With The Dark Knight‘s 10 year anniversary, former stars are claiming that the film almost snagged an ‘R’ rating.
Speaking with press, actor David Dastmalchian revealed his scene with Aaron Eckhart was too violent for the MPAA. Dastmalchian played Thomas Schiff, the Joker’s henchman. In the movie, Eckhart’s Harvey Dent abducted and interrogated Schiff at gunpoint. Dastmalchian spoke on how intense the scene got:
[Nolan] told me a funny anecdote. He said he really liked the scene, but he said when we were shooting it, I was pushing my head against Aaron’s gun and he was pushing the gun back. I remember for a few weeks after I had a big welt on my head and a little goose egg and black bruise. He said that was one of the moments the MPAA asked him to go back and he had to cut out the indent from the gun barrel on my head.
Other ‘R’ Rated Moments
The Dark Knight was re-edited for content in other areas. There is another report of Nolan having to make edits to a scene featuring a bloody body.
Initially, a murdered Batman-imposter’s corpse with a Joker card stabbed into his chest with a knife. However, Nolan needed to tone down the violence. In-film, the body was safety-pinned with the Joker card.