As the weeks go by, we draw closer and closer to what is arguably the biggest movie event of the year, the release of The Dark Knight Rises. With the release date right around the corner, we’re starting to see more and more coverage on the film from various publications.
Last week, the latest issue of Total Film hit newsstands and boasted The Dark Knight Rises as its cover story. For those of you who haven’t yet checked it out, here are some choice quotes.
First up is Mr. Tom Hardy, who discussed the process of bulking up to play Bane.
 “When I started I was about 160-something pounds. When I was done I was 190. You life weights. You eat. You lift some more weights. You don’t run anywhere because if you do cardio, you drop weight. So it’s really good for heart attacks!”
He was then asked how it was wearing the mask on set and if it made things difficult.
“It’s not as bad as you might think. You just put it on. Work out where your drool goes. That’s it. Mask work is good fun. This one wasn’t painful; there was a stunt mask and there was the up-close one for the sexy glam shots.”
Next, Joseph Gordon-Levitt had some kind remarks for his director, Christopher Nolan.
 “He prioritises the acting in a way that’s really rare for such a high-scale, spectacular production. That even amid all these things that are going on, he made sure that the actors have what they need to create an honest performance, an honest moment. I think that’s a big part of why audiences love his movies so much, because they don’t feel like a bunch of fireworks. It feels like real stories, real people.”
Finally, the man behind the camera, Christopher Nolan, had a couple things to say about closing out the story and the responsibility he had to audiences.
“Our telling of the Batman legend has always been centered on Bruce Wayne’s story. We somewhat left the audience hanging at the end of the last film in terms of Bruce’s story and we want to bring it full circle and have a complete tale. We’ve a great ending we’ve been wanting to tell for some years now. We’re just thrilled to have been able to bring our story around to its conclusion.
We feel a tremendous challenge and responsibility to finish our story. We have to give the audiences something they haven’t seen before, but also fulfill their expectations of what they enjoyed in the first two films. That’s the tricky balance.
With a sequel there is always the challenge of trying to meet or indeed exceed expectations. And some of those are based on the size, scale and world of the film. We traveled to many different places because we wanted to give it a broader canvas.”
Honestly, at this point, there’s not really much more I can say about the film. It’s undoubtedly going to be epic and as I said before, the movie event of the year.
We’re just a couple months away now folks so get ready and keep counting down the days until July 20th!
