The Dark Knight is probably one of the best Batman movies to ever be created. Winning the hearts of fans from all around the world, Christopher Nolan made another masterpiece that holds the title of the go-to action movie for several fans even years after its airing. But while the movie was widely acclaimed globally, there was one place that didn’t find the movie to be a masterpiece after all.
There is a city that holds the same name as the Caped Crusader and the mayor of the city filed a lawsuit against Nolan for using the city’s name without permission along with blaming him for the increased murders in the city.
Batman City Mayor Sued Christopher Nolan Following The Dark Knight (2008)
Back in 2008 in Turkey, when The Dark Knight was newly released and gaining success, an oil-producing city in the southeast part of the country filed a lawsuit against the legendary filmmaker Christopher Nolan and Warner Bros. just because the city held the same name as the Caped Crusader. The pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party mayor of Batman, Huseyin Kalkan accused the director and company of using the city’s name without permission. He said,
“There is only one Batman in the world. The American producers used the name of our city without informing us.”
He further went on to claim ludicrously that for the several unsolved murders and the high female suicide rate in Batman City, Nolan is to blame, because all the murders and suicides that took place are only due to the psychological impact on the city’s inhabitants inflicted from the film’s success. Reports also claimed that the former natives of the city, too, face countless obstacles while trying to get their businesses registered abroad.
While all this interest of the city in the name shared with the protagonist of The Dark Knight has caught fans off-guard, another question about why it took so long for the city to take legal action arises, for the first-ever use of the name was done back in 1939, in the Batman comics.
The Dark Knight Was A Huge Success At The Box Office As It Broke Multiple Records
Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight was not just famous among the inhabitants of Batman but was also a huge success on the big screens in theatres as well. Made on a budget of approximately $185 million, the Christian Bale starrer movie didn’t take long to cross $1 billion in revenue at the box office.
Not just stopping there, the movie also went ahead to break multiple box office records as well, including becoming the highest-grossing film of the year 2008, the fourth highest-grossing film of its time, along with the highest-grossing superhero film until 2008. Apart from this, it also remains one of the best movies by Nolan to date.
Looking at the immense success of the movie, some might even say that the fact that The Dark Knight nearly crossed the $1 billion mark at the box office just might’ve played a major part in stirring the rage of the city’s inhabitants, especially the mayor, who went ahead to file a ludicrous lawsuit against the director and the company.
You can stream The Dark Knight on HBO Max.
Source: Variety
