Christopher Nolan makes his next film at Universal, interrupting the director’s nearly two-decade creative collaboration with Warner Bros., the company that has backed many of his big box office hits.
Getting to this point has meant months of courtship, clandestine meetings, big promises and the desire to make a creative leap with one of the most daring, but also most demanding, filmmakers in the business. It also represents a major victory for Universal and its head of cinema, Donna Langely, who moved aggressively to establish a relationship with the director of “The Dark Knight” after he became dissatisfied with Warner Bros. this Wednesday. It was announced on Tuesday that the study will fully fund the $ 100 million Drama about J. Robert Oppenheimer and the creation of the atomic bomb. It will also follow Oppenheimer’s subsequent decision to call for more international control of nuclear weapons and its eventual opposition to the development of the hydrogen bomb. Filming will begin in the first quarter of 2022 and will require extensive digital effects. The study is scheduled to be launched in late 2023 or 2024.
The Nolan jump from Warner Bros. to one of his greatest rivals is remarkable, but not entirely shocking. The director made no secret of the fact that Warner Bros. dismayed him. decision to release his entire 2021 list simultaneously on HBO Max, even though the one-year deal was motivated by the pandemic and did not apply to his current or future films. Still, his comments were so compelling: “Some of the most important filmmakers in our industry and the biggest movie stars went to bed at night before they thought they were working for the best film studio and woke up to find out who worked for the worst transmission service “. it became clear how tight their ties were with the studio he had long considered home. For the past twenty years, Nolan has partnered with Warner Bros. in the trilogy “The Dark Knight,” “Inception,” “Dunkirk” and, more recently, “Tenet.”
Even before the HBO Max deal was launched and triggered Nolan, his relationship with Warner Bros. he had been stressed, which sparked talks he was looking for a new creative partner. The two had clashed privately over plans to launch “Tenet.” Nolan, a fierce proponent of the exhibition industry, hoped his science fiction epic would spark a cinematic renaissance, but studio executives weren’t sure they would debut a $ 200 million budgeted film in September 2020. , a time when most American cinemas were closed and the idea of a widely accessible vaccine seemed like a distant dream. Warner Bros. it eventually backed the film’s fall release, but “Tenet” became a box office disappointment and lost the studio by at least $ 50 million.
“Tenet,” at least in his theatrical life, may not have occurred exactly as Nolan expected, but the filmmaker maintains unprecedented control over the distribution plans of his films. In his collaboration with Universal, he seeks to have a similar closing on where and when his next film will be presented to the public. Naturally, a solid theatrical window (the language of the industry during the time that only one film plays in cinemas) will be of paramount importance.
Sources familiar with the negotiations say Nolan requested, though it is unclear whether he will receive, an exclusive theatrical window between 90 and 120 days for the upcoming World War II epic. The film will likely remain on the big screen for a longer period than the 45-day frame that seems to have become an industry standard in the post-pandemic era. Insiders at Universal confirm that it will be exempt from the 17-day window (or 31 days for films that generate at least $ 50 million in opening sales over the weekend) that Universal forged through a deal with major theatrical chains, such as AMC and Cinemark, to bring movies home faster. Before COVID-19 revalued the movie theater business, novelties were traditionally screened in cinemas for 75 to 90 days before moving to home entertainment platforms. Nolan’s library, including “Tenet,” could not be moved to digital platforms until 120 days after its initial releases.
Universal declined to comment and could not be reached for WME, the agency representing Nolan.
Because of his cinematic pedigree and almost consistent box office success, those who have worked with Nolan before attesting to his contracts are more demanding than those of his peers. In his individual film arrangements at Warner Bros., Nolan has required a three-week shutdown period on the release schedule, meaning the studio was unable to release a film three weeks earlier or three weeks after the opening of one of the director’s films. . With or without such a clause, Hollywood executives would make every effort to avoid cannibalizing a degree that belongs to a similar genre. Nolan’s supply is curious because it’s an agnostic category: anything, from the “Dune Part II” to the latest “The Lego Movie,” centered on children, should have hypothetically avoided the weeks surrounding it. ‘last of Nolan. He applied for terms similar to Universal, but experts say he seems to have some leeway. Maybe that means “Minions 12” won’t have to completely avoid debuting the same season as the upcoming atom bomb drama.
Nolan will also receive a backend deal that promises the first gross dollar, as well as the final cut of his film. Before Nolan presented his next project, he and his team of WME agents had submitted bids for a first deal from both broadcast services and traditional film companies.
Studios interested in supporting Oppenheimer’s image were allowed to see Nolan’s filming script, but were asked to read it in the director’s office to avoid leaks. There were also meetings that took place at the director’s home. Some potential suitors, a group that included Sony, MGM, Paramount and, despite their downfall, Warner Bros., were concerned that the object of the film was smaller than the commercial, which worried them about the high price. .
Ultimately, it was Nolan’s track record of success and ability to pull cinematic gold out of everything from the battles of Normandy to the great explorations of time, space and dreams, which made Universal s ‘take that risk.