Want to know the best Christopher Nolan movies? How about the worst Christopher Nolan movies? Curious about Christopher Nolan’s box office grosses or which Christopher Nolan movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Christopher Nolan movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which got the worst? Well you have come to the right place….because we have all of that information.
Christopher Nolan’s IMDb page shows 11 directing credits from 1997-2017. This page will rank 10 Christopher Nolan movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. His 1997 short Doodlebug was not including in the rankings. His latest movie, Dunkirk, has been added to the page.
Christopher Nolan Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.
- Sort Christopher Nolan movies co-stars of his movies.
- Sort Christopher Nolan movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost.
- Sort Christopher Nolan movies by adjusted worldwide box office grosses using current movie ticket cost.
- Sort Christopher Nolan movies how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations and how many Oscar® wins each Christopher Nolan movie received.
- Sort Christopher Nolan movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score. UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
Check out Christopher Nolan‘ career compared to current and classic actors. Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.
This page was originally part of a Nolan, M.Night Shyamalan and Quentin Tarantino movie page. Part of that original page was this little skit I wrote that looked at all three of their movie careers. I figured even though I was giving each director his own page that I would still include the skit.
Christopher, Quentin and M.Night are at a bar drinking Shiner Bock beers, smoking Red Apple cigarettes and arguing about who will be the next Spielberg.
Quentin: It has to be me, I have been directing movies for over 20 years, my Pulp Fiction is a classic, people love my Kill Bill movies, Reservoir Dogs put independent movies on the map while Inglourious Basterds was a box office hit and picked up 8 Oscar® nominations. My latest movies, Django Unchained and The Hateful Eight did awesome for westerns.
M. Night: You’ve been around the longest but you have only made 9 movies in 20 years and Four Rooms, Jackie Brown and Death Proof died at the box office…that is not a good percentage.
Christopher: You got no room to talk M., between The Village and Split, your movies all tanked! And most people have hated every movie you have made since Signs….talk about some movies with horrible reviews….you had The Village, Lady in the Water, The Happening , The Last Airbender and After Earth all lined up in a row.
M. Night: Well Mr. Nolan, at least Quentin and I have an Oscar® nomination for Best Director in our resume. And I know you remember how I was considered to be the next Spielberg after the success of The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable and Signs. I think you are forgetting The Last Airbender earned over $300 million in worldwide box office and was the 21st biggest hit of the year…plus After Earth did pretty well overseas.
Quentin: I actually have two Best Director Oscar® nominations…but who is counting. Sorry to have to tell you M. Night, but I do not think anybody has compared you to Spielberg in a very longtime….and as for The Last Airbender, true it made some money but I think it was the worst reviewed movie in the last 20 years….and I think the less said about After Earth the better.
Christopher: Speaking of box office hits…do you know my last four movies have a worldwide box office over 3 billion dollars? That includes The Dark Knight that crossed a billion at the box office, Inception which earned over $800 million and The Dark Knight Rises which also crossed the one billion mark. Interstellar picked up $672 million. My latest Dunkirk is being favorable compared to Saving Private Ryan. And oh by the way……now I am considered the next Spielberg….sorry I took that title away from you M. Night.
M. Night: Maybe that ten years was a little rough for my movies, but Split was beginning of my next great run….just wait until you see Glass….I got Bruce Wi….
Quentin: Sorry to interrupt you M.Night, I agree Split was a feather in you cap….but can you capitalize on it?….we shall see. As for you Chris, I loved Memento, The Prestige, and Insomnia but I think the Batman movies are overrated and I still do not understand your dream inside a dream inside a dream movie. And don’t even get me started on the ending of Interstellar..
Christopher: Hey I am sorry if you are not smart enough to figure out Inception, but I will try and explain it for you and don’t worry I will go real slow so maybe you will finally understand.
Quentin: (Reaches into his bag and slams two Oscars® down on the table) I am smart enough to know that this proves I am the best director in this group!
Christopher: You got those Oscars® for the screenplays for Pulp Fiction and Django Unchained, not for directing it. I’ll show you an award for directing…here is my COFCA (Central Ohio Film Critics Association) award for Best Director for Inception.
M. Night: I did not know we were supposed to bring our directing awards tonight.
Quentin: Yeah you could have brought either one of your Razzie awards as worst director for either The Happening or The Last Airbender.
At this point M.Night swipes the Oscar® and the COFCA off the table and a huge fight breaks out among the three directors. While the fight continues an older gentlemen who had been listening to the conversation grabs his stuff, pays his bill and starts to leave the bar.
Older gentleman to bartender: (Shaking his head in dismay) I just do not understand these younger directors…they have so much more to learn.
Bartender: I agree with you 100%….have a great night Mr. Spielberg and I want to tell you I that I am really looking forward to your latest movie, Player One.
If you do a comment….please ignore the email address and website section.
Hi Bruce;
Nolan is talanted, no doubt. Although I personally think he’s become a bit over-rated because of the runaway success of “Dark Night” (Which had more to do with Heath Ledger than with Nolan, I think) he clearly does have some good directorial ability. He’s made a lot of very good movie, but in my view, he’s never made a truly great movie. (Nothing on the level of “Jaws”, “Raiders”, “Shindler”, “Private Ryan”, “Close Encounters” or any of Speilberg’s best work.) His Batman films have been very successful and I’m sure the latest one will be a runaway smash too (Riding on the coattails of DK) but I still think he has a bit to go yet before he proves himself the next Speilberg. He has more potential than the other two but he’s not there yet.
Many people point to Peter Jackson because of his successful “Lord of the Rings” films, but I don’t think he’s quite there yet. He’s only made one good non-Hobbit film (“Tintin”) so he needs to work on that resume.
One of my personal favorite current directors is Tim Burton but he also has a certain niche he’s comfotable in and needs to spread his wings more to be Speilbergian. (The Cohen Brothers fall into the same category.)
I’m not sure who’s around now that has the overall artistry and range to match some of the greats like Ford, Houston, Hawks, Capra, Wilder or Speilberg. We need to start looking at the up-and-coming guys to look for the next king of directors.
Entertaining movie page.
Rob
Hey Rob….you are correct…M.Night has quickly taken the title of the “next Spielberg” to “butt of jokes” in a very quick fashion.
As for Nolan….I agree he seems to have the most potential…and Dark Knight Rises should keep his boy wonder title intact for a few more years…I think the key for him will where does he go when he is done with superheroes(Batman and Superman).
Tim Burton…I wish I would have thought of him when I was writing this hub….but for some reason he slipped my mind. I agree with you about Peter Jackson, he is still the L.O.R. director, and with The Hobbit coming out soon…I do not think he will get past that title for many more years. Thanks for your very educational comment…it is greatly appreciated.
Hello – So Reservoir Dogs was in your skit – that is the movie I could bearly watch and stopped watching – NOT MY THING. It is sunny but NO SNOW. Thanks for the apples and caramel – was good. GOOD MOVIE PAGE..
Hey BERN1960…if you never finished the movie then you will never know how good Reservoir Dogs is….lol. You are welcome for the apples. Thanks for checking out my latest movie page
Hey friend. Thanks for the e-mail and the laugh this morning. I really enjoyed your bar scene. Sounds like a good movie. Keep up the good work.
Hey YankeesRule….look time since you have visited….good to see you. Glad you enjoyed my little skit…maybe not a movie…but maybe a Saturday Night Live skit.
Very funny stuff, I really laughed out loud about them asking Shyamalan to bring his Razzies. Job well done. I would rank the three fighting directors (1) Tarantino (2) Shyamalan (3) Nolan. Sorry never been a big Nolan fan.
Hey Shaun…glad you got a kick out of the Razzie line….I thought that was funny as well. Surprised you are not much of a Nolan fan…but I respect your opinion. Thanks for the comment
Loved your opening play Bruce, hilarious and worthy of it’s own page.
Of the three directors I’d pick Tarantino as my favourite followed by Nolan and Shyamalamadingdong.
I’m surprised to see Inception beat the mighty Dark Knight on the moviescore. I liked both Nolan’s Batman films but personally I prefer Tim Burton’s creepier more gothic take on the comic book.
Hey Steve…thanks for stopping by. When I was trying to think about who to include with Nolan and Tarantino….it actually took me awhile to come up with M. Night Shyamalan. Which just goes to show how far he has fallen. I was a huge fan of his after The Sixth Sense…that lasted until I saw The Village at the theater….talk about a movie with bad word of mouth. I thought Signs was outstanding…..a scary movie with a scary cornfield to boot.
I think The Dark Knight finished behind Inception was simply because Inception got a Best Picture Oscar nom….while The Dark Knight was given a huge snub in that category. I would say I think you will enjoy The Following if you ever watch it….it is black and white and you can see he had some talent in his first low budget film.