Every Christopher Nolan Movie, Ranked

5. Oppenheimer (2023)

The film that finally won Nolan all the awards that had long eluded him, including a Best Picture and Best Director statue at the Oscars, Oppenheimer represents the zenith of his many preoccupations. At its centre stands a tortured genius, behind him, stretching further than he can see, a future he's about to throw into disarray.

Charting the creation of the atomic bomb during the final days of the Second World War, Nolan's majestic thriller follows J. Robert Oppenheimer (a chilling and chilly Cillian Murphy) as he works to bring science to the forefront of the war, even as his opponents (led by a career-best Robert Downey Jr) clamber to dismantle his vision and his legacy.

With Ludwig Goransson's pulverising score backing him every step of the way, Nolan's devastating character study finds him exploring all the themes that have obsessed him over the years - human creation, the consequence of man's hubris, how sound can tell a story - to gripping effect, all the way to a final shot that he, frankly, may never be able to surpass.