100 Fun Facts About The Dark Knight

Which actor plays Bruce Wayne and Batman in The Dark Knight?

Christian Bale overheard the stunt team planning a shot of Batman on the edge of a skyscraper roof and insisted on doing it himself, so that really is him up there.

Heath Ledger's Joker followed which actor's Joker from Tim Burton's 1989 film Batman?

Jack Nicholson. To find a version of his own, Ledger shut himself in a London hotel room for about a month, keeping a diary and experimenting with voices.

The Dark Knight is the sequel to which 2005 film?

Batman Begins ends on a tease, with a police ally telling Batman about a new criminal who leaves joker playing cards behind, yet its director had not planned to make a sequel.

Which real city stood in for most of Gotham City in The Dark Knight?

Chicago. The director, who partly grew up there, liked that its skyscrapers and underground streets were striking yet less instantly recognisable than New York's.

Which actor plays Harvey Dent, later Two-Face, in The Dark Knight?

Aaron Eckhart said he kept thinking about the Kennedys, and he and the director settled on a half-burned suit in place of the pink-haired Two-Face of Batman Forever.

Who plays Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce Wayne's butler, in The Dark Knight?

Michael Caine said that when he first saw Heath Ledger's Joker, on a video in a scene with Batman, it was so stunning that he completely forgot his lines.

Which actress replaced Katie Holmes as Rachel Dawes in The Dark Knight?

Maggie Gyllenhaal stepped in because Holmes turned the sequel down to star in the crime comedy Mad Money instead.

Who plays Wayne Enterprises chief Lucius Fox in The Dark Knight?

Morgan Freeman's Fox agrees to run Batman's city-wide spying machine just once, says he will resign if it outlives the job, and ends the film destroying it.

Which actor plays police lieutenant Jim Gordon in The Dark Knight?

Gary Oldman's Gordon is shot at a memorial and believed dead, then turns up alive at the wheel of a police van to arrest the Joker, and is promoted to commissioner.

Which mob accountant moves the gangs' money overseas and flees Gotham in The Dark Knight?

Lau believes his home city puts him beyond extradition, so Batman flies out, snatches him from his own office tower and leaves him for the Gotham police.

Which kind of building does The Dark Knight's Joker publicly threaten, then blow up?

A hospital: the blast is real, staged at a candy factory that had stood abandoned for years.

In The Dark Knight's climax, the Joker rigs two of what with explosives, giving each the other's detonator?

Ferries: one carries ordinary citizens and the other prisoners, and to the Joker's disbelief neither boatload will blow up the other to save itself.

In The Dark Knight, what does Wayne Enterprises consultant Coleman Reese threaten to reveal on live television?

The vigilante's real name: Reese first tries blackmail, and Lucius Fox asks if his plan is really to extort a billionaire who spends his nights beating criminals to a pulp, then says, 'Good luck.'

What does Alfred destroy in the closing moments of The Dark Knight?

A letter from Rachel: written before she died, it says she chose to marry Harvey Dent, and Alfred destroys it so that Bruce never learns she would not have waited for him.

In The Dark Knight, how does Two-Face decide the fate of the people he confronts?

Flipping a coin: his lucky coin has two heads, so at first he cannot lose, but the night he is burned leaves one side scarred and turns every toss into a real gamble.

Whom is Harvey Dent holding at gunpoint when Batman tackles him off a building in The Dark Knight?

Gordon's son: Dent blames Gordon for the death of the woman he loved and wants him to feel the same loss, and the fall that saves the boy kills Dent.

In The Dark Knight, what does Alfred say some men just want to do?

'Watch the world burn': Alfred is recalling a bandit in Burma who stole jewels only to throw them away, and he later admits they caught the man by burning the forest down.

In The Dark Knight, Harvey Dent says you either die a hero or live long enough to become what?

The villain: Batman quotes the line back at the end, when he takes the blame for Dent's killings and lets Gotham hunt him so that its fallen hero stays a hero.

In The Dark Knight, what does the Joker make 'disappear' in his magic trick at the mob meeting?

A pencil: he stands it point-up on the table, slams a mobster's henchman face-first onto it and announces, 'Ta-da! It's gone.'

In The Dark Knight, the Joker first blames his scars on his father; whom does his second story involve?

His wife: he tells a guest at a fundraiser he cut his own smile so that his scarred wife would not feel alone, and that she then left him; the film never settles which story, if either, is true.

In The Dark Knight's opening bank heist, what kind of vehicle does the Joker drive away in?

A school bus: he pulls out of the bank and slots into a convoy of identical buses just as the police arrive.

Which Gotham crime boss does Eric Roberts play in The Dark Knight?

Sal Maroni, Falcone's successor: Batman drops him off a fire escape, injuring his legs, and still learns nothing, because no one will cross a man with no rules.

Cillian Murphy returns briefly in The Dark Knight as which old Batman foe?

Scarecrow: Batman rounds him up in a parking garage, along with a gang of gun-toting Batman impersonators who have crashed his drug deal.

Which long-serving US senator and Batman fan faces the Joker in a Dark Knight cameo?

Patrick Leahy plays the party guest who tells the Joker 'We're not intimidated by thugs' and gets a knife held to his face; he said the fear took no acting.

In The Dark Knight, what does Batman turn into a city-wide sonar network to find the Joker?

Mobile phones: every handset in Gotham becomes a microphone that maps its surroundings, and the machine leads Batman to the Joker and is destroyed once the job is done.

The Dark Knight was the first major feature film to shoot scenes with which camera format?

IMAX: the bulky cameras and their film cost roughly four times as much as ordinary 35 mm, so the director had to talk the studio into something that had never been done.

In The Dark Knight, how does Batman leave an overseas skyscraper with his prisoner?

Hooked to a passing plane: a balloon carries a line up for a low-flying cargo aircraft to snag, the real 'Skyhook' system the CIA and US military used to lift people off the ground.

In The Dark Knight, what kind of vehicle did the crew somersault for real instead of using CGI?

An 18-wheel truck: it is the Joker's rig, which Batman upends in the film's big street chase, and the crew really sent one end over end in a city's financial district.

What is Batman's motorbike-like vehicle called in The Dark Knight?

Batpod: it has no handlebars and is steered with the shoulders, and only one stunt rider, Jean-Pierre Goy, could stay on it, after unlearning how to ride a normal motorbike.

In The Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne sails off on his yacht with the entire company of what?

A Russian ballet: Harvey Dent and his date arrive at the theatre to find the performance cancelled, because Bruce has taken the whole company on a cruise, which he then leaves by seaplane.

Which painter's distorted portraits shaped the Joker's smeared makeup in The Dark Knight?

Francis Bacon: the director kept referring to one of his paintings during makeup tests, and said the painter's influence brought corruption and decay to the texture of the Joker's face.

Which 1990s comic series, about Batman's pact with a prosecutor and a policeman, shaped The Dark Knight's story?

The Long Halloween sets the same three men against Gotham's crime families, and it ends the same way, with the district attorney scarred into Two-Face.

Which 1995 crime film did Christopher Nolan name as an inspiration for The Dark Knight?

Heat: the director said Michael Mann's film inspired him to tell 'the story of a city', which is why Gotham's politicians, police and reporters all get a part.

Which Oscar category was widened from five nominees to ten the year after The Dark Knight missed out?

Best Picture: announcing the change, the Academy's president admitted he 'would not be telling you the truth' if he said the words 'Dark Knight' had not come up.

Besides Heath Ledger's acting award, which other Oscar did The Dark Knight win?

Sound Editing went to Richard King, in the only category where Slumdog Millionaire, that night's eight-Oscar winner, lost to another film.

Who went on stage to accept Heath Ledger's posthumous Oscar for The Dark Knight?

His parents and sister collected it, but under an agreement with the Academy the statuette belongs to his daughter Matilda, then three, who could not take full ownership until she turned 18.

The Dark Knight's $158 million opening weekend broke a record set a year earlier by which film?

Spider-Man 3 had opened to $151.1 million in 2007; forecasters had the Batman sequel falling short of it, and the studio's own head of distribution admitted he had not thought it could come close.

When The Dark Knight left US theaters in 2009, which film alone had earned more there?

Titanic: even after the studio sent the Batman film back into hundreds of theaters for Oscar season, its $533 million stayed well short of the $601 million record.

Which composer shared The Dark Knight's score with Hans Zimmer?

James Newton Howard took Harvey Dent, giving Gotham's shining prosecutor a brass-led Americana theme, and the two men divided the rest of the film between them by character.

The Joker's musical theme in The Dark Knight is named after which of his lines?

'Why So Serious?' twists its notes until they mimic thunder and razors, and Hans Zimmer said he gave the piece a punk attitude.

Which US institution added The Dark Knight to its National Film Registry in 2020?

The Library of Congress names 25 films a year, none less than ten years old, and the film's director called this pick a tribute to the artists and writers behind decades of Batman stories.

Which make of sports car does Bruce Wayne drive, and wreck, in The Dark Knight?

Lamborghini: the model is a Murciélago, the Spanish word for 'bat', and the company lent the production three of them, one of which was wrecked.

Which 2012 film concluded Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy?

The Dark Knight Rises picks the story up eight years on, with Batman still blamed for Harvey Dent's crimes and Bruce Wayne living as a recluse until Bane forces him back.

Where in England did The Dark Knight's crew stage the warehouse blast that kills Rachel Dawes?

Battersea Power Station: the blast lit up the long-empty London landmark, and people nearby rang the emergency services fearing a terrorist attack.

Warner Bros. kept The Dark Knight out of cinemas in which country, citing 'cultural sensitivities'?

China: the studio blamed pre-release conditions and 'cultural sensitivities to some elements of the film', giving up a cinema market that was growing fast.

Which breed of dog does the Chechen keep at his side in The Dark Knight?

Rottweilers: they maul Batman in a parking-garage fight, and when the Joker takes over the gang he proposes feeding the Chechen to them to see 'how loyal a hungry dog really is'.

In The Dark Knight, Batman travels to which city to seize a fugitive mob accountant?

Hong Kong: the mob's banker thinks he is safe from extradition there, but as the Joker warns the bosses, 'Batman has no jurisdiction.'

Which major award did The Dark Knight's score win in 2009 after the Oscars left it out?

A Grammy, for its score album: the Academy had at first ruled the music ineligible for the Oscars because too many composers were credited.

Under what ruse title did The Dark Knight film in Chicago to avoid attention?

The media quickly uncovered the truth; thirteen weeks of filming were estimated to have generated $45 million for the city.

What do the robbers wear in The Dark Knight's opening bank heist?

Clown masks: the gang members pick each other off one by one for a bigger share, until the last man standing takes his mask off and turns out to be the Joker.

What were some cinema staff given to catch anyone secretly recording The Dark Knight?

Night-vision goggles helped staff spot camcorders in the dark, and one person was caught recording the film in Kansas City.

What does the Joker do with his half of the mob's fortune once he collects it in The Dark Knight?

He burns it, dousing the mountain of cash in gasoline and lighting it with a mobster's cigar to show that money was never his aim.

Which sitcom's Halloween episode has three co-workers dressed as Heath Ledger's Joker from The Dark Knight?

The Office put Creed, Dwight and Kevin in the same smeared clown look for a Halloween party, a sign of how fast the costume caught on.

The Dark Knight was the first superhero film to pass which milestone in worldwide ticket sales?

$1 billion fell in February 2009, when an awards-season reissue nudged the film over the line; only three movies had ever reached it before.

In 2011, The Dark Knight became the first major-studio film offered for rental on which social network?

Facebook hosted the rental a few years after the film's disc release, which had set a sales record for the then-new Blu-ray format.

Which part of the Joker's makeup did Heath Ledger always apply himself while filming The Dark Knight?

The lipstick was always Ledger's own job because he felt it was essential to the character; artists did the rest while he scrunched his face to crack the paint.

In The Dark Knight, what trick does the Joker play when telling Batman where Rachel and Dent are?

He swaps the two addresses, so Batman, racing to save Rachel, bursts in on Harvey Dent instead.

What did Heath Ledger compile during weeks alone in a hotel room to prepare for The Dark Knight?

A character diary, filled with photos, news clippings and things the Joker would find funny, stayed with Ledger on set throughout the shoot.

How does Batman leave the Joker for the police after their final fight in The Dark Knight?

Hanging upside down from a grappling line, the Joker is spared a fatal fall because Batman refuses to let him die.

Which other 2008 superhero film did critic Roger Ebert say had, with The Dark Knight, redefined the genre?

Iron Man got the lesser share of Ebert's praise, though it went on to launch the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Which elected post does Harvey Dent hold in Gotham City before he becomes Two-Face in The Dark Knight?

District attorney Dent is so clean that Gotham calls him its white knight, which is exactly why the Joker sets out to corrupt him.

Where does Bruce Wayne live in The Dark Knight, with Wayne Manor burned down in the previous film?

A city penthouse, sparse and modern, was chosen to reflect Wayne's loneliness; his gadgets moved to a hidden bunker on the edge of town.

After the Joker's capture in The Dark Knight, Jim Gordon is promoted from lieutenant to which Gotham post?

Police commissioner was a vacant post because the Joker had already killed its holder, Gillian Loeb, in his campaign to force Batman to unmask.

What does Batman choose to do at the end of The Dark Knight so Gotham keeps its faith in Harvey Dent?

He chooses to take the blame for the killings Dent committed, so the police hunt Batman while the city mourns Dent as a hero.

In The Dark Knight, what does the Joker pose as, without his makeup, to fire on Gotham's mayor?

A police honor guard uniform, worn with a bare face, let him slip into a public memorial as part of an ambush with hidden gunmen.

In The Dark Knight, how does Jim Gordon drop out of sight before reappearing to arrest the Joker?

He fakes his own death, then turns up at the end of the convoy chase to hold a shotgun to the Joker's head.

What does the Joker reveal beneath his coat to keep Gotham's mob bosses at bay in The Dark Knight?

Grenades hidden inside the coat served as his leverage, letting him walk out after offering to kill Batman for a price.

In The Dark Knight's finale, whom has the Joker dressed as his own gunmen to fool the police?

The hostages have empty guns taped to their hands, so Batman must fight the SWAT teams to stop them shooting innocent people.

Who owns the bank that the Joker's gang robs in the opening scene of The Dark Knight?

Gotham's mafia used the bank to launder its money, which is why the robbery makes the Joker impossible for the crime families to ignore.

What is the name of Batman's tank-like Batmobile, damaged by the Joker's rocket in The Dark Knight?

The Tumbler owes its workhorse look to the armoured Batmobile of Frank Miller's 1980s comics rather than to the sleek cars of earlier films.

Which actor's colourful Two-Face in 1995's Batman Forever did The Dark Knight's makers choose to ignore?

Tommy Lee Jones played him with pink hair and a split designer suit; the 2008 film went for a burnt, neutral-toned suit instead.

Which future Oppenheimer co-star was considered for Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight but had scheduling conflicts?

Matt Damon could not fit the shoot into his schedule, and the search went on for an actor with an all-American heroic presence.

Which role does Breakfast Club star Anthony Michael Hall play in The Dark Knight?

A TV news reporter named Mike Engel, he is among the passengers taken hostage when the Joker seizes an evacuation bus.

Which Lost actor plays Anthony Garcia, the mayor of Gotham City, in The Dark Knight?

Néstor Carbonell, Richard Alpert in Lost, returned as the mayor four years later in the trilogy's final film.

Which Prison Break actor plays the corrupt bank manager in the opening heist of The Dark Knight?

William Fichtner, Prison Break's FBI agent Alexander Mahone, appears in the very first scene shot for the film, which took five days to capture.

Which later screen Joker discussed the part with Christopher Nolan for The Dark Knight but said he was not ready?

Joaquin Phoenix said he was not ready for it then; he later won a Best Actor Oscar for the character in the 2019 film Joker.

Which American political dynasty shaped the portrayal of Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight?

The Kennedys, above all Robert F. Kennedy, who fought organised crime with the same idealism, were the model for Dent before his fall.

Which Gotham crime boss, played by Michael Jai White, puts a bounty on the Joker in The Dark Knight?

Gambol was meant to survive and return in later films, Michael Jai White has said, but the finished film kills him off at the Joker's hands.

What colour is the long overcoat that Heath Ledger's Joker wears in The Dark Knight?

Purple, worn over a green vest, keeps the character's comic-book colours, but the clothes were styled after fashion and music celebrities.

Which punk band's Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious did Heath Ledger draw on for the Joker in The Dark Knight?

Sex Pistols attitude ran through the whole look: the costume designer also had Rotten and Vicious in mind for the Joker's dishevelled clothes.

Which comic-book publisher is home to Batman, the hero at the centre of The Dark Knight?

DC Comics introduced Batman in 1939, a creation of writer Bill Finger and artist Bob Kane, in the 27th issue of Detective Comics.

Which 2006 film about rival magicians did The Dark Knight's director make between his first two Batman films?

The Prestige kept the follow-up waiting: studio talks began in 2005, but development only started once that film was finished.

Which 1970s crime classic helped steer the script of The Dark Knight away from a typical superhero film?

The Godfather was one model for the Nolan brothers, whose finished script read more like a crime drama than a comic-book adventure.

Which writer of the Blade trilogy developed the story of The Dark Knight with director Christopher Nolan?

David S. Goyer spent three months with Nolan on the core plot, and had already drawn up an outline for two follow-up films.

Which cinematographer, later an Oscar winner for Inception, shot The Dark Knight for Christopher Nolan?

Wally Pfister blended the rusty tones of the first film with cobalt blues and greens, partly to fix scenes that had come out too dark.

Which silent-era director's master criminal Dr. Mabuse influenced the Joker written for The Dark Knight?

Fritz Lang's crime-lord films were a model for the Nolans, who later noticed their Joker also resembled the character's 1940 comic debut.

Which unexplained movie menace did a story writer of The Dark Knight want the origin-free Joker to resemble?

The Jaws shark arrives with no backstory, and the writers felt origin stories had weakened screen villains such as Hannibal Lecter and Darth Vader.

Which 1988 Alan Moore graphic novel helped give a purpose to the Joker of The Dark Knight?

The Killing Joke casts him as a man out to prove that anyone can become like him if pushed far enough, the idea behind his assault on Harvey Dent.

When Gotham police search the arrested Joker in The Dark Knight, what do they find in his pockets besides lint?

Knives and lint are all he carries: no wallet, no labels in his custom-made clothes, nothing that hints at a name or a past.

Which musical film, opening the same weekend, finished a distant second to The Dark Knight in US cinemas?

Mamma Mia! was seen as counter-programming that would draw women away, yet it opened with less than a fifth of the superhero film's takings.

At which fan convention did marketers for The Dark Knight slip attendees 11,000 dollar bills defaced by the Joker?

San Diego Comic-Con was the stage for the stunt; a plan to shower the notes from a balcony was dropped for safety, so they were handed out quietly.

Which theme-park chain opened The Dark Knight Coaster, an indoor ride, in the film's release year?

Six Flags opened it two months before the film came out, sending riders through a mock Gotham rail station vandalised by the Joker.

Which James Bond film did director Sam Mendes say was influenced by The Dark Knight?

Skyfall owes it a second debt: actress Bérénice Marlohe said Heath Ledger's Joker inspired her performance as Sévérine.

Which 2008 comedy ended The Dark Knight's four-weekend run as the top-earning film in US cinemas?

Tropic Thunder took first place in the superhero film's fifth weekend, by which time it had passed $400 million faster than any film before it.

Before Heath Ledger's win for The Dark Knight, who was the only actor awarded an Oscar after his death?

Peter Finch won for Network two months after his death, and his widow collected the statuette; James Dean and Spencer Tracy had only been nominated.

What did Hans Zimmer use on string instruments to create the Joker's tortured theme in The Dark Knight?

Razor blades on the strings gave a twisted sound to a nine-minute suite built from just two notes.

Which Stanley Kubrick film's gang leader, Alex, did Heath Ledger study for the Joker in The Dark Knight?

A Clockwork Orange was a shared reference for actor and director, who discussed Malcolm McDowell's performance and the original novel.

What did Heath Ledger study to find the shifting voice of the Joker in The Dark Knight?

Ventriloquist dummies talk in a way he studied closely, and the finished voice can drop two octaves in the middle of a line.

Which scenes in The Dark Knight were filmed and mainly directed by Heath Ledger himself?

The Joker's home videos were left to Ledger; after seeing the first one, the director did not even attend the second shoot.

What did Heath Ledger often do between takes on The Dark Knight while still in full Joker costume?

Skateboarding around the set in costume was part of how he kept the mood light; a makeup artist recalled that he helped everyone relax.