I actually would consider myself a big movie-buff. While I haven’t seen many older films in my lifetime, I’ve stayed up to date with a lot of the newer directors that have become mainstays in Hollywood over the last forty years or so, such as Steven Spielberg, Robert Zemeckis, Greta Gerwig, James Cameron, Guillermo del Toro – the list really goes on, but one person that I had yet to see all their filmography was Christopher Nolan.
While Nolan is responsible for some of my favorite movies of the last two decades, he has many other films that I had never seen before. So, in honor of Oppenheimer releasing, I decided to revisit all of Nolan’s films, both the ones I did watch and the ones I had never seen before – and I have a clear favorite. Let’s get into it.
A Lot Of His Earlier Films Didn’t Impress Me That Much
I’m going to be honest – many of Nolan’s movies from the late 1990s and early 2000s didn’t do it for me.
Don’t get me wrong, they were all great films in many ways. Following was a great directorial debut, Memento is famous for many reasons and has an excellent story, and Insomnia has plenty of psychological moments that get you on the edge of your seat. They all have their good qualities.
If you're wondering where we rank all the Christopher Nolan movies, check out our list.
But for some reason, I just couldn’t get behind these first three. While they were intriguing movies, I don’t think I would find myself watching them again. While they were fun to watch one time, I don’t anticipate heading back towards their respective streaming platforms in order to watch them again.
It’s almost like Requiem for a Dream – I’m glad I at least watched it once, but in terms of coming back to the movie in the future, that’s not really my cup of tea.
The Prestige Was Great – But Not My Favorite
Another Christopher Nolan film I had never seen before was The Prestige, and quite honestly, I think it’s probably my third favorite among all of them.
The Prestige is an excellent film, helmed at the front by two amazing performances from both Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale, and just the premise alone was enough to intrigue me – two rival stage magicians who are trying to perfect some sort of magic trick that would change the world as we know it.
While The Prestige is a totally different film from Insomnia, I think it takes the psychological thriller aspect to a new level and really elevates it. And don’t even get me started on the cinematography – it was out of this world.
Even so, the film is one of my favorites but not the best in my mind.
His Batman Trilogy Is One Of The Best
When we talk about Batman and any iteration of the character that we have seen on screen, Nolan’s films are always in the conversation, and that’s for good reason – they’re good freaking films. The Nolan films are honestly some of the best Batman movies ever made, in my opinion.
From Batman Begins to The Dark Knight to The Dark Knight Rises, these three have cemented their legacy in the movie industry as mainstays, with brilliant performances in all three films – but of course, I have to single out Heath Ledger’s version of the Joker as one of the best.
Beyond his impressive performance, there is so much to love about this franchise. Christian Bale is spectacular as Batman along with the rest of the incredible cast of characters. The visual effects are great. The story is out of this world. I love it. The Dark Knight Rises is definitely my number two among all of Nolan’s films.
Even so, there’s one more that is number one – but we’re not there just yet.
Inception, Dunkirk, and Tenet Are Visual Masterpieces – But Storywise, They Lag
Okay, don’t get me wrong – I love visually dazzling films. I was eager to see Avatar: The Way of Water because I knew it was going to be absolutely beautiful on a big screen. My favorite film series of all time is the Harry Potter franchise, a movie series that is drenched in visual effects.
Out of everyone who knows effects, Nolan knows how to make visual masterpieces and that is amazing to see. Inception, Tenet and Dunkirk are all beautiful examples of that. Heck, I remember seeing both Inception and Dunkirk in theaters (Tenet was during the pandemic so that was an at-home watch), and I was blown away.
But the stories just lag for me.
Before I re-watched these films, I would've had a hard time describing what they were about. The most easy one to understand was Dunkirk, since that was based on a real-life event, but the narrative moved around a lot. Tenet was almost too much information for my brain to handle that it made the movie harder to understand, and Inception is great, but the concepts – at least to me – were difficult to grasp even now watching it again.
Out of the three of them, Inception is great, and would probably be number four because it feels like the easiest one to follow, but still – the visuals are what draw me in for that. One stands above the rest, though.
However, Interstellar Is My Favorite, Overall
It’s just better.
To be honest, the main reason I never watched this movie before was because when it first came out, I was in high school and taking a physics class at the time, and the last thing I wanted to do was watch a movie that was going to be centered around physics and science. So I just missed it for years.
Now almost nine years later, I watched it. And I fell in love.
Is the physics of the movie still a little hard to understand? For someone like me who was never the brightest bulb in science, yes, but it’s not nearly as complicated as some of Nolan’s other films, and for all the science that is included, it somehow flows very easily where it doesn’t feel like information overload.
What makes it better is the visuals – the visuals of this film made me wish I saw it on a big screen. Granted, my partner bought an 85’’ television, so I have a pretty big screen at home, but I could only imagine what seeing this film would be like on a movie theater screen. There was so much thought and effort and design put into every one of these shots, I was absolutely floored.
And the Interstellar cast in and of itself is just so full of talent. The story is heartfelt and inspiring and so much more. Nolan hasn’t made a film like this one since, that’s truly captured my heart and my soul in many ways. I could rewatch Interstellar again and again and not get bored.
To me, it’s my favorite out of all of his films – and it’s time it got even more praise.
I’m Not Sure If Oppenheimer Will Beat It
I am currently writing this piece on July 18th, 2023, and tonight, I am going to be seeing my Oppenheimer screening.
This movie has been getting a lot of media attention recently, and I knew I was going to see it for months just based off of the incredible Oppenheimer cast, but I’m not sure it’ll beat Interstellar for me. While I do love a gritty, biographical movie about war that aims to teach me things about history, I don’t know if Oppenheimer is going to top Interstellar.
I do think it’ll be one of my favorites. I adore these types of films and I really do think that Nolan doesn’t really miss on anything. Even with the movies I didn’t enjoy as much, they were still easily watchable. But we’ll just have to wait and see.
What’s your favorite Christopher Nolan film? All I know is that I am prepared to have my heart hurt after watching Oppenheimer – before re-watching it all over again once I convince my dad to go see it in a theater instead of waiting for streaming.
