10 Movie Directors That Lied To Get What They Wanted
Darth Vader didn't say THAT iconic line on set...
When it comes to a film set, the director is basically royalty. What they say goes and it's their vision that everyone should be working towards. Many well-known directors have come with their own tricks of the trade to achieve their goals and these often have massive ramifications on the people around them.
Sometimes a white lie or an obfuscation of the truth is the only way get what a director needs, whether that's lying to the people working above, below or on the same level as them. The phrase "a need to know basis" exists for a reason, and sometimes directors have given their colleagues what they believe to be the right amount of information and no more.
Whether you agree that these decisions were necessary, or even a good idea...? That's a whole other thing entirely.
This list will look examples of directors telling fibs to make sure they got what they envisioned, whether that's denying scripts, deliberating omitting information or even breaking trust. Nobody ever said filming making was an honest business, after all.
10. Christopher Nolan Lied To The Studio About Their Own Film - Batman Begins
Christopher Nolan, ever the auteur, had a very strong sense of style when it came to the Batman franchise. Considering the last time we had seen the Caped Crusader in cinemas was the toy line advert masquerading as a movie that was Batman & Robin, Nolan had a big task ahead of him of making sure he gave the franchise the shot in the arm that it needed.
One of most important aspects of Batman Begins was the slow burn and part of that was making sure to give pathos to the moment Bruce Wayne suits up as his alter-ego for the first time.
Warner Bros were initially unhappy with how long it took for the hero to appear on screen - just over an hour - and Nolan’s rebuff was to compare it to the 1978 Superman film. Whilst Christopher Reeve’s Man of Steel doesn’t appear until the 48 minute mark, Nolan inflated this number a little to 53 minutes to give himself a little more wiggle room.
Considering the huge success the Superman films had been for Warner Bros previously, they could do very little except let Nolan have it his way and Batman Begins is all the better for it.