Christopher Nolan isn't a man many in the film industry would dream of saying "no" to. The art-house-meets-multiplex film director, heir apparent to Stanley Kubrick, has chosen composer Hans Zimmer to write the musical score for his trilogy of acclaimed Batman movies, as well as Inception , Dunkirk and the utterly brilliant Interstellar .
But there was something very odd about taking a seat in the summer of 2020 at our local cinema The Light, in Stockport, to take in Tenet , his latest mind-bending epic (which after seeing it four times I still don't understand). The film was the first "big" release to hit cinemas during the pandemic. The money men behind it wanted to hold off on bringing it to the screens until Covid was "over", which would assure a bigger box office for a film that had set the studio back a reported $200million.
However Nolan, a cinema purist, demanded its release then and there. He's perhaps the only director in the film industry who could make such a demand and not be laughed out of the building, let alone actually be listened to.
