World-class director Christopher Nolan, whose Oppenheimer lit the 2023 box office on fire, recently recalled a hilarious moment when a Peloton instructor trashed one of his films as he was working out.
Nolan recalled the moment when accepting his award for Best Director from the New York Film Critics Circle, citing it as an example of the democratization of film criticism in the age of social media.
“Directors have a complex emotional relationship with critics and criticism,” he told those in attendance. “A question we’re always asked is: Do we read reviews? Let’s start with the fact that I’m British. A typical family gathering will involve relatives saying to me, ‘You know, Christopher. You probably shouldn’t open The Guardian today.’”
Nolan then recalled working out during a Peloton virtual session when the instructor abruptly trashed one of his films; she obviously had no idea the director of that film was among her students.
“I was on my Peloton. I’m dying. And the instructor started talking about one of my films and said, ‘Did anyone see this? That’s a couple hours of my life I’ll never get back again!’” Nolan said. “When [film critic] Rex Reed takes a shit on your film, he doesn’t ask you to work out! In today’s world, where opinions are everywhere, there is a sort of idea that film criticism is being democratized, but I for one think the critical appreciation of films shouldn’t be an instinct but it should be a profession.”
Nolan then drove home a rather insightful point about film criticism as a profession.
“What we have here tonight is a group of professionals who attempt objectivity,” Nolan said. “Obviously writing about cinema objectively is a paradox, but the aspirations of objectivity is what makes criticism vital and timeless and useful to filmmakers and the filmmaking community.”
Hours after Nolan’s story broke on social media, the age of democratization demonstrated its immense power when footage of his Peloton critic began to go viral. The movie she was bashing, as it turned out, was his 2020 time travel action thriller TENET.
“This song is from the soundtrack of a movie called TENET. Did anybody see this shit?” she asked her virtual audience. “Did anybody see this besides me? Because I need a manual. Someone’s got to explain this.”
“Yea… I’m not kidding,” she later said. “What the fuck was going on in that movie? Do you understand? Seriously, you need to be a neuroscientist to understand. And that’s two and a half hours of my life that I want back. I want it back.”
Footage of Nolan’s speech showed that he took the criticism rather well and handled it with class.
The instructor was later identified as Jenn Sherman, who profusely apologized to Nolan while praising for his work on Oppenheimer. She also invited him back to join in one of her future classes.
“I have seen ‘Oppenheimer’ twice. That’s 6 hours of my life that I don’t ever want to give back… Mr. Nolan, I’m inviting you to come for a ride with me in the Peloton studio. You can critique my class. You’ll have a great time. You’ll sit in the front row. And I promise you it’ll be insult-free,” she said.
Paul Roland Bois directed the award-winning feature film, EXEMPLUM, which can be viewed for FREE on YouTube or Tubi. “Better than Killers of the Flower Moon,” wrote Mark Judge. “You haven’t seen a story like this before,” wrote Christian Toto. A high-quality, ad-free stream can also be purchased on Google Play or Vimeo on Demand. Follow him on Twitter @prolandfilms or Instagram @prolandfilms.