Darren Aronofsky wanted to cast Joaquin Phoenix in his Batman movie

Warner Bros had roped in Darren Aronofsky to direct a Batman movie post the George Clooney-led 'Batman & Robin', but things could not materialise as the script had many differences from the original comic.
The film was abandoned in 2002, but Aronofsky has now revealed that he wanted to cast Joaquin Phoenix as the caped crusader in the movie.

"I always wanted Joaquin Phoenix for Batman.It's funny, I think we were just sort of out of time with our idea. I understood that (with) comics, that there's room for all different types of titles, but I think Hollywood at that time was still kind of in the Golden Age of comics, and they were still just doing the classic titles in classic ways," Aronofsky said.
The directors take was loosely based on Frank Miller's 'Batman: Year One', and he even brought Miller on to co-write the script.