Favorite Christopher Nolan Movie

Which is your favorite?


  • Total voters
    100

x Tame Impala

HFBoards Sponsor
Sponsor
Aug 24, 2011
28,738
13,745
For my money it's Christpher Nolan and Dennis Villenueve as the two best directors pumping out movies over the last 20 years or so. Nolan especially, the guy just has the vision for awesome film. He brings action and humanity to a blockbuster scale and I love just about everything he's done.

The Prestige will always be my favorite of his works. It was casted so perfectly, the story was so tight, the concept and world he built was so intriguing. I just loved all of it. What about you all?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Randy Butternubs

sr edler

gold is not reality
Mar 20, 2010
12,135
6,617
I haven't seen all of those, but from those I've seen (The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Memento, Inception, and Interstellar) my favourite is The Prestige followed by the The Dark Knight, I thought both of those films had some really strong moments (though the latter film still a little bit too long IMO) without dipping too much in the mud.

Memento and Inception were both okay-ish films, but still a bit lukewarm and/or gimmicky for my own taste.

Interstellar I thought was absolutely terrible.

Insomnia I've only seen the original with Stellan Skarsgård. I've no idea why you would want to do a remake of that movie when it already exists in a perfectly fine version of its own.
 

x Tame Impala

HFBoards Sponsor
Sponsor
Aug 24, 2011
28,738
13,745
I haven't seen all of those, but from those I've seen (The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Memento, Inception, and Interstellar) my favourite is The Prestige followed by the The Dark Knight, I thought both of those films had some really strong moments (though the latter film still a little bit too long IMO) without dipping too much in the mud.

Memento and Inception were both okay-ish films, but still a bit lukewarm and/or gimmicky for my own taste.

Interstellar I thought was absolutely terrible.

Insomnia I've only seen the original with Stellan Skarsgård. I've no idea why you would want to do a remake of that movie when it already exists in a perfectly fine version of its own.
Insomnia was great. Robin Williams, Al Pacino, and Hilary Swank killed it. The Alaskan setting was used perfectly IMO. If you haven’t seen it I definitely recommend it
 

JackSlater

Registered User
Apr 27, 2010
19,234
14,538
The Dark Knight, then either The Prestige or Dunkirk. Memento or Batman Begins next. Interstellar and Inception had the potential to be great but never realized it due to plot.

I haven't seen all of those, but from those I've seen (The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Memento, Inception, and Interstellar) my favourite is The Prestige followed by the The Dark Knight, I thought both of those films had some really strong moments (though the latter film still a little bit too long IMO) without dipping too much in the mud.

Memento and Inception were both okay-ish films, but still a bit lukewarm and/or gimmicky for my own taste.

Interstellar I thought was absolutely terrible.

Insomnia I've only seen the original with Stellan Skarsgård. I've no idea why you would want to do a remake of that movie when it already exists in a perfectly fine version of its own.

Definitely prefer the original Insomnia but Nolan's is fine. Almost a pointless remake but there are probably a lot of people who only saw the original due to curiosity stemming from Nolan's version.
 

ItsFineImFine

Registered User
Aug 11, 2019
3,722
2,383
Inception then Interstellar then Dark Knight Rises.

Haven't seen Oppenheimer yet. Man Inception was fun in the theatre and on rewatch.
 

Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,909
10,770
I'm slightly surprised that I've seen all of them, since I'm not the biggest Nolan fan. Oppenheimer was the first that I saw in theater. I do consistently like and respect his movies, though, so I guess that that's enough for me to want to see each one. The one that stands out is The Prestige, which I remember really liking, so I voted that. After that, it's Memento.
 
  • Like
Reactions: BGDDYKWL and Crow

NyQuil

Big F$&*in Q
Jan 5, 2005
99,121
65,439
Ottawa, ON
There is one missing - Following, which was sort of a low budget black and white film that is reminiscent of Memento as far as twists and turns are concerned.

It involves an author who follows around a couple of thieves for inspiration as they go about their criminal activities .

Interestingly, the burglar who takes him under his wing is named Cobb (same as Di Caprio's character in Inception).

I'd heard somewhere that Nolan, at the end of the screening of Following at one of the festivals, told the audience that if they liked what they had seen, they could fund his next project, which was Memento.

It's worth watching if you want to see his entire body of work, but it's definitely raw.

I've seen all of his films (aside from Oppenheimer), but I'd say my top 3 would probably be:
1. Inception
2. Interstellar
3. Memento
 
Last edited:

Hivemind

We're Touched
Oct 8, 2010
37,454
14,097
Philadelphia
The Prestige - The Dark Knight Rises was his golden period. Not that there aren't good films on either side of that range, but Interstellar is markedly where he began to fall off a bit and he started ruining his own audio.
 

johnjm22

Pseudo Intellectual
Aug 2, 2005
20,958
17,837
Memento for me.

I think The Dark Knight is a very overrated film.

Despite it's major flaws, I enjoyed Interstellar.

Nolan is a big ambitious filmmaker. I respect that a lot. He's one of the few director's left whose films feel like an event. That said, I think his movies are often a bit sloppy and fatiguing at times. Primarilly his later output.
 

HanSolo

DJ Crazy Times
Apr 7, 2008
99,228
35,410
Las Vegas
Well my list would be different if it was ranking it by "best"

1. Inception: for me the most inherently rewatchable. I don't think Nolan fully sticks the landing with the wider concept of invading dreams as I found some of the concepts in the last act distractingly silly. But despite being an imperfect concept, it's still a very entertaining one to me and one that created plenty of fun action/visual effect set pieces.

2. The Dark Knight: Not much to say. It's not perfect by any stretch but it's a super polished superhero movie that's really more of a high stakes detective thriller. Ledger's joker remains inherently captivating and one of, for my money, one of the best movie villains in that the Joker truly elevates the narrative, drives the plot, and commands the screen with his presence.

3. The Prestige: everything beyond the Prestige is kind of like "yeah I'd re-watch it if someone asked me to" but the Prestige is the last of the Nolan movies that I'd really feel like going back to to have a fun movie viewing experience. Not much to say about the plot. It's just a fun story.

(The rest are interchangeable)

Interstellar would win more points with me if it wasn't for the last act being totally preposterous; visually impressive movie though.

Dunkirk is solid but having seen it 3 times now I don't feel like I have much reason to see it again. 1917, to me, is a better WW1 movie from the past decade.

Batman Begins I've seen four times but for whatever reason it just never resonates with me. Nothing about it makes it inherently memorable or special to me.

The Dark Knight Rises is almost great but there's some truly stupid writing decisions that take me out of it (like every police officer in Gotham going into and getting stuck in the sewers to allow Bane to hatch his plan when the threat of the bomb is good enough on its own)

Tenet has some really entertaining action but the story is really messy. And after watching it twice, I have no desire to go back.

Memento is a solid entry in his early works but having seen it twice, I don't feel compelled to watch it again. The plot unraveling the first time is compelling. Second time as a reminder of what it was all about, but not as fun just remembering revelations I'd already seen.

Oppenheimer I may come back to 2 or so more times for the excellent performances but it being a three hour talk heavy flick, I don't see that much entertainment value from repeat viewings aside from taking in and enjoying the acting.

I haven't seen Insomnia.
 

Seedtype

Registered User
Sponsor
Aug 16, 2009
2,476
1,041
Ohio?!?!
I chose Inception because I feel it's the one most demanding of a sequel, or what I think would be best, a television series. It just screams for more stories and I'm surprised no one has suggested it.

Inception does a good job of laying down the basics of invading people's mind, and I can see a number of scenarios that can be selected for stories: influencing politicians, stealing tech secrets, assassination by scrambling people's minds, stopping other dream thieves and so on(heck how about a serial killer?).

But not only that, one thing that did struck me about Inception when you think about it was how boring the dreams were in Inception. Where is the really crazy stuff? Heck, where is the sexuality? How about crazy scenarios like space travel blended with weird fantasy stuff? Or how about insane nightmares? How about solving a mystery surrounding a war atrocity by going into a soldier's mind that is broken? You can do all sorts of things with people's dreams, and you can scale the budget however you wish.
 

Howe Elbows 9

Registered User
Sep 16, 2007
3,833
379
Sweden
The Prestige, Dunkirk, Memento, Interstellar and Inception are my current top 5 (haven't seen Oppenheimer or Tenet yet).
 

Ghoste

#JustGetIn
Sponsor
Sep 14, 2005
10,380
5,350
San Diego, CA
I like them all in their own way. But The Prestige and Inception are probably my favorites.

Seen Memento when it was new. Liked his style so much so I looked up what else he did, then watched Following. I was like yeah this guy is going to put out great movies. And it has been pretty much just as I thought, these many years later.
 

Bakayoko Ono

Registered User
Aug 12, 2007
4,679
728
Helsinki
Inception, Dark Knight and Interstellar make my TOP-3. I’ve seen Tenet three times and it’s the only Nolan movie I don’t like.
 

Pranzo Oltranzista

Registered User
Oct 18, 2017
3,980
2,899
I said it before somewhere on here and caught some heat, but I think most of Nolan's films are more gimmicky than truly complex or fleshed out. Hence why I'd probably put some of his Batman films just after Interstellar.

I still like most of them. I just don't think of them as great films.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Spring in Fialta

I am not exposed

Registered User
Mar 16, 2014
22,989
12,639
Vancouver
I think it might be Batman Begins. It is the one I revisit the most.


Dunkirk felt too much like a computer game as I recall. Although it was well done, I considered it his weakest film up to that point. Then along came Tenet and that is the only one I don't like.

Haven't seen the newest one yet.

Batman Begins is my favourite but Inception/Dark Knight are probably his best.
 

The Crypto Guy

Registered User
Jun 26, 2017
28,256
36,782
So I just realized I guess i’m not of fan of his movies. Didnt see the new one though yet.
 

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Ad