[Music from Christopher Nolan Movies]

One of the things I

love about directing is

the multi-faceted
nature of the challenge.

The idea of a narrative

that's a maze or labyrinth.

Rather than being

above that maze,

and watching the characters

make mistakes and wrong turns,

you would enter into the maze,

kind of looking over their shoulder,

and make the wrong

turns with them

and find a blind

alleys with them.

There's a feeling of reality.

There's a feeling of being

somewhere that matters.

I approached the structure from very

mathematical and geometrical point of view.

A lot of diagrams,
lot of careful planning.

So that was certainly

the case with Memento.

First way to draw it is,

as I have like that.

That's basically the

end of the movie.

This stuff is the

black and white stuff.

This is color.

And what we do is we cut between the

two, the whole way through.

-You said we talked before.

I don`t remember that.

- So we alternate scene
here, scene there,

scene there,scene there,scene

there,scene there,

and they meet towards

the end of the film.

[Heavy Breathing]

The thing that I started to

develop and I've carried on over

since that there's most certainly

is probably cross-cutting.

I always trying intercut scenes.

Based on a concept from music called a

shepherd progression or shepard tone.

It's a series of
ascending notes on a scale

that by emphasizing in volume

different elements of the scale,

it can continuously go up, like a

corkscrew effect or a barbershop hole.

It's always rising.

As one storyline is peeking,

and other one is building,

and the third one is

just starting out.

-Full speed, Peter.

Keep coming round.

Keep coming.

Before he fires, he`s gotta drop his nose.

I'll give you the signal.

-Now?
-No, no, wait.

Wait for him to

commit to his line.

-You create a continuing rise in

intensity, narratively.

[Plane engine sounds]

-Now.
[Crowd cheering]

-That's really an approach that I've

carried on using through all my films.

As a director, you have to be

able to not look at the shot

as a two-dimensional picture,

but look at where everything

is in three-dimensional space.

-And go easy on the poor chap.

He does try so very hard.

-That's why I don't use a

monitor on set to this day.

I just say by the camera

because I want to see

where is the camera?

Why is the camera? Where it is?

And then place the camera

according to my idea of
what the point of view is.

I`d like to try and align

the audience quite closely

with the point of

view of a character.

-Come on.

-The use of inserts,

something I've maintained it all my films.

There is a form of
narrative connection

that's made through objects.

-Don't believe his lies.

He is the one. Kill him.

I finally found him.

-We also did it for

technical reasons

because one of the things you

can do with very little time

is you can shoot a

really beautiful insert.

You can soft light

it from the side.

You can throw out the

lens, you can get something

that looks really really

nice, very very quickly.

My fascination with
storytelling in films

is all about that subjectivity.

It's all about, whose point of

view my seeing the story from.

Don't use zoom lenses.

If you don't use zoom lenses,

then you are having to

physically move the camera,

closer or further away to

what you`re photographing.

So there's a scene in the film

where you make a telephone call,

and I remember when you came

in to sit down to do the scene,

and you're pretty surprised

where the camera was,

because it was pretty

close to your nose on a 75,

but what I found is when we put the

camera right there in your space,

the performance is then

exactly appropriate

to somebody being that close

and being so in your head.

-It really helps.

Trish, listen, I`m...

-And I think,
that was the right approach
for me and set me on the path

of always thinking about considering

the point of view of the storytelling.

-This is what happens

when an unstoppable force

meets an immovable object.

You truly are incorruptible,

aren't you, huh?

You won't kill me out of some

misplaced sense of self-righteousness,

and I won't kill you

because you're
just too much fun.

I think you and I are

destined to do this forever.

-One of the great joys as a

director is constructing a world.

On my films I try to shoot as

much in-camera as possible.

So trying to do these
things for real.

There's nothing more dispiriting

when you tell off to work

in this just a green screen,

the collectors in front of it.

It's really - the

magics not there.

For example on Interstellar,

we didn't use any green screens.

We built a set and we enhanced

it with visual effects.

-You've seen the time is represented

here as a physical dimension.

You have worked out that you can

exert a force across space-time.

-Gravity to send a message.

-Affirmative.
-So try to use real locations,

I've always preferred

real locations.

[Music]

If you can believe in it,

if you can relate it to the

textures of everyday life,

you're taking the audience

on a more extreme journey.

-With no word from the Batman

even as they mourn

Commissioner Loeb,

these cops have to be wondering,

if the Joker will make good

on his threat and in the

albitrary column of the Gotham

Times to kill the mayor.

-Really everything you

do, you learn from.

In terms of anytime you

shooting something short film.

You're always learning

about your craft.

It gives you confidence

as a filmmaker.

I think really the only

useful advice I ever got

in terms of trying to
figure out your way

in to the film business

and film industry

is to get yourself a script

and hang on to it.

You have to play

to your strengths,

you have to do something

that really excites you
and what was
different about that.

It's that idea that screenplay,

that concept that's

so important.

And that was going

to distinguish it,

if you can do it successfully.

[Music]