One little thing that we’ve really liked about DC’s cinematic output over the last two or so years is their way of debuting new costumes and looks. They do so by dropping “camera tests,” little segments of normal preproduction let out into the world at large, and these little glimpses replaced the glamour-shots that would appear in a USA Today article before shitty paparazzi spy photos leaked out to fan sites. But they also give a good sense of a film’s mood and a filmmaker’s style — look no further than the first look we were given at Joaquin Phoenix in Joker all of those years ago. And now, to the delight of all, we have one for Matt Reeves’ The Batman, which has been languishing under pre-production hell for the last few years and is now finally ramping up towards filming. Yes, you see Robert Pattinson in the batsuit. But holy shit does this movie look cool as hell.
Reeves put up the video of the camera test on his Vimeo account (not his Vero account because the dude ain’t Zack Snyder after all), and even got Michael Giacchino to compose a little music for it. It’s atmospheric and ambient, filmed in a striking red light, and it’s just great. Hell, we can’t even really blame Reeves for ruining the pre-Valentine’s Day plans of every film-related writer out on the East Coast on Thursday night with this drop because it is so fucking cool.
Grab some Depends, nerds, and watch this shit:
Just…. wow. We’re loving the metal-and-leather aesthetic, which owes quite a bit to the Arkham games (that collar especially, but the jagged-metal Bat symbol as well), and good lord does Pattinson just look genetically engineered to rock this role. As Willem Dafoe said, he’s got the chin for the part.
The bad part is how long we have to wait for The Batman, which doesn’t hit theaters until June 25, 2021.