Before he would attract Hollywood’s attention with "Sin City" and "300" —both graphic novels adapted into feature films, the former seeing a sequel released this year ("Sin City: A Dame To Kill For" opens on Friday)— Frank Miller had spent 20 years as a blue-chip comic book creator. Given the keys to the Batman franchise in the ’80s, Miller’s "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns" and "Batman: Year One" were widely believed to have reinvented the character, with those works undoubtedly serving as the template for Christopher Nolan‘s take on the comic hero. (Darren Aronofsky tried to make ‘Year One’ before "Batman Begins" but couldn’t get it moving, and in 2011 an animated version of the graphic novel was released on home video). And speaking recently with Playboy, Miller revealed his inspiration for making Bruce Wayne older, more grizzled and more vengeful.
"Well, you do get crabbier as you get older. [laughs] Also, I never believed that a guy who tortured people and dressed like Dracula was the most pleasant person to have over for dinner," Miller said. However, when it comes to Batman films, the comic writer can’t bring himself to sit through them.
"When people come out with movies about characters I’ve worked on, I always hate them. I have my own ideas about what the characters are like. I mean, I can’t watch a Batman movie. I’ve seen pieces of them, but I generally think, No, that’s not him. And I walk out of the theater before it’s over. It includes all of them," Miller said, referring to "Daredevil" and "Elektra" as well. "I’m not condemning what [Christopher Nolan] does. I don’t even understand it, except that he seems to think he owns the title ‘Dark Knight.’ [laughs] He’s about 20 years too late for that. It’s been used."
Sour grapes? Not quite, but we do suppose if you’ve been that close to a character, you might not want to see what Hollywood has done with it. But at any rate, we’ll certainly be curious to see what Miller thinks about Ben Affleck‘s take in a couple of years. In the meantime, check out this awesome gallery of behind-the-scene and regular photos you may not have seen from Nolan’s "The Dark Knight."
Miller sounds like a total douche. He needs to get over himself. Look at Stan Lee everyone loves him because he embraces the film's and his fans. Frank Miller directed The Spirit which was a piece of shit. His comic book writing is good for Batman, but he seriously needs an attitude check.
Miller needs to get over himself. His film credentials are directing the Sin City movies and producing the 300 movies. Not a fan of any of those…just a bunch of fluff. Nolan did a fine job with his movies and he was pulling from various sources….Miller didn't invent Batman. Frankly, too much of Miller's material and characters feels redundant.
Frank Miller isn't a good writer either. The Dark Knight Returns goes completely off the rails in the second half and his Daredevil run also doesn't deserve a modicum of the praise it receives. If it wasn't for Year One he could be written off completely.
Maybe that's why Frank Miller is a horrible filmmaker. We haven't gotten any reviews from Sin City 2 because it's going to be awful.
It's like what Ken Kesey said about the adaptation of "Cuckoo's Nest": "If a bunch of Hell's Angels come over to your house and say, 'We've got your daughter on the front lawn. You want to come watch us rape her?' Are you gonna go?"
Love Nolan's trilogy as well. but I was really hoping he would take on the Riddler before bowing out. Who could make a more sophisticated Riddler than the Nolans?
Frank Miller is probably upset Nolan didn't put in a lot of rape & had Batman walking around beating up women & minorities for the hell of it. Miller hasn't just gotten older & crabbier, he's also gotten racist(ier) & woman hate(ier).
Nolan's trilogy is engrossing the first viewing but it's very simplistic at its core. But of course Nolan's films only really work under cloak and dagger mysticism, once you strip away the varnish you realize you've just been suckered into a magic trick of empty content; aka The Dark Knight. If you compare TDK to DKR it's the same picture but without the pizazz of a bad guy to carry the picture, therefore your left focusing on the plot holes, the disregard of actual real time. Better yet you can accept a completely unrealistic hospital being blown up because of Ledgers Joker, but it's harder to accept Gothams plight with unrealistic street scenes in DKR. Miller is correct in Nolan's use of the title, it's absurd and shows how few people truly enjoy the character and not just its studio blockbuster byproduct. Creatively, Miller does own the character, given every interpretation since Returns has been an offtake of the grizzled fractured psyche version of Bruce Wayne.
UH… have you seen Frank Miller's IMDB page?
[on Batman Begins (2005)] "I totally thought they did a damned good job. It was the first "Batman' movie I've genuinely liked. I sat there, I watched it, and I came out of there going, 'Well done, man.' Sure, they used my stuff – they used everybody's stuff, but they used my stuff a lot – but they did it well, and that's all I care about. It was Batman. What I mean by that is, I thought the character was true. You understand, when I work on a character, I have a very, very hard time seeing anybody else's interpretation. I get very possessive. But when I went out to see this thing, I said, 'This is a pretty cool Batman.' I wasn't sitting there going, 'This is a merchandising tool.' I felt like it really had heart and substance, and Christian Bale with no doubt performed the best Batman I have ever seen".
I'm a huge fan of Nolan's 'Batman Trilogy', it's a brilliant vision of all the character's set in 'our' real world, but I am so sick and tired of Frank Miller acting like he owns the character. To me 'Year One' was excellent, but 'The Dark Knight Returns' stank to high heaven, it was god awful, and so political of the time. Miller should get a life and stop acting like he is the be all and end all of the character. He should read some of the brilliant work that is being done now at DC with all the characters to do with the franchise. Meanwhile, at the moment I reserve judgement on Zak Snyder's vision until I see it.
I'm a massive fan of Nolan's trilogy, but I wish they'd leave the character alone cinematically for many years, if not for good. How many Batman interpretations are even that interesting in comic form to begin with? I know there's money to be made, so nothing stops the nerd train.