20 Things You Didn't Know About Interstellar

2. The Story Was Inspired By... Avatar And Wall-E?!

Interstellar ship
Disney

During that early version of the project involving Steven Spielberg and Jonathan Nolan, the younger Nolan brother struggled with the idea of making a realistic space movie. He even went so far as to say that "my take on a realistic space-exploration film was simple: It’s not going to happen."

Obviously though, he eventually cracked the story, and some of the movies he drew inspiration from might come as a surprise.

Around the same time that Jonathan was writing Interstellar, Hollywood was releasing apocalyptic sci-fi flicks like Avatar and Wall-E, and it was this trend that inspired him to set the film in a blight-ridden dystopia.

At the same time, he also wanted Interstellar to be a tale of hope, which - despite the bleak circumstances the characters find themselves in - is another element that all three movies share.

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Contributor

Danny has been with WhatCulture for almost nine years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. He has been writing and video editing for 10+ years, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers and uploading them to YouTube (they're admittedly a bit rusty by today's standards). If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order or to tell you about the making of 1988's Remembrance of the Daleks, Danny is the person to ask.