‘The Batman’: Matt Reeves Had Paul Dano Do “70 or 80 Takes” of A Single Scene

Look at Matt Reeves, being all David Fincher on the set of “The Batman.”

In a new interview with The Guardian, Reeves confirms that he filmed Paul Dano doing “70 or 80 takes” of the Riddler and Batman’s final confrontation in the 2022 film.

“Paul loves doing a lot of takes, as do I,” Reeves said. “We took two days on the final scene between him and Robert Pattinson as Batman, and we must have easily done 70 or 80 takes. Paul loves exploring. He’s obsessive that way.”

“There were all these moments as the Riddler where he’d be tickled by something and then fly into a rage, and you never knew from take to take where that switch would come,” Reeves continued. “I’d be sitting there with the headphones on, trying to stifle my laughter because he’d always do something surprising. Paul would ask me: ‘Was that crazy? Was that too much?’ I’d say: ‘No it’s fantastic. Let’s do another.’”

This is far from being a record for most takes of a single scene. William Wyler (“The Best Years of Our Lives” and “Ben-Hur”) was known for shooting a high number of takes, veering in the hundreds. I don't recall what his highest number was.

As mentioned earlier, Fincher is the modern-day king of multiple takes. The opening scene of Fincher’s “The Social Network,” with Rooney Mara and Jesse Eisenberg, was shot in 99 takes. Amanda Seyfried has also mentioned shooting 200 takes of the same scene on “Mank.”

There are multiple historical accounts of Charlie Chaplin‘s “City Lights” being the actual record-holder. Chaplin shot the three-minute scene, where his Tramp meets the flower girl, a mind-boggling 342 times.

Kubrick was another one. His obsession with multiple takes started when he had a monitor in front of him, which was during “Barry Lyndon,” “The Shining,” “Full Metal Jacket” and “Eyes Wide Shut” — the on-set stories behind those productions are damn-near legendary.