A few months ago we posted some awesome unexplained photos of Matthew Modine holding up lacy pink panties on the set of The Dark Knight Rises, and now we know the backstory. It all goes back — as all things inevitably do — to Vision Quest. Yes, the 1985 male-fantasy-fulfillment film where Matthew Modine wins the big wrestling match and sleeps with Linda Fiorentino.

Downtown Spokane interviewed Modine and found out he suspects the assistants to Nolan’s assistant director planted the pink panties after watching Vision Quest on set. In the film, Modine’s character is caught sniffing Fiorentino’s pink panties in their shared laundry room (video below, of course). The day after the assistants watched the scene, Modine got a surprise gift:

“I put my hands in my pockets because it was cold. I said, ‘What’s this?’ I took it out and it was a pair of pink panties. And there were paparazzi all over the set,” Modine said. “There I am getting caught holding pink panties.” [KXLY via LATFG]

What have we got here, a bunch of f–king comedians? Hell, I like you assistants. You can come over to my house and f–k my sister.

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HeroComplex has an exclusive interview with Anne Hathaway on her role as Selina Kyle in Chris Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises. You can read the whole article over there, but we’ll summarize some of the main points despite doing none of the hard work ourselves. Hooray, blogging.

One of Bob Kane and Bill Finger’s inspirations for the Catwoman character was Hedy Lamarr, the sultry and clever actress who also co-invented a method for spread spectrum radio and frequency hopping. (You can thank her, in part, for your Wi-Fi and cell phone.) Anne Hathaway took their inspiration into account and studied Lamarr’s screen presence:

“I know this sounds odd, but her breathing is extraordinary,” Hathaway said. “She takes these long, deep, languid breaths and exhales slowly. There’s a shot of her in [the 1933 film] ‘Ecstasy’ exhaling a cigarette and I took probably five breaths during her one exhale. So I started working on my breathing a lot.”

That wasn’t acting; everyone back then smoked delicious, physician-recommended cigarettes so often their lungs didn’t work.

“I really got into the comics after I was cast and I like that when she made her first appearance she meets Bruce Wayne and says ‘Let go of me or I’ll claw your eyes out,’ and he says, ‘Careful, claws in or papa spank,’”

Meow.

This next quote, a scene description from part of the movie HeroComplex viewed, is possibly a spoiler:

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Dude, word of advice:  never point that at the hotel sheets.  You don’t even wanna know.

Three different parodies of The Dark Knight Rises landed on our desk this weekend, so we picked them up off our kitten calendar desk blotter and put them together in this post with some high-res still photos from the shoot. Yes, we all share the same desk. It’s cozy.

The first video below is a sweded version of the second TDKR trailer. Kudos to Dumb Drum for making it, and for greatly improving the “Mátalo, mátalo! Bane, Bane!” chant. The second video (from MovieClips) is the “trailer cats” remake of the official trailer. The third video (uploaded by MrJonMoisan) shows what happens when Batman and Bane try to have an intelligible conversation with dubious subtitles. Still makes more sense than my relatives’ drunken ramblings after Festivus dinner this weekend.

[Sources: CBM (1, 2), BleedingCool (1, 2). Thanks to Erica and Bryan for the tips.]

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There were some legitimate Easter eggs in that second trailer for The Dark Knight Rises, and there were some purported Easter eggs that were nothing at all. First off, let’s get this out of the way: no, Robin is not in the movie. Some people have noticed that the R held up by the Gotham Rogues football fans in the screencap above matches Robin’s R from the comic books. Some of those people also noticed the football player in the trailer had the name “Ward” on his back and assumed it was a reference to Burt Ward, who played Robin to Adam West’s Batman. The problem is, there’s a better explanation for both of these coincidences.

The football player is Hines Ward of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He’s a celebrity cameo, so of course his last name is going to be on his jersey; his publicist would have shat bricks otherwise. As for the sign being held up by a fan? It was made by a cheeky extra:

The day this scene was shot, there were 10,000 extras there at Heinz Field. Most of them brought their own props and costumes, so clearly one guy has been smart and, when drawing the ‘R’ for the ‘Rogues’ signs (for the Rogues are Gotham’s team), he’s drawn it in the style of a Robin logo, off his own back. So this is no more a ‘clue’ that Robin will be in the film than the presence of the Batman logo on a door during Following was a ‘clue’ that Nolan would one day make a Batman movie. [Empire]

Nolan has commented in the past that, “This is a young Batman, so Robin’s a few films….not for a few pictures anyway. Dick Grayson’s still in a crib somewhere. I seriously doubt I will even be involved when Robin’s in the franchise.” Although TDKR takes place eight years after the last film, that still places Robin too young to have a creepy relationship with Bruce Wayne just yet.  I mean, Batman is creepy, but he’s not that creepy.  Kid’s gotta be in the double digits at least.  Sheesh.

On the other hand, here’s an Easter egg from the trailer which could be a real and interesting plot point:

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If you missed the bootleg version of the second Dark Knight Rises trailer, it’s no biggie. Warner just released the high def version on Apple. Unfortunately, that Apple video won’t play for everyone (including me), and Warner keeps yanking the videos that actually work off of YouTube to give Apple the exclusivity (curse you, forcefield!). We’ll put a working embed below as soon as we have one (Update: the one below may work). For now, you may be able to watch it here.

And here’s the official synopsis, via FirstShowing:

Eight years after The Dark Knight, the terrorist leader Bane arrives in Gotham City, pushing it and its police force to the limits, forcing its former hero Batman to resurface after taking the fall for Harvey Dent.

Here’s a video via ComingSoon which may be working (and their site name aptly sums up my feelings on this Apple trailer c**ktease situation).

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Christian Bale, pictured on a less exciting day.

Although we no longer have a working embed of The Dark Knight Rises‘ prologue (please accept this kitten video as our apology), we do have a bootleg of the new second trailer which will inevitably also be pulled. That’s embedded below (for now) with another video I’ll get back to in a moment. Screengrabs from the trailer are available at CBM. Here’s a quick summary: it opens with a kid singing the National Anthem at a Gotham Rogues football game while Bane plots something. Alfred lectures Bruce Wayne then, at a party, Selina Kyle whispers in his ear about how he’s got too much money. Bane blows up the football field. Half a second of Marion Cottilard. Then a montage of action shots. Fanboys everywhere throw panties at the screen. The end.

If you missed the prologue or couldn’t figure out what was happening, there’s good news: WWTDD has the six pages of script the prologue was filmed off of, so now we know what Bane was saying. Unfortunately, at no point did he say, “If you want my body and you think I’m sexy come on sugar let me know,” which was totally what I heard.

Finally, the last video below (the one that should still be working by the time you read this) comes from CNN. Christian Bale was part of a car chase while in China for the premiere of The Flowers of War. He tried to visit civil rights activist Chen Guangcheng, who is under house arrest.

Accompanied by a CNN crew, Bale arrived at Chen’s home in Dongshigu Village. Once there, they were immediately confronted by Chinese authorities, who ordered them to go away. Some scuffling followed, and Bale attempted to flee with CNN’s Steven Jiang and the rest of the team in their car. A high-speed chase ensued, with the guards following the pair in gray minivans for 40 minutes through bumpy country roads. [TDW]

Chinese authorities were mad at him? Well, maybe he got in their eyeline while they were trying to shoot something. Wackity schmackity human rights abuses.

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