Everyone has to start somewhere, and for Christopher Nolan got his chops together making corporate/industrial films. But he was destined for feature filmmaking, to which "Following," his first feature film, is testament. In this 26-minute conversation with Vice for The Criterion Collection, the director details his process on making the movie.
The first thing that comes through in the talk is Nolan’s perseverance to get the film done. The director and the crew all had day jobs they had to work during the week, so the film was shot in chunks (on Saturdays) over the course of a year. This stop/start approach meant approaching the project with an eye on efficiency and budget (they had very little time and money). And it’s interesting to learn that the decision to shoot black-and-white wasn’t made for aesthetics, but because filming in color would throw a whole bunch more variables into the production.
Nolan makes even the most technical aspects of filmmaking interesting, and this conversation is well worth clicking for many more intriguing nuggets about the filmmaker’s journey on his first feature effort. Check it out below.
Following is my favorite, then Insomnia. The others are okay, but I like those two best
I'm going to throw my hat in the Yer camp, and add Prestige as another top notch Nolan. His blockbusters don't really do it for me at all.
'Following' and 'Memento' are better than the films that followed them. It's a shame he went from obsessed with Hitchcock to being obsessed with Michael Bay. That's really all Nolan is now, just high brow Michael Bay.