Matt Damon was Christopher Nolan's first choice for the role of Harvey Dent but turned it down. Before Aaron Eckhart was cast in the part, other actors considered included Hugh Jackman, Ryan Phillippe, Liev Schreiber, Jake Gyllenhaal and Josh Lucas.

As a joke, one bat suit was made with nipples, as in Batman & Robin (1997). It was presented to Christian Bale as the real bat suit, but he knew instantly it was a joke, having seen a few design pictures during preproduction. He did pose for some publicity photos in the "nipple" suit.

This is the first Batman film to not have "Batman" in the title.

Christopher Nolan has a son named Rory, for whom the working title of the film ("Rory's First Kiss") was named.

Robin Williams, Lachy Hulme, Paul Bettany, and Adrien Brody all expressed interest for the role of the Joker before Heath Ledger was cast.

When asked, "Why Heath Ledger as the Joker?" Christopher Nolan said, "Because he's fearless."

Dwight Yoakam turned down two roles in this movie. Originally he was offered the part of a cop; then he was offered to play a banker who had dealings with the Joker (Heath Ledger). Yoakam passed on both roles because he was working on a Buck Owens tribute album.

Turning down a salary estimated at between $1 million and $2 million (an increase over the roughly $1 million she was believed to have earned for Batman Begins (2005)) Katie Holmes chose not to reprise her role as Rachel Dawes. This was due to what was described as 'scheduling conflicts'.

Before Maggie Gyllenhaal replaced Katie Holmes in the role of Rachel Dawes, both Rachel McAdams and Emily Blunt were rumored for the part.

While filming on the streets of Chicago in April 2007, the filming was carried out under the fake movie title "Rory's First Kiss". Fliers regarding the filming carried this fake title, complete with a fake "RFK" logo for the movie and an address for the film's production offices.

One of the extra's military uniforms has the name "Philo" on it, after the film's extras casting director, Joan Philo.

On Thanksgiving weekend, 2007, fake four-page tabloid-size "Gotham Times" newspapers were distributed at various public events. Headlined "City at War - Batman Saves Entire Family", every article teased events in the film, and everything in the handout was geared toward the film, including the weather ("Gloomy and overcast...") and advertisements for Gotham National Bank, the Gotham Girl Guides and recruitment for the Gotham Police Department.

To prepare for his role as the Joker, Heath Ledger lived alone in a hotel room for a month, formulating the character's psychology, posture and voice (the last one he found most difficult to do). He started a diary, in which he wrote the Joker's thoughts and feelings to guide himself during his performance. He was also given Alan Moore's comic "Batman: The Killing Joke" and "Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth" to read. Ledger also took inspiration from A Clockwork Orange (1971)'s Alex and Sid Vicious.

Director Christopher Nolan and co-writers Jonathan Nolan and David S. Goyer decided not to explore the origins of the Joker in order to portray the character as "absolute."

Christopher Nolan cites the film Heat (1995) as a major influence on this movie. William Fichtner played in Heat and in the scene in The Dark Knight that was obviously inspired by Heat.

Christopher Nolan shot part of the film in the IMAX format. Nolan had wanted to shoot in IMAX for 15 years, and even now wishes he could have shot the entire film in IMAX, as he felt "if you could take an IMAX camera to Mt. Everest or outer space, you could use it in a feature movie." Nolan shot in IMAX four major action sequences and quiet dramatic scenes which he thought would be visually fascinating.

Off-duty Chicago Police Officers along with Officers from Elyria OH, Hammond IN, Buffalo Grove IL and Joliet IL played Gotham Police officer extras.

Elaborate, interactive marketing campaigns were launched in the months leading

Continuity

(at around 4 mins) During the bank heist scene, The Joker's hair changes from a natural brown color, to green right when he walks past the bus after it just crashed through the bank's wall.

(at around 28 mins) When Lucius Fox is showing Bruce Wayne the new Batman armor, Wayne picks up a wrist-guard with plates that are designed to separate at the press of a button. Wayne launches the plates by mistake, but when he places the wrist-guard back into place, the plates are still there.

(at around 1h 27 mins) As Batman interrogates the Joker, you can see that the amount of make-up on the Joker's forehead changes between the shots from almost fully covered to nearly disappeared (because of the slam on the table).

During the beginning the movie, the police department is labeled as GCPD. During the chase scene after Harvey turns himself in as Batman, all of the armored vehicles have only GPD on the side of them.

(at around 1h 55 mins) Two ferries are shown leaving Gotham just as the sun is going down. Later, it is established to be just shy of midnight, which would mean the ferries have been traveling for at least a few hours. Yet, the ferries are still shown as though they have just departed the harbor.



Factual errors

(at around 2h 5 mins) When Batman has the sonar vision on, he can see shadows of objects like the SWAT members and the Joker's dogs. Sonar would not pick up these shadows. While it is possible that the software which interprets the sonar data might create a virtual display with shadows for visibility's sake, that doesn't explain how the sonar manages to see the letters spelling SWAT on the officers' uniforms (e.g. when the SWATs exit the elevator).

(at around 59 mins) When Bruce and Lucius are reconstructing the shattered bullet, the 3D image shows an entire thumbprint on the bullet. When the bullet was been pushed into the clip, the shell would still be in the casing, blocking the thumb partially from making a print on the shell. When the bullet had been reconstructed, it would have only been a partial print.

(at around 9 mins) For the hydraulic gun bender to work, it must apply superhuman force to both ends of the barrel; however, the device acts on the tip of the barrel only, while the impostor "Batman" holds the other end of the gun.

(at around 1h 45 mins) The set designers created the hospital Emergency Room entrance with no means of rolling a gurney in. Also, the "Emergency" sign should be red, not blue.

(at around 57 mins) Reese meets with Fox and shows him the Tumbler blueprints he's discovered. What is clearly the right side of the vehicle is marked on the print as the left elevation.



Incorrectly regarded as goofs

It is said that all of the license plates seen on cars in the film are Illinois plates. In fact, they're not: they are actually plates for the fictional Gotham, although they resemble Illinois plates. The "Gotham" plates that were created by film makers were made to look like Illinois plates, just in case some slipped through in background shots during filming in Chicago.

Batman's voice has been criticized for being artificial-sounding and unnaturally gravelly. In the promotions for Batman Begins (2005), the cowl is revealed to have a microphone/speaker that alters and amplifies Bruce Wayne's voice to disguise his identity and increase intimidation.

(at around 20 mins) When Bruce, his date, Rachel, and Harvey meet in the restaurant, Bruce says he will "put two tables together." In the next shot, we see all four sitting around a single table. This wasn't meant to be taken literally, since he owned the restaurant his staff would have made sure that his guests were seated at a larger table.

(at around 6 mins) In the opening bank heist scene, the Joker inserts a grenade to the mouth of the manager lying on the floor. A string from the pin of the grenade is attached to Joker's clothes, and once he leaves the bank by the bus, the pin is pulled immediately out of frame by the bus. What you see falling to the floor is actually the "spoon" of the grenade which ejects from the handle once the pin has been removed and it has been released.

(at around 43 mins) When we see the video of The Joker interrogating the fake Batman and he points the camera at himself, his teeth are really yellow and ugly. But when Bruce is watching the same video at his bunker (at around 55 mins), and the computer is analyzing the Joker's face, his teeth are all white and clean. However, The Joker's red painted smile appears to be black indicating that the image is in black and white.



Revealing mistakes

(at around 26 mins) Gary Oldman lets his English accent slip several times, most noticeably while he is yelling at Harvey Dent after the police fail to seize the mob's funds.

(at around 22 mins) When Lau is talking to the other mobsters on television he can obviously see the events in the meeting room, even though no kind of camera is visible in the room.

(at around 9 mins) When Batman grabs onto Scarecrow's van, just before he cuts into the metal, you can see a small indented outline of where he's going to cut.

(at around 23 mins) In the part where all the crime leaders are having the meeting with Lou live on TV, the TV screen gives off a green reflection on the table which means that they put a green sheet over the TV screen so that can put over another version (special effects) of the live video of Lou.

(at around 1 min) In the opening sequence when the robber fires the grappling gun you can clearly see that it doesn't grab onto anything. Instead it travels a few feet and falls down.



Miscellaneous

When Lau is in Hong Kong, the subtitles say he's speaking Mandarin. In Hong Kong they speak Cantonese.



Audio/visual unsynchronized

(at around 2h 10 mins) In their final confrontation, when Batman struggles to get off the net, and the Joker tries to stab him with something, you hear the Joker's voice saying "All the old familiar places", but his lips never move.

(at around 4 mins) When the school bus smashes through the wall during the bank heist, the goon that's supposed to get killed flies backward before the bus even gets near him, even though there's a sound effect to suggest it hit him.

(at around 13 mins) When Alfred first meets Bruce Wayne in the "Batcave" they are talking. Bruce says, "That isn't exactly what I had in mind when I said I wanted to inspire people." The shot has already cut to another angle and Bruce's lips aren't moving, but he is still saying "inspire people."

(at around 29 mins) When Bruce is lounging on the cruise ship scene, he says, "You look tired, Alfred." In the next shot he puts down his cup and says, "You'll be alright without me?" but his lips don't move.

(at around 11 mins) In the early vault scene, Lt. Gordon's speaking voice is also altered by mistake when he follows Batman, as Gordon says "we'd have to hit all the banks simultaneously, SWAT teams, backup": his voice is accidentally audio-"soured" as well.



Crew or equipment visible

(at around 1h 29 mins) In the holding cell, when Batman smashes The Joker against the wall, a camera with a blue LED/LCD screen and two people from the crew reflect on the right mirror.

In the final shot, several non-illuminated lights are at the end of the ramp. They are Bebee Night Lights, which were used to light most of the night chase scene.

(at around 6 mins) During the bank heist scene when the Joker places the smoke grenade into the managers mouth there is a black pipe running down the side of the actors cheek in which the smoke is being pumped from.

In the beginning of the film, during the bank robbery, you can see the shadow of the steadicam operator as he passes the vault door.

(at around 1 min) In the beginning shot of the movie where the camera closes in to a windowed building, you could see the helicopter reflecting on the windows, carrying the camera, on the very left-hand side.



Errors in geography

(at around 32 mins) When Lucius Fox meets with Lau on the terrace of his Hong Kong office building, you can clearly see all of the McCormick Place buildings of Chicago in the background behind Fox.

At the beginning of the movie, during the heist, the robbers enter through the front doors (let's call this wall "north" and the wall that the bus crashes through is "west"). At the end of the robbery when the bus leaves and the camera shows the exterior of the bank, the bus makes a right turn (merges with the other buses which are running directly parallel with the front wall "north"). This is wrong since the bus only made a 90 degree turn, which would have made it directly perpendicular with the "north" wall instead of parallel as it is depicted in the film. In order for the bus to have merged with the other buses and proceed driving parallel with the "north" wall, it would have had to make a 180 degree turn instead of the 90 degree that was depicted in the film. You also know for a fact that the bus crashes through the "west" wall because throughout the heist, you can clearly see the windows that are shown later on the outside when the buses are leaving.

When Bruce travels to Hong Kong, Victoria Harbor is incorrectly captioned "Hong Kong Bay." In fairness, however, Gotham (New York, as seen in the third installment of this series) is filled with the streets and landmarks of Chicago. In the alternate reality of this film, the name of the bay in Hong Kong could be anything.

(at around 1h 45 mins) In the second segment of the Lamborghini chase scene, the car is heading south on Franklin Street. It passes Gene and Giorgetti's restaurant, which appears on the right at the corner of Illinois Avenue. Moments later, the car is heading north on the same street, and the crash occurs with the restaurant on the left side of the car. (The restaurant has since been torn down.)



Plot holes

How is Batman summoned on a cloudless night.

How is Batman summoned during the daytime.



Character error

(at around 27 mins) While planning to get into Hong Kong, Wayne says that he will use Korean smugglers who will fly under the radar the entire way there, and HALO jump out of the plane to get to the ground. HALO stands for High Altitude/Low Opening and the jumps are around 30,000 feet, well within radar range.

(at around 1h 55 mins) When talking to Lucius about the cell phone surveillance device, Bruce says that "The database is null-key encrypted. Only one person can access it." In reality, null key encryption is an encryption scheme that doesn't change data at all, and is for when plaintext data is mandatory.

(at around 1h 35 mins) After the explosion at the warehouse, a fire hose is seen playing a jet of water from side to side across the top of the burning rubble. While this looks very pretty, a professional firefighter would never do this. They would concentrate the water at the base of the fire then work their way slowly across the blaze.

Around 1hr 23m, after Harvey Dent is rescued, Jim Gordon is driven away by the cop the Joker had killed in Bruce's penthouse earlier.

Bruce finds out during the daytime that the Joker will kill her but waits until night time to tell her.