'The Dark Knight' influenced Sam Mendes' thinking for 'Skyfall'

In amongst the gaggle of press interviews "Skyfall" director Sam Mendes has done this week was one interesting segment with IndieWire about how Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight" affected his thinking and approach to "Skyfall".

Both "Casino Royale" and "Batman Begins" enjoyed hugely successful reboots, and as well as praising Martin Campbell for his work on Daniel Craig's first 007 outing, Mendes also tipped his hat to Nolan.

"In terms of what [Nolan] achieved, specifically ‘The Dark Knight,’ the second movie, what it achieved, which is something exceptional. It was a game changer for everybody," he explained about how it influenced his approach.

"We’re now in an industry where movies are very small or very big and there’s almost nothing in the middle," he continued. "And it would be a tragedy if all the serious movies were very small and all the popcorn movies were very big and have nothing to say. And what Nolan proved was that you can make a huge movie that is thrilling and entertaining and has a lot to say about the world we live in, even if, in the case with ‘The Dark Knight,’ it’s not even set in our world. If felt like a movie that was about our world post-9/11 and played on our fears and discussed our fears and why they existed and I thought that was incredibly brave and interesting. That did help give me the confidence to take this movie in directions that, without ‘The Dark Knight,’ might not have been possible. Because also, people go, ‘Wow, that’s pretty dark,’ but then you can point to ‘Dark Knight’ and go ‘Look at that – that’s a darker movie, and it took in a gazillion dollars!’ That’s very helpful. There’s also that thing – it’s clearly possible to make a dark movie that people want to see."

Click here to read the complete interview.

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