Next to James Bond, there probably isn't a character in movies that causes more excitement than Batman. Created by Bob Kane, DC Comics' Dark Knight, the alter-ego of millionaire Bruce Wayne, is forever the justice-seeking vigilante of Gotham City. If there was a scale for superheroes, he'd be at the point marked 'brooding'. Which might explain why director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) was drawn to grunge icons Nirvana as he was figuring out a way into his new movie The Batman.

'I was listening to "Something In The Way",' he says, referring to the ominous track from the band's seminal album Nevermind. 'That was a breakthrough for me. The Bruce Wayne that I saw was sort of Kurt Cobain, but like a fighter, and [I was] seeing him as being someone who was haunted.' He imagined Wayne like the Nirvana frontman, sitting alone, jamming in his living-room, amps turned up. 'And he was kind of addicted. Except in this case, the drug he was addicted to was being Batman.'

The message was clear: this was not going to be George Clooney 'Bat nipples'-era Batman, but something more sinister. When Reeves read Batman: Year One, Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli's graphic novel, he was struck by the representation of the character in his early years. 'He was kind of a drifter, almost like Travis Bickle,' he says, nodding to Robert De Niro's anti-hero from Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver. Similarly, Todd Phillips' 2019 Oscar-winner Joker also drew from that film in depicting the origins of Batman's greatest nemesis.

With all this brewing, as a graffiti-strewn Gotham formed in his mind, Reeves began to think about casting his Batman. Already out of the picture was Ben Affleck, who had played the character in the Zack Snyder-directed Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice (2016) and Justice League (2017) and had originally planned to direct the character in his own standalone adventure. But as he backed out, Reeves began considering an unexpected choice: Robert Pattinson.

'I've been thinking about Batman for years,' admits the 35-year-old British actor when we speak over Zoom. 'I don't know why. It was completely out of reach.' Truth be told, there's nothing in Pattinson's back catalogue that suggests he was right for a superhero movie. His only real blockbuster territory had been Twilight, the vampire series that made him a star. After that, he'd been on a wild ride with arthouse auteurs like Claire Denis (High Life), Anton Corbijn (Life) and Antonio Campos (The Devil All The Time).

'After Twilight, he did a very unexpected thing, which was to just concentrate on giving very, very interesting performances with interesting filmmakers,' notes Reeves, who was particularly struck by Pattinson's nervy turn as the amateur bank robber in the Safdie Brothers' intense 2017 film Good Time. 'He's an incredible chameleon. What's amazing is he can play so many different things. And almost always, he's totally different.'

While Pattinson was about to venture into the mind-blowing world of Christopher Nolan's backwards-set brainteaser Tenet, Reeves didn't know how the actor felt about fronting another blockbuster behemoth. But Pattinson simply couldn't say 'no'. 'As soon as he pitched it to me, I just knew. It was very, very right,' he says. The responsibility of taking on a character played so perfectly in the past by Michael Keaton and Christian Bale only really struck him later. 'You feel like you're inheriting a mantle,' he adds. 'Then it suddenly becomes absolutely terrifying.'

He wasn't the only one who realised just what it meant doing a Batman movie. Zoë Kravitz, no stranger to iconic franchises after featuring in Mad Max: Fury Road, recalls the moment it was finally announced she was playing Selina Kyle aka Catwoman. 'Every person I've ever met in my entire life called me or emailed me or texted me. It was like my birthday on steroids. It was the first time I'd gotten a part that was exciting to other people, not just to me. It was a big deal to other people.'

Around them, Reeves assembled a cast-iron selection of character actors: Andy Serkis as Bruce Wayne's loyal butler Alfred Pennyworth; John Turturro as crimelord Carmine Falcone; Jeffrey Wright as law-enforcer James Gordon; Peter Sarsgaard as District Attorney Gil Colson, a new character to Gotham. Then there was Paul Dano as Edward Nashton/Riddler. Far from Jim Carrey's wacky villain seen in 1995's Batman Forever, Reeves fashioned him closer to the Zodiac Killer, a real-life murderer who terrorised 1970s San Francisco.

It's Riddler who begins leaving clues for Batman, an enigma that will lead him into Gotham's underbelly (including Penguin, played by an unrecognisable Colin Farrell) and into a story of corruption that ties into his own family. 'In other iterations of the story, he truly believes that he can actually change the fate of Gotham. And in this, he doesn't really,' explains Pattinson. 'Not only is he dismissed by pretty much everyone, the people of Gotham are just as scared of him as they are of the criminals. That's kind of where we're starting.'

While this film will tap into the idea of Batman as the World's Great Detective (a legend once emblazoned across DC Comics covers), it's also a character study. Take his relationship with Kyle. 'I think they're both outcasts in different ways,' says Kravitz. 'I do think they believe in the same thing, which is justice. What their solution is, I think, is quite different. But [it's] two people who have felt really alone their entire lives, and both have a lot of anger, and had a really hard time connecting to anybody. Then this person enters their lives. And it's almost like looking at a mirror, but you also want to punch the mirror and break it.'

It all adds up to a film that feels more like David Fincher's serial killer mystery Seven and its follow-up The Game than a Batman film. For Pattinson, it marks a radical departure and a role far more physical than he's used to. Even that famous Batman growl took work. 'I've never really had any vocal training … so I was kind of inventing my own exercises,' he grins. 'But yeah, it's hard. When Christian Bale was doing it, I remember him saying he lost his voice all the time. And it's very, very difficult to not lose your voice.'

For Reeves, it was essential that Pattinson found that vocal rhythm, to convey the anguish so often obscured by the imposing black costume. 'You're meant to feel, emotionally, for Batman in the cowl,' he says. 'Rob had to play through the cowl. Often Batman can become a cypher, and he's just like an incredible image: wow, he's so striking. In this case, you needed to see him in many moments where he was in a freefall; where he was supposed to have power but suddenly he was terrified.'

How will audiences take to Pattinson as Batman, reconfiguring the character to his most bleak, his most confused, his most alone? The actor has no idea. But after a pandemic-delayed shoot (one that even filmed at the Glasgow Necropolis in February 2020), Pattinson now understands what the character means to so many. Even the costume left others breathless. 'It has such an elemental power; it connects to something really, really deep in people.' The cowl is his now. The justice can begin.

The Batman is in cinemas from Friday 4 March.