Christopher Nolan’s Visual Style: A Look At Nolan’s Directing

Christopher Nolan is a film director who, over the last fifteen years, has been at the forefront of Hollywood’s current resurgence in blockbuster filmmaking.

He is often quoted as saying that his films, especially in the Batman series, are very much influenced by the two things he loves the most: Memento and comic books.

Ever since Nolan started making films at the age of 7 with his super 8 camera, he knew that film-making was what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.

He made amateur films with family members in the garden of their home when he was young.

He also wrote stories about a fictional superhero named Batman during this time which became the inspiration for his successful films later on in his career.

In addition to being a director, Christopher also worked as a writer before becoming famous for directing films. He has written scripts for other Hollywood movies, also.

How Does Christopher Nolan Write & Direct?

Towards the end of his 2005 blockbuster Batman Begins, Hans Zimmer’s score rises to a crescendo and we cut to black.

This ending was not only shocking for its abruptness but also for the fact that it provides no resolution to Gotham City’s need for a hero.

This is where The Dark Knight picks up, with Harvey Dent as Gotham’s new folk-hero after he took out Joker in prison (in one of the most memorable scenes of any superhero movie).

Nolan had already said that there was always a plan to make two Batman movies but what makes The Dark Knight so special is that it seems as if it was all planned from pretty much day one.

It wasn’t though, Nolan simply had a rough idea of what he wanted to do with his second Batman movie and left himself enough room for improvisation and changing plans along the way.

Christopher Nolan Filmmaking Basics

Welcome to the Christopher Nolan Filmmaking Basics series! This series will be a collection of articles that will teach you the basics of filmmaking, and hopefully help you understand some of Christopher Nolan’s unique directorial choices.

Tightness vs. Brevity

When people talk about Nolan’s style, one thing they often mention is his use of long takes. They feel it makes the movie more realistic and immersive, and they’re right. But that’s not all it does.

In Batman Begins, Nolan uses these long takes to compress time and push the narrative to a higher pace than would normally be expected from a blockbuster film. One great example of this is the scene where Bruce Wayne first sees Ra’s al Ghul for the first time (image 1).

Ra’s arrives late for his meeting with Bruce, and so he meets him in the hallway instead of in his office (image 2). We see Ra’s as he walks down the hallway towards Bruce, who is waiting for him by his assistant (image 3).

The camera rests on Ra’s as he walks past them (image 4), then follows him as he walks into his office and closes the door (image 5). It then tracks backwards until it reaches its original position in front of Bruce and his assistant (image

Christopher Nolan Directing Techniques

Christopher Nolan is a director who has directed many great movies. He has been nominated for and won many prestigious awards. He is known for his incredible directing techniques and the use of practical effects rather than CGI where possible.

Here are some of the most used Christopher Nolan Directing Techniques:

The rule of 3s: The rule of thirds is a rule about composition in art, photography and design. The idea behind it is that the human eye will naturally be drawn to any object placed along the diagonal lines of a tic-tac-toe board, or at the intersection of two such lines.

Experienced photographers know this, and know to place the important parts of their image along these lines or at these intersections. Nolan uses this technique in every film he makes, often with characters placed in the upper right hand corner of the frame – like Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins.

Motion in camera: Nolan tries to avoid using computer generated imagery (CGI) wherever possible, instead he opts for real sets and real props that have been moved by hand on camera. Inception was filmed with an array of custom-made miniature models that were then composited together digitally; Inception’s cityscapes are all CGI creations. 

Christopher Nolan Writing Tips

Christopher Nolan is one of the most successful writers and directors of the past decade, but that hasn’t always been the case. Before his breakout film Memento, he struggled to get his writing taken seriously and was told that he would never work in Hollywood again.

In an interview with The Guardian, Nolan revealed the ten tips he learned from his experience writing for Batman Begins: Find a voice for your character. If you can give your characters a distinct voice then you have a beginning.

For example, when I first met my wife, she had just finished working on a play where she spoke in rhyming couplets. The characterisation was so strong that I remember thinking immediately: “I’ll make a movie with her one day.”

The audience must always be able to follow what’s happening on screen or it’s not worth making the film. It needs to be clear who’s doing what to whom and why. One of the most common mistakes made by amateurs is giving characters too many things to do at once. You can’t juggle seven balls while walking a tightrope; three is already pushing it.

Best Nolan Movies

The best Nolan movies show a director with a firm grasp of action and suspense and an understanding of human nature. “Memento” (2000) is a good example of how Nolan can create a film that demonstrates those strengths while still being completely unique.

The movie is presented in reverse order, meaning that in the beginning the main character suffers from memory loss, which means that the ending reveals itself first. This allows Nolan to present the story in a non-linear fashion and maintain a sense of mystery throughout.

The great thing about this movie is how it leaves you guessing until the final moments. It’s one of those films where it’s hard to really know what’s going on until the end, but it’s worth taking the journey to get there.

   

Some other great examples of Nolan’s work include: “The Prestige” (2006), “Inception” (2010) and “Interstellar” (2014). These are all great films for showing off his storytelling ability and his skill with suspense as well as action.

The best Nolan movies also show his ability to direct actors with charisma, such as: Michael Caine, Christian Bale, Leonardo DiCaprio and Gary Oldman. 

Christopher Nolan’s Directing Style

Christopher Nolan is a director who has made a historical impact on the movie industry. He has left his mark on movies like The Dark Knight, Interstellar and Inception.

Even though he has been working since 1997, it wasn’t until Batman Begins that he became popular even with non-movie goers.

Trying to understand Christopher Nolan’s directing style is no easy task. His films are so different from each other and at the same time, they all have specific characteristics that make them so unique.

The main concept of Christopher Nolan’s directing style is vision. He is a director who tells stories that are new every time, even if they have similarities to other movies in some aspects. This can be seen as a good thing or not, but you cannot say that he doesn’t know what he is doing.

Everything in his films comes together in order to create a great story and an experience for the viewers. One of the most important characteristics of his films is the viewer’s involvement in the story.

He tells extraordinary stories that captivate the audience and force them to share the same feelings as the protagonists at all times (even if those emotions range from happiness to pure terror). Another characteristic of Christopher Nolan’s directing style is symbolism. 

Christopher Nolan Directing Tips

Here are some tips that you can learn from watching his movies: Use a rule of three: Nolan loves to use the rule of three when he writes screenplays.

This rule is also known as the principle of threes in literature and rhetoric for its use in oral storytelling traditions dating back to ancient Greece and beyond.

Three is an important number that can be used to tell stories. A classic example from literature is the fairy tale The Three Little Pigs by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

The first pig builds his house out of straw; the second pig builds his out of sticks; and the third pig builds himself a house out of bricks.

Christopher Nolan’s Circles

If you’re a screenwriter who hopes to write a movie that a lot of people will want to see, you need to study the work of Christopher Nolan. Tense and Confidence

Quick cutaways, flashbacks and transitions are classic Nolan signatures. They’re also hallmark techniques that keep viewers on edge, in suspense and unable to predict what’s coming next.

That makes for compelling reading.

Nolan doesn’t lay out his plot points in chronological order like most screenwriters do. Instead he jumps back and forth between past, present and future tense, sometimes within the same sentence.

He also uses the same strategy when it comes to the timeline of his story—sometimes jumping from one year to another with just a few lines of dialogue. His scripts read like he’s daring you to understand what’s going on, which makes them fun and exciting and keeps them from being predictable.

Other Nolanesque Moves Other hallmarks of Nolan’s writing include:

Lots of description that evokes images in the mind’s eye (as opposed to a lot of dialogue) Inclusion of “parallel action” or subplots that run alongside the main plot line but are independent from it. 

Christopher Nolan’s Shot List