After I got the idea for this series, I was looking at the IMDB pages for many Nolan movies and was staggered at how often they turned up in the Top 250, in high numbers to boot! I started wondering whether he has the all-time record.
Going through the entire Top 250 and making note of how many titles each director had was not easy, especially because even a film buff like me only knew the directors of about half the movies by heart. I was actually surprised by how many movies I’d never heard of; apparently I need to broaden my foreign film exposure.
Anyway, once I’d gotten through the whole list I put together what you see in the picture.
Nolan is in the lead with the whole Top 250, but he’s tied with Kubrick and Scorsese.
That doesn’t tell the whole story though. 250 is a big number. If you look who to see who has the better movies AMONG those, in the Top 200 Nolan only shares the lead with Scorsese. In the Top 150 he moves into sole possession of 1st place, and he keeps it as you wilt it down to Top 100 and Top 50!
That still doesn’t tell the whole story. There’s something to be said about consistently turning out classics, rather than simply churning out a bunch of movies and bringing down your overall quality. The Win % column refers to the number of movies a director has in the Top 250 divided by the total number of movies he’s directed. The Big Win % column refers to the number of movies a director has in the Top 50 divided by the total number of movies he’s directed. In both cases Nolan decisively beats everyone else!
There is some bad news in that his last two movies have not made it and ended his streak of getting every single movie he wrote other than his debut movie in there. Still, you know I feel Tenet is on par with his other classics, and I trust he will be giving us many more masterpieces before he’s through.
Let’s wrap our heads around the fact that Nolan is only 50, young enough to be the son of still-active directors on the list such as Scorsese and Spielberg, and has already produced a better body of work than anyone else. That’s incredible!
Will this be Nolan, Darren Aronofsky, Wes Anderson, and Paul Thomas Anderson in the early 2030s?
What’s unbelievable in a bad way is his lack of love from the Academy. He got nominated for writing Memento (trying again not to get triggered about Gosford Park, trying again not to get triggered about Gosford Park…), he got nominated for producing Inception, and he got nominated for directing and producing Dunkirk. That’s it.
Not only has he never won, but despite being a triple-threat of a writer-director-producer, he got no recognition at all for The Prestige, The Dark Knight, or Interstellar. The Prestige and Interstellar were shut out of the Oscars except for minor nominations. While The Dark Knight won Heath Ledger an Oscar, its screenplay was ignored even after breaking ground by being a comic book movie that got the Nolan brothers a WGA nomination. Admittedly, The Dark Knight’s omission from Best Picture contention led to enough of an outcry that the Academy changed the rules to allow up to 10 nominations, paving the way for more commercial films. I feel that’s the only reason Inception squeezed in though, as it got ignored for all the other major nominations, including both ones for which Nolan was in contention. The irony that DUNKIRK was the only film for which he got two nominations!
He’s in good company though. Looking at some of the other high-ranking directors on the list. Kubrick never won. Chaplin never won. Hitchcock never won. Scorsese did finally win Best Director, as you see in the picture above, but not until he was in his mid-60s. That gives Nolan over a decade – and heck he might win everything next year by default because Tenet was the only contender even released. 😅 Even if it never happens, it’s certainly not the be-all end-all to determine filmmaking greatness. The fact that Kubrick, Chaplin, and Hitchcock never won is considered a negative reflection on the Academy, not on them.
A handful of legendary snubs.
Like I said about critics, the Academy seems to like their movies more cut-and-dry. Nolan might be too challenging for their tastes, but cinephiles appreciate him like deserves!
Let’s give the man the trophy he deserves for greatest filmmaker of all time.
Small note: if anyone is wondering why Ridley Scott is the only director with his first initial in the chart, it was because I thought his brother Tony might have something in the Top 250 as well. He didn’t, which is too bad considering True Romance is astonishing!
This post isn’t about either Scott or anyone else though. It’s about Nolan, the man of the hour, with such filmmaking power, for no one better can you scour! Congratulations Mr. CBE!
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