During the press junket for the dramatic thriller Sleuth, Michael Caine provided an update on one of the most anticipated movies of 2008, The Dark Knight. Caine’s excited about being a part of the second Batman film starring Christian Bale and directed by Christopher Nolan, although he initially found one of his new co-stars a little creepy...
Tackling the Role of Alfred One More Time: “I was the butler in the first one, Batman Begins, which I thought was the best Batman ever -- and this one will be better,” revealed Caine. “The big surprise out of this will be what we thought was a big problem inasmuch as we're doing, although it's called The Dark Knight with a ‘kn’, it was the Joker. There, you've got the shadow of Jack Nicholson as the Joker, which is an incredible performance. Then we've got Heath Ledger who's gone in a completely and terrifyingly different direction and is extraordinary. He'll be the big surprise in that.
He'll frighten the life out of you. He did me the first time I saw him, because we did a rehearsal on the first day and we hadn't met or anything. He had to come up in an elevator to our home, Batman's home. I'm thinking I'm letting friends in, instead of which he's killed them all and he's coming up in the lift. So on the first rehearsal, I've never seen him. He has like seven dwarves with him, like Snow White, only it's not like that. When the bloody door opened on that lift, he came tearing out. I forgot every line. Terrifying.”
The Best of the Batman Lot: Caine’s familiar with the franchise and isn’t shy about voicing his opinion on who made the best Batman. “Oh yeah, I've seen all the Batman, mens, men. I've seen them all. I think by a long way, Christian is the best Batman I've ever seen. He certainly is the best actor, a wonderful actor, as he's proven in Yuma now, and in The Machinist. What was the other one he was in between, where he played [the POW]? Rescue Dawn, that's the one. That's a wonderful performance.”
