This Dark Knight Scene Almost Went Too Far

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Subtitles (31)

0:00How far is too far for a PG-13 rating?

0:03From shocking gore to some messed up

0:05implications, it's truly wild what some

0:08movies get away with.

0:10>> Let's put a smile on that face.

0:13>> Well, Christopher Nolan's bat

0:15masterpiece isn't a [music] particularly

0:17bloody movie. It doesn't shy away from

0:19its violent side, either. Even

0:20cinematographer Wally Pfister was

0:22surprised that it didn't earn an R

0:24rating. He once told Vulture, "It's kind

0:26of shocking that The Dark Knight ended

0:28up being PG-13. All of Chris's movies

0:30would be PG-13 to open it up to a wider

0:32audience. Somehow, he always had some

0:35magic with the MPAA." Pfister referenced

0:38one particularly gruesome scene as an

0:39example of the movie's violent

0:41tendencies. You probably know which one

0:43we're talking about. As he said, [music]

0:45"Lo and behold, he has the pencil, and

0:47I'm like, 'You are not getting the PG-13

0:50with that. There's no way this is going

0:52at. He's driving this pencil through a

0:54guy's head.' And I was wrong." Nolan and

0:57his crew were clearly cutting it fine

0:59[music] here by using the pencil trick

1:01as the punchline to a joke. However,

1:04they [music] managed to narrowly avoid

1:05that dreaded R rating.

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