Christopher Nolan Movies Ranked from Worst to Best - Collider
Christopher Nolan Films Ranked from Worst to Best · 12. Tenet · 11. The Dark Knight Rises · 10. Insomnia · 9. Following · 8. Interstellar · 7. Batman Begins · 6. The ...
Following
Christopher Nolan’s debut feature <anchor>Following</anchor> is all the more impressive in hindsight. The 1998 noir was a passion project for the director, who took a full year to complete production as his cast and crew all had day jobs. But the result is a solid yarn in which Nolan’s confidence as a director is already fully formed. This is not the work of someone who is trying to be a filmmaker; it’s the work of a born filmmaker. The twisty story of a struggling young writer who follows strangers around the streets of London only to find himself being followed by a stranger as well is classic noir, and visually Nolan captures the intensity and paranoia of his lead character through plenty of handheld, striking black-and-white photography (Nolan served as his own cinematographer). The story unfolds in a fractured narrative—which would become a hallmark of Nolan’s films going forward—and while its conclusion is somewhat contrived, it’s satisfying nonetheless.
Christopher Nolan's Low-Budget Feature Film Debut Showed His Promise
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# Even With a $6,000 Budget, 'Following' Showed Christopher Nolan's Promise

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Published Jul 20, 2023

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following

Christopher Nolan is a unique breed in Hollywood. In a current landscape with limited amounts of sources of financially sturdy films, Nolan's films are viable through his name alone. A mass audience flocks to see any of his movies, whether it is an adaptation of a comic book, a heist thriller about dreams, or a time-bending World War II movie, as if they exist in a franchise or extended universe. The director's selling power has the chance to reach its apex with the release of Oppenheimer, a three-hour, historical docu-drama about the creation of the atomic bomb that's being promoted as a blockbuster. However, true anomalies like Nolan sprung from humble beginnings, and that is evident with his feature directorial debut, Following.

## The No-Budget Production of Christopher Nolan's Feature Film Debut

A shot of Chris Nolan's debut Following starring Jeremy TheobaldImage via Momentum Pictures

Nolan, born and raised in the United Kingdom, opted out of attending film school despite being inspired by the process of filmmaking in his youth. Throughout his lifetime, he learned the craft through home movies and working behind the scenes as a script reader. With limited experience, Nolan decided to dive head-first into feature filmmaking — banding his friends together to shoot on weekends with a minuscule budget of $6,000. Like any grassroots tale of a young filmmaker pulling themselves up by their bootstraps to finally make a movie, a prevalent phenomenon in the late 1980s and early '90s, production stories on Following are admirable. Each scene needed to be rehearsed extensively to preserve their limited film stock, and Nolan had to comply with lighting his set with available light.

Less of a small-budget film and more of a no-budget film, Following is a neo-noir about a young writer, simply named "The Young Man" ( Jeremy Theobald), who follows strangers on the streets of London for creative inspiration. Along the way, he encounters a thief, Cobb ( Alex Haw), who takes him under his wing. At a surface level, elements of the plot and synopsis in Nolan's first film stand as precursors to his later filmography. This is evident in the nameless protagonist that would be passed on to John David Washington in Tenet, and the surname "Cobb" being shared with a more prominent Nolan thief character, Leonardo DiCaprio in Inception. Following's Cobb is dressed fashionably in a well-fit suit, which quickly became a staple of the director. There are various scenes of Cobb explaining the process of theft and deception to the Young Man in an expository function, which is something Nolan would often be criticized for. In retrospect, Following is a curious exercise of converging ideas that Nolan would realize in his later films, notably regarding deception in The Prestige and theft in Inception.

Ultimately, Following working as a Nolan Rosetta Stone is only practical in theory, as the budgetary confines and artistic growing pains amount to this being merely a glorified student film. The indie charm of signature breakthrough films of the '90s, such as Richard Linklater's Slacker, Quentin Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs, or Wes Anderson's Bottle Rocket is rougher on Nolan's part. The director clearly possesses rich and provocative ideas, but he is still processing the craft of filmmaking that he ostensibly taught himself. However, it is unfair to sincerely judge Following at a critical level considering its close-to-nothing budget. The aforementioned indie films of the '90s are The Dark Knight compared to Nolan's debut.

## 'Following' Represents Christopher Nolan at His Artistic Infancy

followingImage via Momentum

Under scrutinized analysis, the seeds of Nolan's identifiable artistic craft that made his Dark Knight trilogy indelible for a blockbuster audience exist under the budgetary confines of Following. Beyond just the reduced scale of his future tent-pole releases, Following can be interpreted as the first film of a spiritual trilogy of twisted neo-noirs by Nolan, which were followed by Memento and Insomnia. Each film centers around an aimless protagonist desperately looking for a resolution to a lofty conundrum. The intuitive editing intercutting between the main action and insert shots of minute objects signified Nolan's intrigue with the manipulation of reality and time. The pitfall of Following is that it loses grasp of the character's angst that is established in the beginning, and instead focuses heavily on Nolan's still prevalent fascination with figurative and literal magic trickery.

When watching Following, the affirmation that Christopher Nolan is better equipped as a blockbuster filmmaker with an expansive amount of resources rather than a do-it-yourself indie visionary becomes clear. A crucial element of Nolan's populous appeal is his propelling momentum in the story, which often relates to a twist or complex machinations in the film's universe, such as the inception of dreams or a space wormhole expedition in Interstellar. Again, primarily due to the lacking budget, Following is stagnant in its narrative outreach. There is a climactic set piece, whether it involves a high-octane heist or psychologically visceral stand-off, simmering on the outskirts of the film, but Nolan ultimately never satisfies this urge.

## 'Following' Shows the Other Side of Christopher Nolan's Thematic Style

following-christopher-nolan-movie-2Image via Criterion

Despite the film's shortcomings as a brilliant demonstration of highbrow blockbuster entertainment, Following is a fascinating window into the alternate direction that Christopher Nolan could have pivoted into. Based on his first three feature films, Nolan's influence from Alfred Hitchcock is eminent. Not only did he craft calculated, searing thrillers like The Master of Suspense, Nolan told stories through the warped mind of a protagonist who may or may not be morally corrupt. Obsession is another mutual thematic trait between Nolan and Hitchcock. In the former's earlier films, especially Following, obsession is engaged with at a primal level. Additionally, the Young Man's obsession with writing inspirations and the life of a thief prove to be fatalistic. Jeremy Theobald's nervy, ominous performance as the nameless protagonist bodes well with Nolan's inclinations. The amateurish visual language created by the use of handheld cameras placates the unsettling desires that drive the Young Man.

Between his advocacy for the theater-going experience, emphasis on shooting on the highest quality of film stock, and history of employing a singular artistic voice to a blockbuster level, Christopher Nolan's place in Hollywood should not be taken for granted. While not an overwhelmingly esoteric filmmaker, his most commercial films share no resemblance to the cookie-cutter pieces of franchise content that have flooded the market in recent years. From a perspective of pure entertainment value, Following is lacking, which is understandable due to its paltry resources.

Having said that, Nolan's feature debut slowly laid the groundwork for the recognizable traits and sensibilities that defined the director. On the flip side, various elements of Following would be greatly welcomed in his films nowadays. There is a biting edge and downbeat aurora omnipresent in the film — an element missing from Nolan's recent filmography, so much so that it was a turn of events when it was announced that Oppenheimer would be his first R-rated picture since Insomnia. In typical fashion for the director, Nolan decided to return to his cynical roots under the lofty pretext of a universally cataclysmic event in the creation of the atomic bomb.

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