Christopher Nolan - Following

0:01 It's only been a few days since Oppenheimer was released. The movie is so good. I'm still feeling the aftershock. Well, there's only one director I want to talk about. Well, he is the man of the hour. So let's talk about a film by Christopher Nolan, his nineteen ninety eight neo noir underrated classic. Following Hello everybody, and welcome back to a Film by Podcast, I'm Jeff Johnson. I am Brad Kozo. Brad, You've you've got to be excited about about Oppenheimer. I know you saw it, but yeah I did. I did see it, and obviously I listened to the Back to the box Office review. I adored it. It is a film, as you guys talk about, was so much going on. I feel like I didn't get everything. I mean, Christopher Allen films deserve a second and third watch. But I'm excited to watch it again and to do a little research about it as well, because I think the story itself is fascinating.

1:32 Absolutely I mentioned this, Uh, I think I mentioned this too with Dayton on our Back to the Box Office review. I implore you, Brad, watch the nineteen eighty nine film Fatman and Little Boy, starring Paul Newman because it goes hand in hand with Oppenheimer, right, And now that I've seen Oppenheimer, right, I did, and I'm excited to talk about this. And I mean we had to pull an audible. Basically we were set to do Insomnia, yeah originally, And if listeners, if you don't know basically what we do is, you know, we get a basically a list of what we've got coming up as far as filmmakers, episodes and stuff.

2:12 And you know, we usually prep by watching a few movies of the director and stuff, and we're you know, talking beforehand. And I had gotten on the subject of I've seen every one of the Christopher Nolan's films except following, and I only thought it was unavailable, like if you bought the Criterion disc or you had the Criterion Channel and you said that it was on to B and I was gonna watch it before I rewatched Insomnia anyway, and and you were like, this might wanna we might want to shift gears and talk about the following because it sawny as good as a movie it is, and is it an underrated film, yes, but it's still got you know, big stars in it and stuff. But this, I feel is the true kind of underrated. You need to know about this. We need to tell people about this movie. Yeah, I cannot agree with you more. I was fascinated by this film. Uh when I when I've seen it just several days ago. I mean we you talked about us switching gears, you know.

3:14 Uh, I'm glad we did. Though. I'm definitely glad we did um before we get started. Brad, Yes, right quick, I do want to uh say thank you to uh one of our regulars, Scott Hoffman, who just completed our most recent Patreon episode exclusive to a film bias Patreon. Uh, you would you'll you'll love this, Brad. We did uh cheap Tricks Mighty Wings versus Yeah versus King Cobra's Iron Eagle Never Say Die. It was like a battle of underrated songs from the two of the biggest and best soundtracks of nineteen eighty six, talking about Top Gun and Iron Eagles.

3:57 So look, don't miss out. For as little as three dollars, you can get full access to all the exclusive content and some pretty sweet merch. Yeah. Absolutely, Brad. I also want to take a quick moment to to say hello to one of our newest listeners who has who's been interacting with us quite a bit on social media talking about mister Jason Costlett. This guy he actually he discovers us because he's listening to our friends Dan Jason at Shirley You Hit Me Serious podcast. Happened to catch at that classic where we discuss Superman, The Quest for Peace and Jaws of Revenge. Oh yeah, yeah, but he kind of found us through them, Brad. He starts off with one of his favorite films that we happened to review recently. He did, he listened to cob loved it so nice. Yeah, so, Jason, and we are happy to have you. And Jason is not alone, Brad. It seems like we are on the rise in Great Britain, Australia, in Denmark. So all of you outside the US, thank you for for listening, and we appreciate it. Yeah, we do so, Brad.

5:25 Following right, Here's the thing. I know, for the longest time, I assumed it was like a short, like a like a like a short film that he had done in college or something like that, and I never really got into it. I never really checked it out. Can you give us a quick synopsis? Yes, that's a spoiler free as best I can kind of sum it up real simple m synopsis. So basically, when a down on his luck rider starts following strangers as a hobby, it quickly turns into a deadly game as he meets Cobb, a burglar that quickly he takes him under his wing. As the two men jumped from place to place brugalizing strangers, a mystery unfolds with sex, betrayal, possibly murder. Before anyone knew about the man who reinvented the Dark Night, dazzled us with an inception, inspired us with Interstellar, and it's blowing up the theaters with Oppenheimer.

6:17 This is following a film by Christopher Nolan. I'm glad that you said spoiler free because watching this, I have to believe that a lot of people have not seen this movie, and this is this we got, we gotta. We're gonna have to be careful because this is one that you don't want to spoil for people, because at the end of this movie, I had that you know, you know, that feeling you got when when you watched The Sixth Sins for the first time, or you watched The Usual Suspects for the first time. Did you have that feeling? Yeah, it's a yeah, this is a mystery, you know, like I said, like you said, a film nor So it's a lot of um. There's some time jumping in between, you know, just a little bit of time jumping.

7:00 But it's easy to tell because the main character, who's never really given a name, just considered the young man. He has a little bit longer hair and like facial hair. At one point in it has short hair. But you might be a little confused with stuff. But trust me, it's one of those films, like with all the Christopher Nolan films, once it comes to the end, it all comes together. You know, no one Brad this is his his film debut. He writes it, he shoots it, he directs it, he edits, and he co produces. He's a short craft services. He's pretty much doing everything on this project. Yeah, and this is a I mean, this is one of the ways you do a small I've got no money, I've got no locations, I've got no special effects, I've got no stunt man. How am I going to do a movie? Very small? And he makes it interesting. You know, the beginning of the film and this is not as spoiled as that. The you know, the young man talks about following people, you know, not in a creepy way, just interested in where they're going, And the idea itself does sound kind of interesting. Could you follow someone without any you know, negative intent in it, just to see where are they going, what are they doing, and then find out about their lives. But like I said, as it unfolds, you realize it sounds so innocent to do, but

8:33 you're just looking for trouble when you start doing that. It's a great opening moment because with any good film, to are you don't know who to trust, You don't know who who to who to get behind. Just yet, we see two guys talking and this one guy, the young man who you know, he goes by Bill, he goes by Danny. At certain different you know parts of the movie, he's explaining that what he's doing is shadowing. He's not following, he's shadowing, and he's talking to someone else, and at that point he does sound kind of creepy. So you don't know if this is this our guy, Is this the guy that we're gonna follow or not. I love the I love how he asked to speak to that person, you know, which you know, I don't think this is any kind of any kind of spoiler. But he's talking to a detective, right and he's and he's trying to like he's trying to, you know, explain himself so that he doesn't sound like a creep. Yeah, And as he's explaining it, you know, you're in your mind thinking like, okay, this is a little wrong, but he's laying it out in very innocent ways, so it doesn't sound like he is a bad guy. And like I said, you don't know if he's the protagon that's obviously. Seeing other films of Nolan, you know, you're you're in something. You know, the next film a mento, you're sitting there watching the narrator of the entire time and you're he's wrong, you know. So you don't know really who to trust. But that's the thing, because you keep guessing because you don't know,

10:07 and these things pop up and you're like, why does this person have a black eye all of a sudden and just just trust me, hold on to it. And this is not a long film. This is a very short term. This movie is an hour in ten minutes. Oh yeah, yeah, and but it has a first, second, and third act and it's a it's brilliant the way it's conceived. Yeah, speaking of how speaking of its conception, no one gets this idea after his house is broken into. Yeah, and one of his first thoughts upon realizing this is, I wonder what the thieves we're thinking about while looking through my stuff? So, Brad, let's uh, we got we got four central characters we can talk about here. Jeremy Theobald plays the young Man aka Bill aka any Not a lot uh, not a lot that this guy has done as far as big box office stuff. He does have a couple small credits. He does show up in Batman Begins and Tenant, but yeah, very small parts. Yeah.

11:18 Yeah, great actor though, Yeah I was. He was really good at it. Yeah. Equally impressive is Alex Hall and plays Cobb. Now, Brad, this is his only film role. Yeah. I have seen him in nothing, but he has a has an interesting quality to him. I don't know why he h it wasn't any gone any further that he chose to because he's really clever in Thiss and he's very um, he's very smooth. This is one of those situations where he was doing this kind of stuff just to pay his way through school. If you're looking for Alex All, now look no further than one of the leading New York architecture firms where he's an architect. Wow, that's only credit, only film credit. And if you want it, you know you want more from Alex Hall. You know he's gonna have to, you know, design a house or a building for you. I guess I think I'd put that on my billboard or billboard or business card. It's a start in Christopher Nolan's first ever film. Yeah, I don't care what job I've got, that that would definitely be on my business card. Yeah, let's let's talk about Lucy Russell. Every every good neo noir or mystery needs that film Fatale. Lucy Russell playing the blonde.

12:33 Never get a name, she's just the blond and uh quick snappy dialogue she gets you know, yeah, you know, like she's got an answer for everything quick. You know she doesn't. She doesn't search. So even though if you think she's lying, you're not sure because she's so quick about it. And once again you don't know her intensions. Good are they nuts? You just yeah, you don't know. You never know if you can trust the film fatale she has. We've seen her in smaller roles in Batman Begins and World War Z and Um. Definitely on on television where she's been on The Crown, Chernobyl and recently Bratt she was playing she's been playing supervisor Grandy on Disney Plus's Star Wars show and Or which I know you haven't started yet, but man, I know that's where. That's what she's from. I recognize her face now that's you've seen her. Yeah, and I know, yeah Chernobyl, you had to you probably, Yeah, I did watch Chernobyl as well. Yeah, now we got we got our police detective played by John Nolan. Yeah, is he that? That's not I don't know if that's a nephew of them or an uncle or this is that John Nolan is actually Christopher Nolan's uncle, prominent TV actor. Uh. He had some small roles in Dunkirk and and I always I remember for the Batman trilogy because he's one of the Wayne industry's board members. He plays Fredericks, one of the

14:07 one of the good, one of the good ones. You know, it's not trying to always bust, you know, Bruce winch chops. And then lastly, look, I've watched this movie three times. I have a whole really I've yet to find her. But apparently Emma Thomas uh. Not only is she co producing this, uh, she is an extra in the film. She's listed in the cast. I yeah, I watched it. Yeah. Well, let's talk a little bit about how this movie comes to be Okay, because it's you know, it's filmed in London for six thousand dollars. Most of the locations are actually houses that belong to friends and family.

14:52 Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's how you do it when when you got no money. Now here's what you talk about, not having any money to finally at something. This really shocks me. Everyone that's involved in this film has nine to five day jobs. So Nolan shoots this only on Saturdays over the course of several months, aiming to get about fifteen minutes of footage every day. I mean that's not only extremely clever for this type of film, but extremely nice to his actors, especially when you're doing a very very small production and they're asking a lot of out of you and then one minute they're like, okay, we need you to dedicate so much time and you're like, yeah, well but you're not paying me, and you know, I got a you know, a child and a family and things like that, and you know, you don't want to be able to quit your job because you know, I think if they all knew where he would eventually go, I'm sure they would have quit their day jobs in a second. But you know, considering, I think that's extremely nice for him because that is the way that a lot of stuff has to get done. It's like you got to work around everybody's schedule. The only director I've ever heard of doing this is our very own David Burns, and I see I say that from experience because doing a couple of his documentary shorts, that's that's how it gets

16:25 done. You work when when you can, and you take advantage of it. Speaking of taking advantage Nolan, you know he's pretty much financing this whole thing by himself. So to keep costs down, his actors rehearsed for months on location because he was insistent on hey, we're going to use the first take or the second take. There will not be a third take. He shoots it in black and white because as we all know that's that's always the cheaper option, right and then uh, no, no professional lighting equipment, Brad. He uses natural light for this whole this whole thing. Yeah, And it's a little closer than you would see most Christopher Nolan films. It's a little bit more tighter shots of actors, not a lot of pullbacks and things like that. So you almost feel a little bit of a closed space.

17:18 You know, you almost feel tightened in. You could feel the tightness of that neighborhood, the you know, the littleness of the room and stuff like that. It doesn't really open up until they're at you know, the Blonde's place. But other than that, you know, you're so tight and you know, constricted. But it's almost like a yeah, like I feel like claustrophobia. It's gotta be because he's doing guerrilla filmmaking here. It's it's all handheld, you know, he's and he's the one operating the camera. It's interesting because to do that style of filmmaking while also telling a non linear story and in the film noir aesthetic. Let me think about this, this film, like you kind of talked about at the beginning, you were talking about it's a little there's a little confusion here here and there. That's because he's he's employing flashbacks, flash forwards. He's he's shooting out of He's he's showing this story out of sequence. There's fast cuts, you know, and this is this is the beginning of his of his style. But you know, think about it. You know you saw this. You see this kind of filmmaking in Memento. Yep, Batman begins the prestige. You definitely Oppenheimer.

18:34 Oppenheimer just did it. You definitely see it. Inception. Yeah, I want you to hear this Brad speaking of his his style of shooting. You know, this is what Christopher Nolan says, quote for me. Film noir is one of the only genres where the concept of point of view is accepted as a fairly important notion in the story telling, and where it's totally accepted that you can flash back and flash forward and change points of view. The best film there are always involves a continuous reassessment of things, especially in terms of who's the good guy and who's the bad guy. You want the double cross, you want the surprise, and you want to keep the audience mindful of the fact that they don't know the full story and that they can't trust all the characters. Yeah, that that that's that on and he's continued to do that throughout his career. I think every Yeah, I think every movie he's done that. That that quote sums up his his entire style.

19:41 I'm gonna ask you, and I know we gotta and I know, Um, I'm interested to see what you're gonna say, because, uh, you know, you might you might have to censor yourself here. But when you when you when you think of a pivotal scene here, Brad, you know something that's really important to the story. But maybe you know, not like the big, the big, the best moment you know, anything come to mind for you? Um? Yes, when um Cobb has broken in or has been led into the young Man's apartment and he lays out his life exactly how it is and how kind of sad it is, you know, when he lays all that out there, Um, I think that's a pivotal moment because then you see why he's kind of attracted to this dangerous side. I like that. I gotta be honest with you. The young Man's apartment hauntingly similar to your very first. Yeah, spot in a sunset boulevard. I was like, damn this Brad Coz lived there. Yeah, I mean it's just it's small, it's I mean, and to have someone come into your life and you think that they've never seen in your place before, and to analyze you kind of sure lock you, you know, and break you down and tell you everything about yourself, and you're like, well that's not exactly right. Yeah, yeah, it's true. Yeah, cops, cops brilliant.

21:11 He's a sociopath, he's a he's a he's a master thief, but he is, he is brilliant in his assessment of people. I'm gonna go you one. I'm gonna go a different scene. Uh, for the similar reason, you know, because you you mentioned Bill kind of the you know, the young man being what starts his attraction to a different lifestyle. Yeah. I think it's the dinner scene between Cobb and Bill when he gives him the uh the credit card. Yeah. For d Lloyd, Yeah, d Lloyd, I see that as that's for me, that's the moment where Bill makes his transition from curious writer to thief because he's infatuated with the lifestyle.

21:56 I think, Yeah, and it's most when he changes his look, he changes his confidence and almost his demeanor. M Well, let's take a quick break. But when we come back where we were talking about the great Christopher Nolan. Did you grow up with a lack of parental supervisions? Do you know all the lyrics to the Fresh Prince of bel Air? Remember Mary mc cheese and the Pride guys have an inexplicable love for the counting erasist. Can you remember Madonna's original phase? And you might be a part of the Doom Generation. Laugh until you cry with us each week as we stumbled blindly through the memories of the movie. Another random thing that doomed us to be the salty, sarcastic, sardonically easy. You want to handle it. You know us, you love us, you can't live without us. Doom Generation available everywhere you find podcasts. Now, Jeff, you know I love my extrasm, my bonus features. Now, are you ready to offer some to our listeners? Absolutely, Brad. That's why we've launched via film by Patreon.

23:03 Starting for as little as three dollars, you can become a production assistant to receive a film by merchandise and gain access to our exclusive content. That's right. Each month, we'll be offering up everything from episodes about our favorite actors to audio commentaries of our favorite and not so favorite movies. And for you fans of the familiar, we've got a nice surprise, right Jeff, That's right, Brad. Our Patreon is the only place you'll get access to the lost nineteen eighty six episodes. We're covering twenty more movies from nineteen eighty six, and we've got some of our favorite guests joining in. Now you mentioned merchandise stickers, t shirts, our new color changing stadium cups exclusive to the Patreon. So join today and get in on all the great bonus content.

23:57 Welcome back to a film by everyone one. As we are discussing director, writer, producer Christopher Nolan, Brad, I've got something for you. I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna give you some background, because every every hero has their origin story. Of course, I'm gonna call this, Nolan begins, Okay, yeah, so, Brad. Christopher Edward Nolan was born in London. He developed an interest in filmmaking at a very young age, citing Ridley Scott, Stanley Kubrick, Michael Mann, and Orson Wells as his influences. Brad, I'm gonna point out we've we've covered two of those. I think it's time we we get the other two on the on the books. So who who we haven't done? Wells and Michael Mann. We just did Man Hunter.

24:49 We didn't actually do a Michael Man. Yeah, I mean Man Hunter. That was that was part of our limited series of nineteen eighty six. But we really you know, that was about the movie manh. I feel like we owe we owe Michael we will well. From age eleven, he aspires to be a filmmaker, and having made several short films with his father's Super eight camera, his earliest work is a stop motion film using his action figures, in an homage to Star Wars that he calls Space Wars. We'll give it. You know, he's eleven, so give him time. Yeah. As a teenager in nineteen eighty nine, he co directs Tarantella, which gets shown as part of a video showcase for PBS. Really yeah. He attends University College London, better known as UCL, where he majors in English Lit rather than film, and that's at his father's suggestion because his dad says do something different so that you have your options. But he meets his girlfriend, future wife and producing partner, Emma Thomas. Following college, he takes work as a scriptwriter and a director of corporate videos in industrial films. And here's the key, because using limited equipment and self financing, he creates several shorts which gained the titchen on the festival circuit. And that's kind of like the birth of where we get this this incredible filmmaker, maybe one of the

26:23 best of the twenty first century. Absolutely. I mean, there are five filmmakers that can release a movie based on their name alone. Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, the Coen Brothers, and who am I missing? Well, Nolan. Nolan would be your fifth one, and Nolan would be the fifth one. Those ones just on their name alone are the only people that can open up a movie like that. And I mean, I've loved everything he's done since i've, you know, saw Memento the first time.

27:04 I think he is our modern day Kubrick in a way, with a little bit of a little bit of George Lucas, a little bit of Spielberg, but a little bit of everything, but with a twenty first century mind to it. And he likes and he likes to dazzle. You know, he likes Look, there's nothing wrong. You know, he wants to see a film in all of his movies in the theater. He said, he's never gonna work for Netflix or anything like that. But I mean he's one of the last true filmmakers. He uses real film, loves the imax. I mean, he definitely is the genuine article you wrong, proponent for using film, you know, never going digital, strong proponent for seeing it on the big screen. You know, I dig that about him, I really do. And I got something here, Brad that I think you're gonna you're gonna appreciate because this is one of your favorite directors, one of my favorite directors. And when you get a look at his top ten films, meaning these are the films that Christopher Nolan says, these are these are my top ten, you get an idea of why this guy is one of our favorites.

28:22 Check this out, Brad. His top ten films are two thousand and one A Space Odyssey, Disney's The Black Hole from nineteen seventy nine, Blade Runner, Chinatown, The Hitcher, nineteen eighty six, The Hitcher, The Hitcher. We covered that with the with Jason Covin on our nineteenth six series Lawrence of Arabia on Her Majesty's Secret Service. Wait, that's the only one with George Lazenby, Right, That's the only one, and that all you know, all the all the years of Bond, no one's no one's pick is is that one? Uh? He also rounding out his top ten star Wars, a New Hope, The Man Who Would Be King, and a film from nineteen sixty four called Top Cappy. Yeah, I looked it up.

29:23 It's basically it's it sounds kind of like a an older version of Oceans eleven because it's all about a guy trying to knock off a casino, like in Steel Jewels or something like that. But it starts a bunch of people we have never heard of, Brad, But I gonna tell you, just knowing that it's on his top ten of all time, we gotta I'm gonna find I'm gonna find it because I want to check it out now. The fact that he loves The Hitcher is awesome though, isn't that a fantastic I saw that I was like, yes, this guy gets it, you know, well, I know. One of the things that I found extremely interesting in the also to the fact that he's, like you said, an English major, so I mean it's he's very good at the writing stuff. He does not create a story outline, you know, from the beginning of writing a screenplay, which shocks me due to the not just obviously Oppenheimer, but all of his you know films post you know, Batman begins require a lot of characters, and really good characters. The fact that he doesn't outline them out I mean, that's pretty awesome. I watched, uh, he did a promotional thing like it was like an interview with al Paccino after they after Insomnia came out, and Paccino was kind of interviewing him and talking about his process and that's and he was like, you he's he basically just what you're saying. He's like, I don't like to do outlines. I don't like the storyboard. I don't know what I want until I get on location and

30:56 I'm there and I see it and then I block it in my in my head, in my mind's eye, and that's how I do it. And Pacino's like, that's fascinating. It's like, speaking of fascinating, Brad, let's get into this guy's filmography. Excellent filmography. Yeah, so obviously following his director to be a nineteen ninety eight this movie, I think it wins awards at like five different film festivals, and all the while it's making him money to to finance his next picture, which is two thousands Memento. Uh, the movie still fascinates me as well as it's done, is as low budget as it's done. I mean, it's it's a cool movie, but yet it's a mystery, and it's a movie that I don't see too many people not liking this movie. I mean you watch this and be like that's a good movie. You got to be, you know, really dull to not like this movie. Well, yeah, because I mean following we can't really we can't talk about it. But right there's a there's one hell of a twist ending and that's it's it's kind of like the blueprint for the rest of this guy's career because Memento, you're watching it the whole time, like you're like, I don't know what's going on. Now I do know what's

32:27 going on, Like you think you know and then and then you don't know, And yeah, I feel like Memento. It is one of those where you walk away going I love that, and I can't wait to watch it a second time. Yeah, and start and start picking up on stuff. Would you watch it in chronological order? No, I don't think that would work, do you know? But very interesting about our film Following, But apparently on the Criterion disc you can watch Following in its chronological order by saying wow, yeah I I honestly, I gotta say, if you watch it that way, I feel like it becomes a good film rather than a brilliant film. Yeah, because you're not guessing. Yeah, well you're not guessing as much. You know, You're not. Yeah, you're being you're being spoon fed, right, Yeah, I don't want that. You're not as you're not as on your seat. Yeah. You mentioned you mentioned the change of changing appearance of the young man in following, uh, just randomly, and I was like, wait, what what is going on? Like?

33:32 Am I in the past? Am I in the future? Where where am I in this story? Yeah? You know, like you mentioned his black eye. You know, he obviously you know, takes a beating at some point. But because he's shooting out a sequence, you're you're trying to The great thing about Nolan is watching one of his movies is like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. Yeah, it's frustrating, but it's fun. Yeah. Right, let's talk about two thousand and two, the film that we initially we're going to cover, Insomnia, starring Alpaccino and maybe one of his creepier performances for Robin Williams. Yeah, this was this is the same year that Robin Williams went evil. Yeah, he did like this in one hour photo.

34:19 I felt like right around the same time. And apparently this is like one of Alpaccino's funnest times ever doing a movie because he loved Robin Williams, he loved working with him, and this film is a very another, very interesting story and a very interesting location. And another thing of it might not be another like, wait a minute, we're supposed to be following Alpaccino, but is he such a good guy. He might not be. I mean, thankfully you got Hillary Swank in there too to kind of anchor the movie and give you give you someone to like say, hey, you know what right or wrong? I know that I can trust her, yeause at the same time, like I gotta say, as as evil and creepy as he is, Robin Williams is almost throughout the entire movie, he's almost kind of lulling you into a sense of safe, you know, into a sense of security.

35:19 You're like, maybe he's not so bad he is. I mean, for a second, I thought this movie was gonna be another Al Pacinos a cop, He's gonna do his I'll put your no thing. And then when it kind of turned out of like, he's not you know, Vincent Hannah, He's not Serpico, and instead he's a guy with faults, you know, many of them. And so in seeing him kind of you don't see Appuccino sweat too much anymore, and in this movie he sweats, He gets nervous, he gets scared. So it's it's interesting thing to see two actors that don't usually do this type of thing go that way. So it's, um, it's such a fun movie. The idea of seeing them, oh it is, And the idea of seeing two incredible actors, you know, Pacino and Williams going head to head. It's that makes that for me, makes it a must see right there. Yeah, two thousand and five, Brad, he takes on a job because he's got bigger he's got bigger things on his mind. Yeah, and he accepts directing responsibilities to reboot the Batman franchise and Batman we get Batman begins. Yeah, beat out a couple of

36:49 big name people that were gonna take over that franchise. There was going to be a Darren aronofsky Ye Batman like Year one, which was originally what I was going to be called. There was supposed to be a Justice League directed by Wolfgang Peterson, so there was a lot going on. But when I heard his name, he I think it had already been announced by the time Insomnia had come out, possibly around that time. I had faith in it, and it didn't. You knew from the promotions of this film that this was not the Batman of McDonald's anymore. There was no cross promotion with Happy Meals or anything like that. It almost seemed like it was kind of a little film, you know, that was a big summer for like War of the Worlds and Revenge of the Sith, and Batman was going to kind of squeeze in there. But when people saw that they go that was the best movie of the summer, not the ones that they told us was going to be. And after that, I was like, this guy can do whatever he wants now. Yeah, and then and he changes Hollywood because this is where like the earth of the reboot right idea takes takes hold, Like all of a sudden, it's like, well, yeah, we're gonna reboot it.

38:07 You know, you know, we're not remaking things anymore. We're rebooting and we're not going to continue on from that Burton universe. You know, we're gonna we're gonna do it safe, and we're gonna keep it contained to three films. Yeah. I love that. One thing I appreciate about Nolan, He's on record as saying, despite his trilogy, his Batman trilogy, he has a very special place in his heart for Tim Burton's Batman movies. He loves Tim Burton's Batman movies, and he takes inspiration for Batman Begins from Richard Donner. He watches uh Superman one and two and decides like it's time for a more realistic approach. Yeah. So I love that about him.

38:49 Brad, what do you think of his his you know, the following year, two thousand and six, he gives us the prestige. I enjoyed it. I like those, um almost kind of Victorian mystery things. You know, we talked a little bit about it with it um when we were talking about Out of the Furnace, the most recent Christian Bale film, The Pale Blue Eye or But But I liked that, you know, the costumes, the stuff of saying we're gonna give you magic, but we're gonna tell you from the beginning we're not doing magic. We're doing tricks and this is how you do them, and showing how they do that. But making a story between those two I thought was was very powerful of like who can be the best and stuff And it's a um, it's got a dark ending to it.

39:38 You know, if you haven't seen it, you know it's got some interesting stuff. But seeing these two guys almost battled, you know, based with battle to the death over of who is going to be the supreme magician of you know, of their field is just I mean, it's an interesting drive. Yeah, Victorian era Hugh Jackman going head to head with Christian Bale again electrifying performances and this is the second of what six six films in a row that he does with Sir Michael Kane. And yeah, you talked about the Michael, you know, like the We're gonna show you a trick. I love Michael Kane explaining how how a trick happens. You know that the turn and all, you know, the prestige and all that. Yeah, man, this movie's fantastic. Absolutely love it. He goes on, you know, right, Uh, Kane's gonna be like his guy for a while because two thousand and eight we get what Brad might be the greatest superhero film of all time. It very well could be Dark Knight. Wow, it just never gets old. I can watch this movie again and again and again.

40:55 I mean actually all three of the films, but this one particularly get excited by. Just I love the way the film begins with that just kind of the little whistle and seeing the kind of clouds come in. It was just that film was an event as much as I feel that Oppenheimer is. You know, when people got done seeing The Dark Night, you talked about it for an hour, you know afterwards of the performances, what you saw, what the grand scale of it, how it was a little bit of heat, and it was a little bit of that, you know a little bit. It was everything and it was so good and when it ended, you're like, oh wow. Well and again, you know, back to his his love of noir, he gives you these opportunities to take the bad guy or who you assume is a bad guy, and the obviously in the Dark Knight, we know the bad guy is the Joker. But what I love about Christopher nolan movies is the good guys are flawed, and the bad guys, even though you know they're bad, they're not really far off with some of their thoughts and ideas. You know, the Dark Knight. Think about you know, joke the Joker with you know, being an agent of chaos some of it so a lot of what Heath Ledger says in that movie as the Joker, I'm sorry, it makes sense. Yeah, you know.

42:22 Yeah, and there are people that, like he said, just want to see the world burn. Yeah, it's it's it's an incredible movie. I absolutely love it. Uh, you know, and and keeping the whole miss mysterious film to our concept. Going two years later, twenty ten, we get the mind bending, uh incredible film Inception. Yeah, and this film gave me a lot of um ease because yeah, he can do Batman. We saw that and prestigious a good film, but a big, bigger scale maybe not. He's still kind of a smaller film. So I was a little worried is this gonna be it? Is he only going to be a Batman guy? Or is he gonna be able to kind of float back and forth? And so a lot of my worries were put to rest after seeing Inception and be like, this guy is not just a good action filmmaker or a good superhero filmmaker. He is an excellent filmmaker for like I said, movies in the theater. That's a theater movie. Brad, I have two questions for you regarding an inception. So he initially took on the Batman franchise, you know I mentioned earlier, I had mentioned that he had some big movies on the horizon and he needed to finance them. So he takes

43:54 on the Batman gig. Well, the movie that he had been working on and planning for all the way back from his days working on following is Inception. So my first question to you, Following has a suave master thief named Cob like you said, he's smooth inception as a suave master thief, and you cannot deny that Leonardo DiCaprio is smooth as the character Cob. My question to you is it possible, you know, obviously different actors, but is it possible that this is the same Cob from following? Noah, because the Cob from following is a dick. He's just a mean He does mean things.

44:46 And I don't want to say some of the things he does, you know, it just he just doesn't burglarize their place. He does very just kind of jerkish things, right, little sadistic. Yeah, no, but I mean I think it's a good name the cop. You know that he keep brings it back. But now I don't think they're the same person. All right, Well, you know, because you just said, like why would he do some of the things he does, the young man in following asks that exact question. Yeah, you know, when they're in the I love the line that Cob gives in following, he says, if you take it away, you show them what they had. Yeah, he's almost it's like a morality that he's teaching people to appreciate what they have. Yeah, almost a little bit. That's kind of what the Joker did, a little bit like I'm a little bit blow it up because you guys don't know how well you got it. All right, Well, all right, you say that's not we're dealing with different cops. I'm cool with that. I'm curious what our listeners are going to say about that, you know, once they've seen following and an inception. But my second question to you, Brad is the age old question for Inception. Christopher Nolan has been asked thousands of times and he always gives a purposely vague answer. My question to you. At the end of Inception, when Cobb takes his total out the top and spends it and walks away, it's spinning strong. We see a slight wobble and then fade to black, cut to black. I should say, so my question you was he dreaming or was it reality? I think it was reality,

46:19 and I'd like to see as much as Cobb went through. I mean, especially when you see what he dealt with, you know, dealing with Sato, and I'd like to see I think he deserves a happy ending. I think he does deserve to be with his kids. So yeah, i'd like to think that's reality. I think my take on it is at that point, giving what he's gone through, I don't think he cares if it, whether he's dreaming or not. He's where he wants to be. So Yeah, but I love I love I love how how vague that ending is. I know some people were like, what, but I kind of I kind of looked at it as a little you know, he's dark, but he's also you know, he likes to make audiences smile too. All right, well, speaking of smiling. Uh. Two years later, he's back in Gotham because he is completing his trilogy with The Dark Knight Rises. Yeah.

47:12 People got a problem with this film, and I got a problem and I got a problem with those people because this is a really good movie. It is, you know, the longest of all of them, but I think it's a really good film. I think a character like Baine, which we only saw once very badly, was a bold choice. But the way they did it, I thought that having the city under siege with I mean, I like this movie a lot. I don't know, people, Oh, it's just sure. The Dark Knight is a great triumph. But I feel that all three of these films are a great, perfect contained trilogy.

47:54 Yeah, I like I like the beginning. The beginning Plane Crash is so awesome. I I completely agree with you. I don't understand why the movie gets the heat that it does. Um, and maybe that's just because The Dark Knight it's hard. That's a tough fact to follow. Yeah, but I think he does it. I think The Dark Knight Rises is amazing. I love the you know, the loose, the very loose adaptation of DC's No Man's Land that they did in Batman, where Gotham was kind of you know, massive earthquake and then they're annexed for a while. There's it's like martial law, there's no law. I loved it. I love that you get the back crack, you know, the punching of the of the mask and seeing that was I would love that poster of Baine walking back and seeing the Batman you know, cow just broken in half. I was like, and that fight sequence, I love it at it's done in imax, the sequence underneath. There's a lot of good stuff in that movie. And I feel that that movie even now is getting a little bit more. Oh, you know, people that didn't like it it's maybe not so bad. Yeah, it's not so bad because it's awesome. I like it's not so bad because it's awesome. Yea, Brad, let's talk about awesome. Twenty fourteen Interstellar. Well, I'm gonna go ahead and say I think this might be his best work. Well, you mentioned his very first favorite film is two

49:27 thousand and one of Space Odyssey, and I think this film is a very good companion to that film. I like there's a lot of similarities. There's a lot, but I think it's a good if you're in the mood for letting your mind free of time and space and kind of go on a you know, lunar kind of experience. I think they kind of go hand in hand, you know. But I think it's a very interesting film. It gets, I think a little bit better each time I watch. Yeah. Um, you don't have to know a lot about um, you know.

50:07 I like he does these extremely complicated things with quantum physics and all this stuff, but he always has somebody mapping it out in Layman's terms. You know, you talk about like in the Prestige and they Layman's terms and you know, an intersteller and an inception, they say, oh, it sounds like this, but let me explain what it is, and you're like, oh, okay, I got it. He's greated at explaining what you're looking at to the audience and also saying have fun, don't don't get too caught up on it. I'll throw the key points in when you need to think about it, but relax and have a good time too. I gotta I gotta check my Blue ray because I'm not sure if it exists. But the music that Hans Zimmer does for Inception is some of my favorite that Zimmer has ever done. You know, if there's a if there's a like an isolated film score track, man, I gotta check it out like that next time because I love the music and that you know, yeah, probably McConaughey's best performance I think ever. Um, and what a that was the year of the McConaughey. That was the year of you know, alright, alright, alrighte.

51:16 He went from true it was a true Detective Dallas, you know, Buyer's Club, gets the Oscar in that summer, does Interstellar and yes, I actually do believe it's one of his better performances too, because um, it could be his accent, but you know the way he's talking about farming, materials and technology and flying, it's it doesn't sound like dialogue. It just sounded like, Yeah, it just sounds like you know, farm talk. Yeah, I get it. Let's go to twenty seventeen. He gives us a Dunkirk. Hm, man, what a great film. I have to tell a quick story about seeing Dunkirk. I missed it as it initially ran in the theater, okay, but luck had it to where I think it was through sag Aftra had a screening of it on the Warner Brothers lot.

52:17 It was sometime around October and they were showing it in a regular like you know, good print on the Warner Brothers lot with a after questionnaire by Christopher Nolan and cast and crew. And I got to experience that and actually see him in person to of course, when they say Q and A, you don't really get to answer ask questions from the crowd, but it was it was really cool to see that and then it just to be in his presence, I was. I was giddy, you know, it was giddy just to be and it looked great on the big screen too, you were I remember the night you called to tell me where you had been. You could not contain your excitement, and I was so jealous. I was like, I can't believe you got to see that because I was an answer question.

53:08 Yeah, and it was. It was such a great phone call because I was you know, I think like the week or two weeks before that, I was telling you how awesome Dunkirk was on the big screen and you're like, yeah, I'm trying to get to it, and you missed it, and then you get that, and I mean, I was happy for you, but I was I was definitely a little jealous. Not gonna lie bright. Let's talk about twenty twenty. Maybe, you know, if if we can, if we can get a movie that's more complex than Inception and more dazzling than Interstellar, it's got to be Tenant. Yeah. I like it. I like Tenant. Um. It's also a little it's a little bit confusing, but I like it. I think great casting of John David Washington and like, Okay, they're like, here's your new here's your new leading man. Right now. Um. I think it's I think it's a very interesting story. It's a it's a fun watch. He's good at the spy, the espionage thing, you know. With this, I don't know if he's gonna do like one more, you know, like Inception and Tenant.

54:16 I'd like to think that Tenant and Inception and was kind of living the same you know world. I like, like I could see them being like connected. Yeah, I could definitely see them being connected. You know, I don't know where. I don't know where you go after Tenant to kind of make like a you know, a collection of trilogy. He'll figure it out. He'll figure it out. I know he will. Well, I know, we we we kind of started this episode talking about how incredible Oppenheimer was as blown expectations away at the box office. Um, you know, I was telling Dayton, you know, because we saw it on Imax screen.

54:57 Brent, I'm gonna ask you your thoughts. Is it necessary to see Oppenheimer on on an Imax screen. I don't think it's necessarily see it on an Imax screen. I did not see it on Imax, but I did see a seventy millimeter film print on it, so I got the seventy millimeter. Yeah, So it wasn't the Imax seventy millimeter, but it was the seventy millimeter, and I think it is a good Like you guys talked about it, it's a you know, it's a long movie, but it moves along quick. Try to see that it's a it's a film event. You know, it's not just a it's not just a small movie that came out to somebody. You know, it's a kind of a film event. You know. Make a night of it, make a make a dinner night of it, a date night, you know, something that's you know, that's what me and my wife did, you know, we you know, we made a night of it. We went to the Westwood and Theater. It's the old school theater, so I mean it was you know, and to hear that projector going at the same time, you know, just I gotta tell what I guess, Like when when it comes to Christopher Nolan, the theme for us is that you're always gonna besting me and making me jealous.

56:06 Yeah, but you know what, I did not get to see Tenant in the theater because around here there was nowhere showing it because of the lockdown. Yeah. I used to see Tenant until it came out on disk. Yeah, but you saw the seventy millimeter print of Oppenheimer. And there's only nineteen theaters in the United States that have that, and you got to go to the one that guess. So I'm happy for you and I'm jealous again. Brad Christopher Nolan has already stated he is not considering any future projects until these strikes are resolved. With the writer's gold and uh and Sage ask you, well, yeah, I totally get that, But you got you got anything in mine that you know you would want to see from him? Next?

56:52 Okay, what have we seen? We've seen action, We've seen comic book, We've seen science fiction, you've seen biography. We haven't seen a period piece. Maybe, uh, sword kind of play kind of film? Are you talking like swash? Yeah, like a dark age, like a you know, medieval type of thing, you know, with swords and you know, kings and queens and backstabbing. You know, I think that would do well. Um. But also, out of all these movies, you know, even though people are saying about up Hummer, he hasn't jumped into horror yet. Could he ever give us a big, crazy kind of summer horror film, would he? Dare? I that's an interesting concept, and I you know I'm gonna see it regardless, but uh, I think there's only one option for me. Given his long history with the Bond franchise, his love of it. Why are the Broccolis not begging him to direct the next James Bond film? Because Christopher Nolan doing James Bond that seems like the obvious choice to me. I couldn't even imagine what he could he could do with it, and it does. But I feel that he's kind of used things like Tenant an inception to kind of make his own type of James Bonds,

58:28 and a James Bond film like him would be very good. You know, he was a big eye or the guy that did Scott sam Mendez basically used Christopher Nolan as an inspiration to kind of give us is good of the film as Skyfall. So I feel that I almost kind of know a little bit of what we get with James Bond. And yeah, so he does espionage and spy thrillers very good, So it would be too easy for it. I don't know about that, but Brad, I do want to hear your final thoughts about following and whether or not you recommend it if you think you've seen everything Christopher Nolan, and you want to see what he can do with no money. Watch following and you can realize that this man is very gifted and he is a very talented filmmaker. He is a very talented screenwriter.

59:22 And I hope that he just continues on to keep thrilling us into surprising us. You know, we've I don't want to see a Quentin Tarrant to anything like, oh this is this is my last film and then I'm I'm done. You know, that's respect to him and to do that. But I love that he's giving us a new film every couple of years. And sure he says he's got nothing on his but there's something up there. You know, he's I feel like, I mean, because as big as his movies are, he does not take a long time between films. I mean, yeah, Kubrick's is here about Kubrick's a long time between movies. And you know he has mentioned that really Scott is one of his influences. Look what really Scott's going? I mean, God never stops. So I'd like to see you know, my kids seeing you know, a Christopher Nolan film in you know, twenty years. Well, in my lifetime. I hope, I hope we get your horror film. I hope we get my James Bond film. Until then, following, in my opinion, is a must see for any fan of Christopher Nolan, any fan of independent film, any fan of film noir. When you watch it, you know, you just assume, like, yeah, this is an independent film. They probably only spent like fifty to sixty thousand dollars on this, And to know that this man did this kind of film for six thousand dollars, Wow, must see.

1:00:51 It is currently streaming free on two B. So we don't know what Christopher Nolan is gonna have next, But you never took that vow, Jeff. So what we got coming up next time? We are finally getting back to the nineteen seventy six series that we kicked off a couple weeks ago. Uh, you know, we had some schedule changes, you know, a couple of things going on, and uh, and I get it, you know, fans of seventy six where you know, I don't want them to be mad as hell. I know they're not gonna take anymore, Brad, So, uh, you and I are going to tackle uh, Sidney Lamet's network Yeah, it's gonna be a good one. Until then, check us out www dot film by podcast dot com. You can always reach out to us at a film by podcast at gmail dot com. Hit us up on social media, like our new our new one of our new listeners, Jason Coslo did. We love interacting with people, especially on Twitter, especially on Facebook and Instagram. Let us know what you what you're thinking and uh until then, Brad d at the movies to be t