These days, Christopher Nolan is a big deal. His Batman films have made boatloads of money. He's had big hits with epic, challenging works like "Inception" and "Interstellar." He's also one of the only directors who can get his movies made on celluloid, while everyone else has to work on digital (via the DGA).
And with his upcoming movie, "Oppenheimer," Nolan demanded, and got, complete creative control over the film, 20% of the first-dollar gross, and the promise that the film will play theatrically for 100 days before it goes to streaming (per IGN.com).
All of this started with "Memento," which made it clear that he was a major new talent. His trajectory from "Memento" to Batman feels similar to Peter Jackson ("Lord of the Rings"), another filmmaking wunderkind who could do a lot with a small budget and a lot of ingenuity. Once both filmmakers got bigger budgets and more resources, they really showed what they were capable of.
As one critic noted that when he first saw Nolan's early work, he was "struck with the same feelings as watching 'El Mariachi' [Robert Rodriguez's feature-length debut]. It doesn't matter how expensive the film is; the person who made this is a born, bonafide, instinctual filmmaker through and through" (via Collider).
"Memento" showed Nolan could tackle challenging, nonlinear storytelling and complex characters. Once Nolan took the big leap to the "Dark Knight" series, he said he was "excited to contribute to the lore surrounding the character," and that Batman was "the most credible and realistic of the superheroes, and has the most complex human psychology" (per Variety).
