian Murphy Hailed The Dark Knight trilogy
Murphy, as Vulture noted, was accompanied by actor Jamie Dornan (Fifty Shades of Grey) who appeared in the 2016 war film Anthropoid alongside him. The actor, sitting in his comfy chair, elaborated on how The Dark Knight trilogy set the bar high.
He remarked that the films were very grounded in the sense that no character was found to be doing some sort of “magical” thing to stand out.
“It was a different time back when we made Batman Begins,” Murphy told Vulture. “I think that Chris [Nolan] has to take credit for making that trilogy of films. I think they’re so grounded in a relatable reality. Nobody in those films ever had a superpower. Do you know what I mean? It’s a slightly heightened level of storytelling, where New York is Gotham, and no one did anything magical.”
He continued that his kids are fond of Marvel films but he found Christian Bale’s Batman more enjoyable to watch as he “just did a lot of pushups and was, like, British.”
Cillian Murphy On Modern Superhero Cinema
While it’s a known fact that superhero films today rely heavily on special effects to make the adventures even grander, this wasn’t what bothered Cillian Murphy. The modern comic-book adaptations, according to him, have been exhausting comic books in a way that the franchises are filled with characters he had no idea about.
“Have they exhausted every single comic book ever? I don’t know where they’re coming from anymore,” (via Vulture.)
We’re not sure if Murphy had a bias for one particular type of storytelling, but his career got a major boost during and after Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight trilogy.
Anthropoid is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Source: Vulture
