Pre Production Unit - Producer/ Director Research: Christopher Nolan

Christopher Nolan is a famous producer and director who has worked on many blockbluster films that are well known to the movie industry and is one of the highest grossing director /producers of all time. I felt it would be really interesting to research him as he is also multiskilled in the roles that I am aiming to carry out myself so it will be intriguing to see his story and how he achieved his success.

Nolan was born in 1970 in London England and began his love of film making at just 7 years old. He borrowed his fathers Super 8 camera shooting short films with action figures. From there, his uncle who worked at NASA sent him some footage of a recent rocket lauch where Nolan would cut and re edit the scenes together. It was from here at age 11 he knew he wanted to be a film maker. Nolan made his first directorial debut with a film called 'Following' (1998). This was classed as a modern neo-noir film and was completly different to anything that had come out at the time.

The term neo-noir is a type of genre that appeared in the 1940's - 1950's and is often interperated as a more contemporary and stylish version of a noir film. They also pay homage to old American crime thrillers. The film is no acception as the plot follows a man who observes people walking around on the street looking for inspiration to write a novel. He becomes particularly fancinated by a man in a dark suit who he later discovers commits burglaries and other various crimes.

After this film he recieved a lot more attention when he directed his second feature called 'Memento'. Still sticking to the same genre, this neo- noir thriller was something that Nolan had written himself based off a pitch by Johnathan Nolan. The film follows the plot of a man who suffers with amneisia allowing him to occur memory loss every 5 minutes. With all this, he is trying to track down the person who attacked him and also killed his wife. Whats really interesting about this film is the structure and the way it has been done. It is done in reverse starting at the end of the film working its way backwards to the start. You can see a diagram of the structure below:

The film also plays with colour with most of the sequences in colour whilst transition in and out of black and white. I find this really interesting as a way to help with the films structure and the overall added style to the film. 'Memento' recieved numerous awards including Oscar nominations for best screenplay and best editing. From here Christopher Nolans career grew at a rapid pace. He followed with films such as dunkirk, interstella, inception and produced and directed what is know by IMDB based on critic reviews as the 3rd best film of all time behind 'The Shawshank Redemption' and 'The Godfather' called 'The Dark Knight'.

For me im interested to see how a successful film from a director/ producer who has such vision and style turns something into the film that it is. I am going to be analysing a scene from 'The Dark Knight' later but first I want to see some production notes about the film. After doing some research there was an interesting interview with Charles Roven, a producer that helped Christopher Nolan with the film. He says, "Chris had a wonderful overall vision of what he wanted to achieve in this film, and he was able to acomplish that and more. Hes one of those rare directors who, when he tells you what hes trying to do, no matter how ambitious, you can rely on the fact that he will do it, usually even better than you imagined". This was really interesting for me. It says to me if you have vision in what you are trying to achieve, it will go a long way and will become clearer to a team when trying to explain what you want to do. Without vision you will struggle to achieve the exact looks you are going for and the communication to your team will not be as good. 

Nolan also talks about casting in this interview. When talking about casting the role for the villian of the film The Joker, he says "in casting the part, the defining quality I was looking for was fearlessness. I needed a phenominal actor but he also had to be someone unaffraid of taking on such an iconic role". He also explains how he met heath ledger who ended up playing the role even before the writing process had finished to explain characteristics and to break down what the role involved. This is something that I feel is really important as a producer and a director. I feel its important to meet up with the actor from a very early stage to ensure they are going to play the character right and to cast well. Its also important from a directors point of view to really ensure the actor/ actress will understand the vision and inspiration of how the character will perform.

In terms of locations, Nolan describes a good tip. He explains that "when you are writing or you are reading a script, you often envision a place that you have been to in your head before. I find that if you can work in that exact place you are thinking of, or place you have seen, you will be working exactly true to your vision". This has resonated with me as I feel when being a producer/ director I should stay as true to my vision as much as my budget and possiblities allow me to.

I wanted to look at a scene from this film and break it down as I mentioned earlier. The scene I have looked at is an intense scene where the Joker is held in an interegation room whilst Batman's love interest and Gotham Cities famous district attorney are held hostage at seperate locations. You can watch the scene below: 

Whats interesting about the first sequence we see when the scene opens is the use of shots that Nolan has decided to choose. When the joker is asking the police officer how many of his friends he has killed, Nolan decides to focus more on capturing the reaction of whats being said rather than whos speaking. We hear the two people talking but as one speaks the camera mainly focuses on the person whos being spoken to, not whos speaking. This i felt was interesting and really affective when they are talking about such an intense subject. All the shots are very static, slow and smooth with a slight zoom in on the subject. This heightens the intensity of whats going on as well as a sense that eventhing is closing in as the conversation goes on. I feel if I was to do a scene where there is intensity with a character this is something I would try myself as I feel it really works well. We then cut to a man in a cell, portrayed as mad and speaking nonsense. Here we also have the same effect. The camera is fairly still with the slight zoom into the subject to add the intensity. 

Following this we cut to the two people that are being held captive talking over a radio. In this sequence we cut between the two different people in a mid shot almost intentically positioned. The only thing about the two shots that are different is the background of where they are and that one person is talking to the right and one is talking to the left. Whats interesting about this is the way Nolan has set it up in such a way that its almost like they are in the same room having a conversation and its just cutting between them. I felt this was clever as although they are not in the same room, hes done this in such a way that it makes you feel like they are and helps conversation to flow comfortably.

The next shot that follows is really bold and different. Harvey tries to break free rocking his chair but it slips and knocks him onto the floor along with a leaking petrol barrel. To break the shots up and to make things different. Nolan decides to film this shot on its side as the petrol pours along the floor from the top. I feel this is done effectively drawing attention well to whats just happened. 

We then revert to all of the other locations again as if a cycle right to the climax of the whole scene. As we revisit each place the shot draws close and closer to the characters each time and the score has an eerie high pitch tone that gets louder and louder. This is done really well building up tension and keeping it interesting seeing 3 differernt things going on at once as well as happening in real time. 

Overall after analysing this scene in depth I can really see a clear structure of what Nolan has chosen to do in order to create intensity and to keep an audience really drawn to the screen. Although the film I will be making wont be as high budget as this in terms of locations and effects, I still feel I can take a lot from the scene in terms of shot types and how to do things slightly differently as well as cinematically.  

Finally I wanted to see if Christopher Nolan had advice about producing and directing a film. I came across several articles where he explained what he finds is important to film making and I feel this is something I can learn from. In regards to producing a good film he stated the first importance is getting a good team together to help execute the film with you. He says "I was at a film festival with an early film and Ron Judkin's Hi-Line was being shown at Sundance. I thought It was a really beautifully executed film that was clearly produced with limited resources. I had to meet the guy who shot it. I decided after our first conversation that I wanted to work with Wally. We formed a great realationship and I made sure I envolved his talent in my next film". This shows that forming a good team and making use of spotting talent is important when looking for crew and cast.

The next tip he gave was to understand every job throughout the process of the production to ensure you can produce with all the knowledge you need. "From sound to editing and the music, If you understand all the departments, you can understand what you need inside and out for a film". This has made me think that I need to make sure I have knowledge of how the film is going to work from a producers point of view as well as a directors point of view to ensure the two are in sync and can be planned effectivly.

The final tip he gave was on locations. He explained that "real places have credabillity". What he means by this is that in order to do the film justice, it has to work with the story as best as it posibilly can. If you are saying someone is poor, make sure they are in a poor place. If you are talking about someone who is rich, make sure their surrounding are grand and exdravagant. Also using CGI can really take away from a film if you use to much of it or if it is not done right. If it can be done in real life, choose to do it in real life.

I will take all of what I have learnt about Christopher Nolan for my own work. I feel I have retained a lot of useful information that will help me develop my film in many different ways, even if the budgets are very different.