The trailers for “The Dark Knight” have shown quite a bit of Heath Ledger’s scabbier, surlier reinvention of the Joker, but the producers have been keeping the film’s other Batman bad guy, Two-Face, under wraps.
“That’s right, people don’t really know yet,” actor Aaron Eckhart said with grin. “I can tell you that, basically, when you look at Two-Face, you should get sick to your stomach. Being the guy under all that, well, that was a lot of fun for me. It’s like you would feel if you met someone whose face had pretty much been ripped off or burned off with acid.
“I can’t talk about it beyond that because I don’t want to give away too much of the plans by Chris.”
Chris is Christopher Nolan, the director of “Batman Begins,” the acclaimed 2005 franchise reboot, and of “The Dark Knight,” the sequel that hits theaters July 18.
The death of Ledger in January and the word of his incendiary performance in this film have made him the natural focus of early media coverage of “The Dark Knight.” But Nolan told the Los Angeles Times this year that the foundation of the film is the tale and transformation of Eckhart’s character, Harvey Dent, from a crusading Gotham City prosecutor to Harvey Two-Face, a maniac whose face is ravaged on one side by a horrible injury.
“There are fans on the Internet who have done artist’s versions of what they think it will look like, and I can tell you this: They’re thinking small; Chris is going way farther than people think.”
There were plenty of name actors lined up hoping to get the role of Two-Face, but in the end Nolan went with Eckhart because of his “complexity and this aura he has of a good man pushed too far,” Nolan said.
Two-Face in the film is more of a vigilante hunting down the Joker than he is a criminal, as he has most often been portrayed in the comics. His trademark is flipping a two-headed coin, one side defaced, the other pristine, and letting its landing determine his actions, often in situations where he has a gun to someone’s head.
“The difference between Batman and Two-Face is how far they are willing to go and how they make their point,” Eckhart said. “Otherwise, we’re talking about vigilante crime-fighting. That’s what Batman is all about. He has a strong sense of justice. And Harvey Dent has an extremely strong sense of justice. His fiance is killed. He’s horribly injured.
“But he is still true to himself. He’s a crime fighter, he’s not killing good people. He’s not a bad guy, not purely.”
ROLE PLAYER
Aaron Eckhart has a history of playing authority figures pulled away from the bright path. He was a cop on a path to destruction in “The Black Dahlia,” the slick tobacco lobbyist in “Thank You for Smoking,” and the junior executive looking to punish women in Neil LaBute’s “In the Company of Men.” “You look at a good guy too long and it’s not that exciting,” Eckhart said. “I’m interested in good guys gone wrong. They’re not the bad guy, they’re the good guy doing bad things.”
ODDS-ON FAVORITE?
In “Batman Begins” Christian Bale faced off against Ra’s Al Ghul and Scarecrow, and in “The Dark Knight” he tangos with the Joker and Two-Face. So who would Batman’s next big-screen villains be? RedEye had a few thoughts and set some early odds.
2:1
Riddler
One of Batman’s most formidable adversaries besides the ones in the two latest films.
5:1
Poison Ivy
Sultry and deadly. Bale could match wits with a fiery young actress. Paging Keira Knightley (above).
10:1
Mad Hatter
Another dark character to explore, but maybe a little too cartoonish.
25:1
Penguin
Picture it: Scenes in Lincoln Park Zoo. Bird droppings on Michigan Avenue.
100:1
Harley Quinn
Something of a protege of the Joker’s. … OK, it’s kind of a stretch.
2,350:1
Mr. Freeze and Catwoman
Thank you, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Halle Berry for ruining this possibility.
