What drew me to Batman in the first place was Bruce Wayne's story, and that he's a real character whose story begins in childhood. He's not a fully formed character like James Bond, so what we're doing is following the journey of this guy from a child who goes through this horrible experience of becoming this extraordinary character. That, for me, became a three-part story. And obviously the third part becomes the ending of the guy's story.

The real truth of that is that much as you want to believe that it's you being on top of everything, you're actually relying massively on the people around you.

To me, any kind of filmmaking that's reactive is not going to be as good as something more inventive and original.

By the time I was 10 or 11, I knew I wanted to make films.

I never considered myself a lucky person. I'm the most extraordinary pessimist. I truly am.

To me, the most interesting approach to film noir is subjective. The genre is really all about not knowing what's going on around you, and that fear of the unknown. The only way to do that effectively is to really get into the maze, rather than look at the maze from above, so that's where I sort of come at it.

I think there's a vague sense out there that movies are becoming more and more unreal. I know I've felt it.