• Light/Dark
  • Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
  • We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.

Christopher Nolan and his dead wives

scitek

scitek

Member
Oct 27, 2017
10,078
JB1981 said:
It's kinda similar to how a lot of the male characters in Spielberg's movies need to grow up or learn to care about children (Hook, Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds).
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Or how Tim Burton's characters often have daddy issues.

Storytellers often just stick to whatever they're familiar with. It doesn't even have to be something personal, it may be something as simple as they had success with a certain formula/story and just don't want to stray too far from it.
 
AuthenticM

AuthenticM

Son Altesse Sérénissime
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
30,111
It's more than that. There's a distinct flair of patriarchy in his movies.

In The Dark Knight, at the end when Two-Face holds hostage Gordon's son and daughter, he tells Gordon "I'm going to take what's most important to you" as he decides to kill the son. The movie is saying that the son is more important than the daughter. On top of that, the son is named "Gordon Jr"; a father naming his son after him is another trait of egocentrism and patriarchy.

In Batman Begins, Bruce's parents die; both of them. However, everytime Bruce has a flashback to "his parents", he always thinks of his father. In fact, his mother doesn't have a single line in the movie.
 
BossAttack

BossAttack

Member
Oct 27, 2017
43,033
AuthenticM said:
It's more than that. There's a distinct flair of patriarchy in his movies.

In The Dark Knight, at the end when Two-Face holds hostage Gordon's son and daughter, he tells Gordon "I'm going to take what's most important to you" as he decides to kill the son. The movie is saying that the son is more important than the daughter. On top of that, the son is named "Gordon Jr"; a father naming his son after him is another trait of egocentrism and patriarchy.

In Batman Begins, Bruce's parents die; both of them. However, everytime Bruce has a flashback to "his parents", he always thinks of his father. In fact, his mother doesn't have a single line in the movie.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

That's not true actually.
 
BossAttack

BossAttack

Member
Oct 27, 2017
43,033
AuthenticM said:
The fact that she does have a few added to my not remembering it despite having watched the movie many times is a good testament to how unimportant the movie makes her out to be.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

True, though to be fair that's how the source material tends to always go. Bruce trying to live up to his pops. Still, Nolan had the opportunity to make her more important but didn't. Bruce only seemed to remember he had a mother in TDKR.
 
Calm Waterfall

Calm Waterfall

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
1,228
jett said:
Apparently I have to point out that last sentence was a joke. Although I didn't know he had already talked about this (didn't think about the whole "fear" aspect either), if indeed someone brought it up to him. This is more of a curiosity for me, and as has been mentioned, it is pretty morbid.



Well coop's wife not being around intensifies the drama of him leaving his kids, since he's essentially orphaning them. It's kind of a similar reason why he makes Bale's wife in The Prestige kill herself, just to have the whole situation of their daughter becoming an oprhan and being adopted by Angier.

Also, thanks VaporSnake I had forgotten there are actually two dead wives in The Prestige lol.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Why the word fear is in quotes? Every husband´s nightmare is to lose a partner or a child.
 
cognizant

cognizant

Member
Dec 19, 2017
13,756
jett said:
good lawd

Just pretend I bolded or italicized the word instead.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

No, this thread is about you now. Welcome to ResetEra!

ShorttermThornyFlycatcher-size_restricted.gif
 

foggy

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,972
Creative types have their fixations. People have been psycho-analyzing Hitchcock for years, because of his preoccupations.
 

Deleted member 13798

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
12,374
Why does Scorcese make movies about criminals? Is he a secret criminal? Writers tend to use certain themes in their work, this is a common one. Wouldn't read into it more than that.

Disney movies have a thing for dead parents too.
Shugga said:
He loves refrigerators
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Stuffed ina fridge is not the same thing as a generally dead spouse. That's a very specific thing that's getting thrown around all the time now anytime there is a dead significant other in a story and it's not applicable universally.
 
Sectorseven

Sectorseven

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,560
It's just an auteur thing.

Spielberg has a trademark where almost all his movies involve a parent-child relationship.
 
Deleted member 21339

Deleted member 21339

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
13,691
AuthenticM said:
It's more than that. There's a distinct flair of patriarchy in his movies.

In The Dark Knight, at the end when Two-Face holds hostage Gordon's son and daughter, he tells Gordon "I'm going to take what's most important to you" as he decides to kill the son. The movie is saying that the son is more important than the daughter. On top of that, the son is named "Gordon Jr"; a father naming his son after him is another trait of egocentrism and patriarchy.

In Batman Begins, Bruce's parents die; both of them. However, everytime Bruce has a flashback to "his parents", he always thinks of his father. In fact, his mother doesn't have a single line in the movie.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Wow I just watched that scene again. I never even realized Gordon *had* a daughter.

But, to use an example from another Nolan movie, in Interstellar Cooper really doesn't give two shits about his son in that movie, just his daughter. He doesn't mention a single thing about him at the end when he finally reunites with Murph.

Meanwhile his son is the dumb student who takes over the farm and Murph is physics genius who solves the gravity equation with the new data, saves the world and has a station named after her. Yea, so much for "patriarchy"
 
Last edited:
Baccus

Baccus

Banned
Dec 4, 2018
5,307
Have you lost a loved one? Shit is devastating.

The trope itself is not bad, is what you do with it. Most stories treat it as an afterthought to get the character into a killing frenzy. I think Nolan uses the trope very well by exploring the ever lasting impacts of the trauma.

The dead wife was the best thing about Inception.
 
wenis

wenis

Member
Oct 25, 2017
16,117
for a second there I thought Chris Nolan had the same issue as Jerry Lee Lewis. Some dead wives, cover-ups and no one ever talking about it.
 
lemonade

lemonade

Member
May 8, 2018
3,044
Some of yall need to calm down. Don't immediate pull out the "Nolan doesn't know how to write strong female characters" card.

It's just a trope that he likes to use, no need to add your personal explanation to it.
 
HStallion

HStallion

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
62,262
The thread title had me expecting this was going to be about Netflix's next shocking true crime documentary series focusing on the many suspicious deaths of the spouses of a famous film director.
 

Deleted member 4034

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
26,560
AuthenticM said:
It's more than that. There's a distinct flair of patriarchy in his movies.

In The Dark Knight, at the end when Two-Face holds hostage Gordon's son and daughter, he tells Gordon "I'm going to take what's most important to you" as he decides to kill the son. The movie is saying that the son is more important than the daughter. On top of that, the son is named "Gordon Jr"; a father naming his son after him is another trait of egocentrism and patriarchy.

In Batman Begins, Bruce's parents die; both of them. However, everytime Bruce has a flashback to "his parents", he always thinks of his father. In fact, his mother doesn't have a single line in the movie.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Wait, are you saying Two Face not holding his daughter hostage is because of patriarchy in a thread about dead wives?
 
Biggersmaller

Biggersmaller

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
4,966
Minneapolis
Luckett_X said:
He just seems incapable of writing women most of the time, so its a convenience thing.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Incapable? I think Carrie-Ann Moss' character in Memento, Murph from Interstellar, Inception's Ariadi+Mal, even women in the Batman trilogy were ok-to-good-to-sometimes even great imho.

He is very capable. I could name 5 more prolific directors than Nolan that routinely treat their women characters far worse.
 
LewieP

LewieP

Member
Oct 26, 2017
18,102
thesoapster said:
Inception (Cobb and the kids he cannot get back to)? Or are you talking about Cooper and Murph?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Inception. It's like he made a movie, working in a field that can be all consuming of your time, potentially at the expense of family life, about an individual who allowed his obsession with creating worlds to separate him from his family.

I think his movies can clearly be read in part about him grappling with his familial relationships, including fears and regrets.

But yes the dead wife thing has become a crutch creatively, and feels less like a recurring theme and more like a writing shortcut in his movies these days, so I'm glad that he broke that habit with Dunkirk.
 
Conciliator

Conciliator

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,132
I don't think he has some dead wife fetish or something, but Nolan absolutely sucks with female characters. Half of his movies it feels like someone had to pull his teeth out to get him to add one woman with dialogue and story agency
 
Deleted member 21339

Deleted member 21339

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
13,691
Stanley Kubrick also made movies mainly starring only white men and didn't seem at all concerned about subjects involving minorities. Lots of filmmakers have gaps in their work.
 

Deleted member 4034

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
26,560
Hydrus said:
Whoa, you're right. I don't ever remember seeing a sex scene is his films.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
As with most PG13 movies, that's the most you're getting.



It's an okay scene, but "incapable of approaching romance or sexuality" is just making shit up.

Not trying to come off as a Nolan fanboy but a lot of you keep saying things that are really easy disprove.
 
Sordid Plebeian

Sordid Plebeian

Member
Oct 26, 2017
17,385
Just his thing I guess, a good way of incorporating a woman into a story as an important character when you can't write them well lol
 
Biggersmaller

Biggersmaller

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
4,966
Minneapolis
Conciliator said:
I don't think he has some dead wife fetish or something, but Nolan absolutely sucks with female characters. Half of his movies it feels like someone had to pull his teeth out to get him to add one woman with dialogue and story agency
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I understand the entire industry has this problem, but the same could be said about nearly any director. Why this pops in every Nolan discussion is odd to me as I feel he is much better in this regard than other directors: Spielberg, Scorsese, Kubrick, Eastwood, Coppolla, Gibson, and Tarantino (with one big exception).
 
Sectorseven

Sectorseven

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,560
Bobo Dakes said:
As with most PG13 movies, that's the most you're getting.



It's an okay scene, but "incapable of approaching romance or sexuality" is just making shit up.

Not trying to come off as a Nolan fanboy but a lot of you keep saying things that are really easy disprove.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I half suspect that scene was even included because someone was afraid people would think Batman is gay.

But I agree the lack of sex is primarily due to striving for that all appealing demographic, just like there isn't much blood in his action scenes.
 

OtherWorldly

Banned
Dec 3, 2018
2,857
Hydrus said:
Whoa, you're right. I don't ever remember seeing a sex scene is his films.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I heard somewhere he is not a fan of adding sex or romance to move his story forward. He apparently said he is a filmmaker who is about moving the story and getting to the point and unless his movie had romance as a main point he wouldn't add it to spice it up with a sex scene.

His only emotional movie has been interstellar and rest have been very calculated stories with arcs that get to the point fast so I get why he avoids sex or romance unless the story calls for it
 
BossAttack

BossAttack

Member
Oct 27, 2017
43,033
JB1981 said:
Wow I just watched that scene again. I never even realized Gordon *had* a daughter.

But, to use an example from another Nolan movie, in Interstellar Cooper really doesn't give two shits about his son in that movie, just his daughter. He doesn't mention a single thing about him at the end when he finally reunites with Murph.

Meanwhile his son is the dumb student who takes over the farm and Murph is physics genius who solves the gravity equation with the new data, saves the world and has a station named after her. Yea, so much for "patriarchy"
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

That's one thing that always bothered me about Interstellar. Coop didn't seem to give two shits about his son. It's like he accepted his son moved on without him and focused on his daughter. But, he can't even be bothered to ask, "hey, did my son turn out alright?"

LewieP said:
Edit: It gets super weird when you realise that Cobb is a stand in for Nolan in Interstellar.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Does that make Arthur a stand-in for his wife?
 

Deleted member 4034

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
26,560
Sectorseven said:
I half suspect that scene was even included because someone was afraid people would think Batman is gay.

But I agree the lack of sex is primarily due to striving for that all appealing demographic, just like there isn't much blood in his action scenes.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Or because it shows that Talia successfully honey potted him and got him to trust her which becomes a major plot point in the finale.
 
Conciliator

Conciliator

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,132
Biggersmaller said:
I understand the entire industry has this problem, but the same could be said about nearly any director. Why this pops in every Nolan discussion is odd to me as I feel he is much better in this regard than other directors: Spielberg, Scorsese, Kubrick, Eastwood, Coppolla, Gibson, and Tarantino (with one big exception).
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I think that's fair to a degree, I guess I just expect more from a modern younger director, and I definitely wouldn't say he's better than those examples. There are faaaar more complex, driven women with agency in Tarantino movies than in Nolan movies.
 
AegonSnake

AegonSnake

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
9,566
Lol honest trailer made fun of this in their Nolan honest trailer. His wife is a producer on all his movies so maybe he's trying to tell her something.

Every artist writes about something that affects them. It's likely that he loves his wife so much that his worst fear is losing her. The honest trailer also pointed out how all his protagonists look like him. Hes clearly writing his leads as some versions of himself. It's not too much of a leap to assume he's basing his female leads on his wife or ex girlfriends.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.