Film News: ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ Casts Matt Modine as Nixon, Tom Conti, Joey King

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CHICAGO – On the same day the Batman world was set ablaze by the launch of “The Dark Knight Rises” viral marketing (where the villain Bane was revealed), Variety on Friday had fun by misleadingly breaking the news of a “joker” being cast in the highly anticipated 2012 film.

Of course, this false tease wasn’t about Heath Ledger or any Batman foe. Rather, Variety reports that Matt Modine, Tom Conti and the 11-year-old Joey King have been cast in Christopher Nolan’s Batman threequel. Modine played Private Joker in Stanley Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket”.

Matt Modine (left), Tom Conti (right) and Joey King (middle) have been cast in “The Dark Knight Rises”.
Image credit: Variety

The report says Modine will be playing a character named Nixon, but just like the film’s plot is still tightly under wraps, details about Modine’s role haven’t yet been fleshed out. And no information is currently available about the roles for Conti and King.

King played Ramona in 2010’s “Ramona and Beezus” and recently appeared in “Battle: Los Angeles”. Conti is best known for his Oscar-nominated performance in 1983’s “Reuben, Reuben”. Modine will soon appear as ex-Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain in the HBO telepic “Too Big to Fail”.

Interestingly, just yesterday Warner Bros. released its first official press statement announcing the beginning of the film’s principal photography (weeks late). In the statement, Warner Bros. listed its confirmed cast members. Matt Modine, Tom Conti and Joey King were not listed.

“The Dark Knight Rises” will again star Christian Bale as Batman/Bruce Wayne, Gary Oldman as Jim Gordon, Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox, Michael Caine as Alfred, Tom Hardy as Bane, Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle/Catwoman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as John Blake, Marion Cotillard as Miranda Tate, Josh Pence as the young Ra’s al Ghul, Diego Klattenhoff as a rookie cop and Matt Modine as Nixon. The film also stars Juno Temple, Alon Aboutboul, Tom Conti and Joey King. Nestor Carbonell and Daniel Sunjata are currently rumored to be involved.

The film, which is again directed by Christopher Nolan, is scheduled for release on July 20, 2012. “The Dark Knight Rises” is written by David S. Goyer (story), Bob Kane (characters), Christopher Nolan (screenplay), Christopher Nolan (story) and Jonathan Nolan (screenplay) with original music from Hans Zimmer and cinematography by Wally Pfister. During filming, “The Dark Knight Rises” is going by the fake name “Magnus Rex”.

By ADAM FENDELMAN Publisher HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]