It’s time for another directorial retrospective and this
week, in honor of the release of his latest film, ‘Interstellar’, today we’ll
be looking at the films of another one of the best directors currently working today
in Hollywood: Christopher Nolan. The London-born director got off to a pretty
good start early in his career with a few solidly-acclaimed movies like ‘Memento’
and ‘Insomnia’. But then in 2005, he truly made his mark in Hollywood when he
took over the ‘Batman’ film franchise. Not only did he bring the character back
to top form after the franchise had died out eight years prior, but also ended
up giving us what is quite frankly the best superhero film trilogy to date
whereas most other superhero film franchises have weaker third entries compared
to the first two (like ‘Spider-Man’ and ‘X-Men’). Nolan is one of the few
directors right now who, in my opinion, has yet to make a bad movie. But with
that said, let me make something perfectly clear; while Nolan is one of my
favorite directors, that doesn’t mean that I’m a Nolan ‘fan-boy’.
Unfortunately, there are some people out there who are so huge fans of Nolan
that they act like he’s the best director ever and act like jerks to anyone who
doesn’t like his movies. You may recall back when ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ came
out, they actually sent death threats to any critic who gave it a negative
review (and given the current critical reception to ‘Interstellar’, I’m
guessing they’ve already done the same thing again to those who didn’t like it).
So while I am a big fan of his movies, I’m not ‘that big’ a fan. So now that I
got that out of the way, here are the films of director Christopher Nolan.
FOLLOWING (1998)
While Nolan first attracted major attention with his second
film, ‘Memento’, his official feature-length debut was 1998’s ‘Following’ and
really, for a film made on a $6,000 budget, featuring a cast consisting of what
we can assume as a bunch of Nolan’s friends (along with his uncle John, who
later appeared in two of the ‘Dark Knight’ films) and with a runtime that’s
just a bit over an hour long, it’s actually a pretty impressive directorial
debut. It’s a very engaging/twisting crime drama that very much feels like a
crime noir. Nolan makes the most of his incredibly limited budget, handling the
cinematography himself and only doing about one or two takes of every scene,
heavily rehearsing them beforehand, so he wouldn’t waste any film stock. This
results in a film that feels incredibly focused from beginning to end due to
how careful Nolan was when it came to making the film. Plus, at just 70 minutes
long, it’s a breeze to get through. All in all, ‘Following’ is a film that, for
its time, was the first to show-off Christopher Nolan’s talents as a director.
Things would only get better for him as time went on.
Rating: 4/5
MEMENTO (2000)
After ‘Following’, Nolan immediately followed that up with ‘Memento’,
which was based off of the short story ‘Memento Mori’ written by his brother
and frequent collaborator Jonathan Nolan. This was the film that officially
established him as one of the best new directors working in Hollywood at the
time although you could also say that he really didn’t become a household name
until he took on the ‘Dark Knight’ trilogy. ‘Memento’ is a very complicated
film, primarily through the way it is structured. There are two parts to this
film; a series of black-and-white sequences and a series of color sequences.
The black-and-white sequences are shown in chronological order, but the color
sequences are shown in reverse order. In other words, one color sequence will
begin where the next color sequence will end and the film intercuts between the
color and black-and-white sequences. It isn’t until the end when both sequences
meet where the film finally starts moving in proper order. So like with many of
Nolan’s films, you have to make sure you’re paying attention because otherwise
you might get lost.
That’s why ‘Memento’ is such an effective psychological
thriller. Because the film is technically ‘out of order’, we’re usually trying
to figure out what’s happening due to the fact that we basically go into each
scene in the middle of the action. We gradually learn more about what happens
as the film goes on. It isn’t until the end, with a great twist regarding the
truth behind the events of the story, when we finally understand what’s really
going on. It’s all headlined by an outstanding performance by Guy Pearce in the
role of Leonard, a man who has anterograde amnesia following an attack on him
and his wife, which resulted in her death, by two men who now looks to find the
one that escaped to enact his revenge for the death of his wife. It’s a
complicated role, and Pearce fits the role of what can be classified as an ‘unreliable
narrator’ perfectly. So much so that it’s sad that he didn’t get nominated for
an Oscar for Best Actor that year because I feel that this is one of the best
performances from any actor/actress that I’ve ever seen. ‘Memento’ is, without
a doubt, one of Nolan’s best films as it is a smartly written thriller with an
excellent payoff.
Rating: 5/5!
INSOMNIA (2002)
This is one of Nolan’s lesser-talked about films and I’m
guessing the main reason for this is because this is the only film that he has
directed where he wasn’t primarily involved with the screenplay. Instead, it
was someone else who wrote this remake of a 1997 Norwegian film of the same
name, though apparently Nolan did write the final draft of the screenplay.
Despite this, the fact that Nolan wasn’t in charge of the screenplay does kind
of show, as the film isn’t as twisted as Nolan’s other works. It’s a much more
straight-forward story. Still, Nolan’s direction shines through in this film, which
centers on a pair of detectives who travel to a small Alaskan town in order to
help solve the case of the murder of a teen girl. However, during the
investigation, the main character Will Dormer (Al Pacino) accidentally shoots
his partner Hap (Martin Donovan) dead, resulting in him suffering from insomnia
due to both his guilt over what had happened and also because the town he’s
staying in is stuck in perpetual daylight. It’s an interesting look into the
psyche of Dormer, who slowly but surely starts to lose his mind as the movie
goes on. Pacino is fantastic in this, but really the main stand-out is Robin
Williams in the role of the killer, crime author Walter Finch. I actually have
to admit that this is the first film of Williams’ that I have seen that wasn’t
a ‘comedy’ and it goes to show that with films like this, ‘Good Will Hunting’,
and ‘The Fisher King’, that Williams was very much a truly great screen talent…
and he will be very much missed. So in short, ‘Insomnia’ is another solid effort
from Nolan, but while I do feel that it’s definitely one of his more underrated
films, I can’t really say it’s his most absolute underrated. Still, ‘Insomnia’
is very much worth checking out.
Rating: 4/5
THE DARK KNIGHT TRILOGY (2005, 2008, 2012)
Due to the fact that I already talked about these films back
in May when I did my retrospective on the ‘Batman’ films in honor of the 75th
anniversary of the character’s first appearance, I’m not going to go into too
much detail about them here. For that, just refer back to that earlier post (http://rimoviecorner.blogspot.com/2014/05/batman-film-retrospective-part-1-live.html)
but I’ll still do a quick recap on what I had said there. After the ‘Batman’
film franchise hit rock bottom in 1997 with ‘Batman and Robin’, Christopher
Nolan revitalized the series in 2005 with ‘Batman Begins’. That film returned the
series to its darker roots and gave us a solid look into the origins of Batman,
something that we hadn’t really seen before in previous films. Featuring a
great cast, great writing, and some terrific visuals, ‘Batman Begins’ is a
phenomenal entry in the comic book genre, even if most of the hand-to-hand
combat sequences aren’t really that good due to shaky cam work and quick
editing. It does something much different in that while it is a comic book
movie, it’s much more grounded in reality than what one would usually expect from
a film of this genre. It’s a style that has influenced many as shown in films
like the Daniel Craig ‘Bond’ films and even some other superhero films like ‘Man
of Steel’ and ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’.
Thankfully, that issue of weak fight sequences disappeared
three years later with ‘The Dark Knight’… I don’t need to go any farther than
that. You all know how phenomenal a movie it is with a well-deserved Oscar win
for Heath Ledger who gave us the best on-screen portrayal yet of Batman’s
iconic nemesis, the Joker. It was such a great movie that admittedly it ended
up having a bit of a negative effect on the finale, ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ and
sure enough there are some people out there who were extremely disappointed by
it. I’m not one of them… sure it may not be as great as ‘The Dark Knight’ due
to some small issues like the occasional plot-hole (even though I’m not really
bothered by them compared to most people) and some rushed character
development. But it’s still an excellent conclusion to this trilogy and if
anything, you can’t deny it’s still a well-crafted film. In short, ‘The Dark
Knight Trilogy’ is the best superhero film trilogy to date as all three films
are superb. That’s because they’re more than just your typical superhero films…
they’re incredibly well-written films that ignore the more fantastical elements
of the comic books to go for much more grounded storylines that I feel do one
of the most iconic comic book superheroes of all time justice. Simply put, this
trilogy is a high mark of the superhero film genre.
BEGINS: 4.5/5
DARK KNIGHT: 5/5!
RISES: 5/5!
THE PRESTIGE (2006)
‘The Prestige’ is easily Christopher Nolan’s most underrated
film, one that feels like it’s been rather forgotten about in recent years. It’s
sad because ‘The Prestige’ is arguably one of Nolan’s best films. It’s an
incredibly compelling story about two magicians, played by Hugh Jackman and
Christian Bale, who form an intense rivalry as they each try to one-up each
other in regards to creating amazing illusions of magic, often leading to
dangerous and tragic results for the both of them. As you would expect from a
Nolan film, ‘The Prestige’ is full of twists and turns to keep you guessing the
entire film. After all, the film opens with the line ‘Are you watching closely?’
which just goes to show how twisty the film’s plot is from beginning to end. I’ve
heard some people say that they didn’t like the ending, but I found it to be a
pretty neat ending. Now for the sake of spoilers I won’t say anything about
what actually happens during the ending. However, if I had to describe it in
just one word, it would be this; Duality. If you see the film, you’ll
understand what I mean by that. All in all, with great production design, great
direction from Nolan (obviously), and a terrific cast including Jackman, Bale,
Michael Caine, and Scarlett Johansson, ‘The Prestige’ definitely deserves more attention
than it’s currently getting. Like I said back in May 2013 when I reviewed the film
‘Now You See Me’, I feel like the idea of magicians isn’t very popular anymore
which I do find a little sad because the art of magic can lead to some amazing
results and this film is very much proof of that.
Rating: 4.5/5
INCEPTION (2010)
In between ‘The Dark Knight’ and ‘The Dark Knight Rises’,
Nolan took on a dream project of his that he had been working on since 2002
about ‘dream stealers’. Originally envisioned as a horror film, it soon became
what we know today as ‘Inception’. As is typical with Nolan’s films, the film
is very complicated in terms of its plot. This is one of those films that very
much requires constant attention throughout… otherwise you might get lost. But
if you do stick with it, the payoff is quite satisfying. ‘Inception’ is an
incredibly engaging and original story (although some will say it’s just ‘The
Matrix’) featuring some incredible visuals that come as a result of the many
dreams that the main characters infiltrate throughout the course of the film,
like the fight sequence where Arthur (Joseph Gordon Levitt) fights henchmen in
a rotating hallway. It’s even more impressive knowing that Nolan, as he did
with the ‘Dark Knight’ films, opted to use as much practical effects as
possible. The cast is terrific from top to bottom, highlighted by Leonardo
DiCaprio in the lead role of Dom, a ‘dream thief’ who takes on one last job in
order to get back home to his kids following the death of his wife Mal (Marion
Cotillard), who now haunts his memories due to him feeling guilty for letting
it happen. The pulse-pounding score by Hans Zimmer, which as many of you know
has been copied quite a lot in many other films since this film came out, is
also excellent. My only complaint about the film is that the pacing is rather
too slow. When I saw this film in the theaters, I swear that it felt like I was
watching a four-hour movie when it was really only two and a half hours.
Despite that, ‘Inception’ is just an awesome sci-fi heist film and another
great entry in Nolan’s prestigious resume.
Rating: 4.5/5
No comments:
Post a Comment