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Christopher Nolan
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Christopher Nolan wearing a black suit and tie, smiling slightly while attending the Oppenheimer United Kingdom premiere in London.
Split image showing Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer at a chalkboard on the left and actor Cillian Murphy portraying Oppenheimer with a cigarette and hat on the right.
Heath Ledger as the Joker sits at an interrogation table with Christian Bale as Batman standing behind him in a scene from the film The Dark Knight. Inception Matthew McConaughey as Cooper in Interstellar stands in a white spacesuit on a desolate, icy landscape with rugged mountains in the background. Emma Thomas and Christopher Nolan stand together backstage, each holding Oscars, with Nolan also holding an envelope, after winning for their film Oppenheimer at the 96th Academy Awards. Matt Damon as Odysseus in The Odyssey (2026), wearing ancient Greek armor and a plumed helmet, stands in profile before a red and tan painted wall. Matthew McConaughey as Cooper and Mackenzie Foy as 10-year-old Murph stand facing each other beside a truck in a cornfield in a scene from Interstellar. Matt Damon as Leslie Groves, in a military uniform and coat, stands beside Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer, wearing a gray suit and hat, in a scene from Oppenheimer. Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema operates a large film camera on a dolly while filming actors Tom Conti and Cillian Murphy, in costume, beside a pond for the film Oppenheimer.
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Christopher Nolan wearing a black suit and tie, smiling slightly while attending the Oppenheimer United Kingdom premiere in London.
Christopher Nolan Director Christopher Nolan at the London premiere of Oppenheimer, 2023.

Christopher Nolan

British director
Written by
Melissa Albert
Melissa Albert was a research editor at Encyclopædia Britannica. Her first novel, The Hazel Wood (2018), was a New York Times bestseller.
Melissa Albert
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Britannica Editors
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....
Britannica Editors
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•History

Christopher Nolan (born July 30, 1970, London, England) is a British film director and writer acclaimed for his noirish visual aesthetic and unconventional, often highly conceptual narratives. His notable films include Inception (2010), Interstellar (2014), Dunkirk (2017), and several Batman movies. In 2024 Nolan won an Academy Award for best director for Oppenheimer (2023), which was also named best picture. Two years later he directed The Odyssey, an epic adaptation of the ancient Greek poem...

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