Say what you like about Christopher Nolan’s high-volume, occasionally provocative, only potentially pandemic-abetting stances on the sanctity of the theater experience: The man puts his money where his mouth is when it comes to his love of big ol’ blockbusters. That comes through, not just in a body of films that never do less than dazzle (if also, occasionally, confuse), but also any time Nolan merely talks about movies, instead of making them. Take his recent appearance on Josh Horowitz’s frequently star-studded Happy Sad Confused podcast, a free-wheeling conversation that runs through not just the philosophy behind the recent Tenet, but also Nolan’s takes on the Bond flicks, Alien films, the John Wick movies, and that most block-busting of big, dumb action movies: The Fast And The Furious.
In fact, Nolan swiftly outs himself as a fan of the franchise that lives its life a quarter-mile of family at a time—although his picks for favorites might be somewhat surprising, given the director’s own taste for massive spectacle. He’s apparently the biggest fan of the very first, relatively sedate Rob Cohen-directed outing, as well as having a “very soft spot” for 2006's Tokyo Drift. (Justice for Han, at last!)
Nolan and Horowitz don’t stay on the topic for long, getting sidetracked by a conversation about the need for ever-more ludicrous escalation in sequels, lest you fall into the same trap David Fincher found himself in on Alien 3. (Nolan, hilariously, sounds mortified at the prospect of ever bringing the cult film up to Fincher, who had a famously bad time making it.) But it is gratifying to remember that, in addition to whatever clever tricks and philosophical implications power his movies (and his strident defenses thereof), at the end of the day, Christopher Nolan is just a man who loves watching a car go very fast at a neat angle (and also, if he can swing it, somehow backwards in time).