The Political Philosophy of Christopher and Jonathan Nolan

This is a rough draft, but the basic premise is that the political ideologies underpinning all of their works is a strong libertarian/volunteryist/anarchist bent. MANY SPOILERS

1. Following: This was his first movie, I would think practical concerns predominated and it seems crazy to imagine that he would be so bold as to use his first feature film, which he’s hoping will propel his career forward, to extol some political ideals. That being said, the only government involvement in this movie is when the police are used by the villain to wrongfully imprison the protagonist.
2. Memento: A story about an everyman with no memory of the past who an agent of the government is manipulating to serve his own interests while claiming that it’s for the greater good (getting rid of drug dealers). It’s also interesting to note that the “greater good” Teddy sites is getting rid of drug dealers considering the war on drugs is widely regarded as a total failure that in fact creates violent criminals. It adds a layer of absurdity to Teddy’s justification. It’s like he’s saying, “Sure we’re breaking the laws we claim to uphold (those in power are always the exceptions to their own rules) but hey at least we’re getting rid of this problem we created! And what about Leonard’s “condition?” Could Leonard represent all of us with our poor short term memories always forgetting how we are manipulated and deceived to suit the interests of others, often under the pretense of the greater good? We had to go to war in Vietnam and Afghanistan to fight communism. We had to go to war in Iraq to fight Al Qaeda, a terrorist group created by our involvement in Afghanistan. Again the state wants credit for “solving” a problem it created, but all it ever does is create more problems. In the end, Leonard doesn’t buy Teddy’s justification and kills him.
3. Insomnia: The protagonist is a government agent (detective) who abused his power and broke the law (planting evidence) claiming it was for the greater good, while actually being more concerned with his own legacy. Again a government agent holding himself to a different standard than others, justifying his illegitimate actions under the pretense of the greater good. Throughout the movie the villain, a sociopath, repeatedly asserts that he and the protagonist are the same. The state is a sociopathic killer. In the end the crime destroys him and almost gets Burr (Hillary Swank) to lie and manipulate by hiding evidence that would reveal the truth about Dormer’s (Al Pacino) guilt. We see how easy it is to get corrupted by power. In the end she doesn’t go through with it, but maybe she realized this is the kind of case that makes a career in state law enforcement.
4. The Prestige: Borden is a passionate and brilliant lower class artist. Angier is a member of the upper class and seeming nobility (i.e. member of the ruling class). Through his use of money and power, presumably inherited, Angier eventually defeats Borden and, like in Following, the State only gets involved to wrongfully imprison the protagonist. But, Nolan reveals, he was not alone. The people (represented by Borden and Fallon) outnumber the powerful and in the end Angier (the member of the ruling class) is murdered.
5. Batman Begins: Ra’s al Ghul trains Bruce Wayne and seeks to indoctrinate him into his anarchic revolutionary cause to destroy Gotham which he compares to Rome, i.e. the capital of a massive an empire, the largest power structure conceivable. Instead of telling the authorities Bruce Wayne works outside of the law to suppress the plot. They are two sides of the same anarchic coin, only their methods, and their belief in the possibility of salvation for Gotham, separates them. As always there is a corrupt cop. Ra’s wants to destroy Gotham to restore balance, but only someone who thinks anarchy leads to balance would think that destroying the seat of power and influence would cause anything other than incredible chaos. The villain does not use large-scale violence to defeat the city, but fear. Who else uses fear to foster compliance? The state. Ra’s al Ghul merely amplifies the same thing that citizens of powerful empires already allow to be used against them. The hero defeats the villain in the end … but things don’t actually get any better do they? In addition, some parallels exist between Nolan’s Batman and Alan Moore’s anarcho-hero “V” from V for Vendetta. Batman: “It’s not who I am underneath… but what I *do*… that defines me.” V: “Beneath this mask there is more than flesh. Beneath this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy, and ideas are bulletproof.” Ra’s: “If you make yourself more than just a man, if you devote yourself to an ideal, you become something else entirely.”
6. The Dark Knight: The Joker is the revolutionary anarchist to Ra’s al Ghul’s kind-of-buddhist anarchist, taking direct violent action instead of merely encouraging the city to “tear itself apart.” That the Joker is an anarchist, I’m sure, surprises no one. But let’s look at some quotes. “Introduce a little anarchy, upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos, I’m an agent of chaos, and you know the thing about chaos? It’s fair.” Both he and Batman are working outside of the law to seek justice where the state has failed. Who are the Joker’s main targets? Actually, mobsters, politicians, and other government agents … but interestingly not Batman stating, “I don’t wanna kill you … you complete me.” They are two sides of the same coin. In the movie one of the theories about the Joker’s origins was that he was a former soldier suffering from acute PTSD, which also explains his seemingly extensive knowledge of weaponry, explosives, and combat. Could the “villain” of the film actually be just a product of the power structure he’s now attacking? Obviously the Joker had no origins, he isn’t a real person. The fact that Nolan introduces the PTSD option into the film is what matters and it indicates that he wanted to at least mention the possibility that the “villain” of the film was actually a victim … of the State and, like Batman, is simply seeking justice. In the end Batman wins by using an all-seeing mass surveillance apparatus, but puts control over the machine into the hands of a private citizen, who destroys it rather than handing it over to the State (more on this below). Again, Batman wins, but things don’t get any better in Gotham.
7. The Dark Knight Rises: Despite Batman’s successes, Gotham is still going to hell in a hand basket and our hero is seriously bummed out. Of course there’s still one group of people who’ve been left largely ignored by Batman: those in power. Fortunately, his everyman buddy, James Gordon, is the commissioner but we’re told early on that despite his spectacular performance, the bureaucrats of the city are planning on getting him replaced. The villains, Bane and Talia, are looking to complete Ra’s al Ghul’s mission, the destruction of the capital of a decadent empire. In the process (to quote wikipedia), “The wealthy and powerful have their property expropriated, are dragged from their homes, and given show trials presided over by Dr. Jonathan Crane, where any sentence means likely death.” Why make the trials a show, unless the rich and powerful were by definition guilty. Maybe because they were part of the ruling class in the capital of the empire. But through this process, class divisions are destroyed and everyone (even the cowardly and corrupt government bureaucrat played by Matthew Modine) cooperates as equals to defeat their common oppressor and our hero can finally ride off into the sunset. The people cooperate without any defined laws, political or judicial apparatus, or military involvement. Did Baine and Talia really fail at all, or did they sacrifice themselves to destroy the old, corrupt Gotham and make way for a new, egalitarian one?
8. Inception: So what if the Nolans are anarchists, that doesn’t mean that’s what all their films are about right? Take Inception, for example, a movie with a cast of characters which roughly align with those in a film crew (Cobb/Director, Eames/Actor, Ariadne/Writer, Yusuf/Effects, Mal/Muse) tasked with implanting another person’s idea into the mind of the audience. HOLY SHIT.
9. Interstellar: MASSIVE SPOILERS. Consider not reading this if you have not already seen the movie. In a world where the excesses of modern society have lead to a permanent and global dust bowl, a private citizen is tasked with saving the world with the help of scientists. Politicians, law enforcement, and military don’t seem to exist though at one point Professor Brand reveals that politicians did demand NASA nuke the population to eliminate the blight. This was presumably for the greater good, though one would imagine those giving that order would be safely secured in a bunker. In another scene Cooper visits his children’s school and is told by a government bureaucrat (employee of a public school) that his son will become a farmer because, “We need farmers.” Cooper says, “I pay my taxes.” This is a public school using Cooper’s tax dollars to determine his son’s future supposedly for the greater good. Of course all the past sacrifices “for the greater good” have created the predicament they currently find themselves in. To quote the character Donald, “…we made a lot of mistakes. Six billion people. Just try to imagine that. Every last one of them trying to have it all.” Eventually it’s revealed that the head of NASA (a government agency kept hidden from the public) was actually lying and manipulating everyone to trick them into participating in his plan to “save” humanity, again for the greater good which “coincidentally” involved one of the few surviving members of the human race being a loved one of his. Again, the greater good just happens to be in his self-interest. Dr. Mann too, the creator of the program, lies, manipulates, and attempts to kill the protagonist, again explicitly claiming that it is for the greater good, which just coincidentally involves his own personal survival. Dr. Mann the creator of the Lazarus project (hmmm … Dr. Mann. Dr. MAN. Like the first man, Adam? Original sin guy? It is only the hero who sacrifices himself, but his sacrifice winds up saving the whole of humanity and himself.

More evidence:

The Killing Joke

It’s amazing what happens when you come up with a good theory: the evidence just keeps piling up. Nolan has admitted that The Killing Joke was a major influence on The Dark Knight. But that’s not putting it quite right, in fact he said, “It’s my favorite. It’s the first comic I’ve ever loved. And the success of those graphic novels made our ideas more acceptable [emphasis mine].” And who wrote The Killing Joke? Alan Moore, a vocal and proud anarchist. Here he is talking about it. Some people take issue with Nolan’s changes to Moore’s ending (which already isn’t fair because the book was merely an influence). Here’s one such analysis:

Ironically, Nolan’s 2008 film contradicts Moore’s moral lesson. In the film, Batman creates an extra-judicial mass-surveillance network using cellphones. Much like the NSA after 9/11, he temporarily ignores the rule of law in order to catch the Joker. These unprecedented steps are akin to what Pericles did to preserve his beloved Athens against Persia and what George W. Bush did to preserve America against Al-Qaeda. In most instances in history, this “temporary” suspension of established laws and adoption of emergency powers often become “permanent.” Unpleasant consequences sometimes follow

As such, the key difference between Moore’s The Killing Joke and Nolan’s The Dark Knight is that Moore sagely realizes the perils of even temporarily suspending the rule of law, while Nolan naively assumes the laws which govern a society can be momentarily ignored without ingravescent consequences.

This is an objectively incorrect analysis, but is somewhat reasonable if one does not consider that Batman is an anarchic hero. But, if we believe that Moore’s Batman was the influence for Nolan’s (remember, Moore’s book was a massive influence on Nolan as a person, after all he LOVED it long before he made the movie) then it seems fairly obvious that he should be an anarchic hero. It wouldn’t make much sense if an anarchist would make a communist or statist hero. In fact, all of Moore’s works are anti-statist, the most unabashed of which is V for Vendetta in which the hero (and superhero) is openly anarchist. Speaking of V for Vendetta, I’ll bet you didn’t know that the same soundtrack was sampled for it’s trailer and The Dark Knight’s.

But back to the claim that Batman is some kind of fascist arguing for the suspension of the rule of law. The most important point here is that it’s utterly nonsensical. All the acts cited by the reviewer were State acts. Batman is not a state, nor is it remotely reasonable to assume that he is a representative of the state. He is a VIGILANTE. He operates outside of the state because he does not feel the existing apparatus is functioning properly. If he did he either wouldn’t need to exist, or would become a cop. Batman doesn’t believe in the rule of law, as the Joker states explicitly Batman only has ONE rule, a rule the Joker seeks to force him to break. We assume that law is, “Do not kill,” but in fact I believe the one rule he is referring to is the one and only rule anarchists find legitimate: the non-aggression principal. You cannot commit acts of aggression (the initiation of violence) against anyone who themselves has not violated the non-aggression principle. A rule that I don’t recall Batman ever breaking. The Joker admits as much saying, “You truly are incorruptible, aren’t you, huh?”

In fact, what Nolan shows is how a seemingly unstoppable enemy can be vanquished without involving the state and its massive expenditures on the apparatus of war. States solve existential threats by using massive amounts of funds taken from their citizens by force (a/k/a theft) to create militaries, police forces (both of which so often operate above the laws they supposedly protect), and weapons of mass destruction that oppress and propagandize the people they claim to protect while murdering countless people abroad which in turn creates enemies who seek retribution against their oppressors through attacks which the State characterizes as not retributive, but “anti-freedom.” Of course, funds taken by force to fund the military is not considered by those in power to be “anti-freedom.” Batman, on the other hand, defeats the Joker by crowdsourcing. He doesn’t use the State’s apparatus (e.g. the already massive system of surveillance it has already set up which Batman could no doubt hack) he uses the people’s apparatus. Their cell phones. That he does it without asking their permission is a preposterous critique. The people of Gotham were in a nightmare, it was perfectly reasonable for Batman to assume that they would volunteer the use of their cell phones to defeat the villain terrorizing them. One could argue that this was not the Batman’s decision to make, but States (i.e. the rule of law) make this determination all the time, the only difference is that once they create a privilege for themselves, they never give it up. Batman, on the other hand, destroys it once it serves his purpose. One of the go-to, knee-jerk critiques of anarchy is that the State needs to exist to protect its citizens from existential threats, and yet when Nolan clearly demonstrates how a private citizen, with the help of other private citizens and existing consumer (i.e. private citizen) technology (no additional capital expenditure, let alone the $530 billion the US spend on its military which is up from $287 billion as recently as 2001) can conquer an existential threat. In the end it is a private citizen who makes the decision to destroy the apparatus, though it’s never explained why. After all, it could help prevent a lot of crime. Perhaps this quote from anarchist Noam Chomsky sheds some light on the matter:

Anarchism is a tendency in human development that seeks to identify structures of hierarchy, domination, authority and others that constrain human development, and then it seeks to subject them to a very reasonable challenge: justify yourself. Demonstrate that you’re legitimate (maybe in some special circumstances, and conceivably in principle) and if you can’t meet that challenge, which is usually the case, the structure should be dismantled [emphasis mine].

The structure was no longer legitimate, therefore it had to be dismantled.

Person of Interest

Person of Interest is a tv show created by Jonathan Nolan in which the state has created a massive surveillance apparatus to monitor its own citizens. I don’t think I could say it any better than the opening narration:

You are being watched. The government has a secret system, a machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I know because I built it. I designed the machine to detect acts of terror but it sees everything. Violent crimes involving ordinary people, people like you. Crimes the government considered “irrelevant.” They wouldn’t act, so I decided I would. But I needed a partner, someone with the skills to intervene. Hunted by the authorities, we work in secret. You’ll never find us, but victim or perpetrator, if your number’s up… we’ll find *you*. [emphasis mine]

In Person of Interest the state has invested considerable funds in a secret mass surveillance apparatus which it uses to spy on its own citizens and only considers violent actions taken against it as “relevant.” A word with negative connotations (“spies”) is used instead of a more neutral word like “monitors.” Crimes against citizens are referred to as “irrelevant” to the government. Two private citizens, one with a military background (remember the Joker’s theoretical PTSD diagnosis) who separates himself from society, reappropriate the state’s apparatus to protect the people. And people think the Nolans are fans of the NSA! One of the main characters in the show is a corrupt government agent who was part of a gang of corrupt government agents. By episode 9 it is revealed that, in fact, the entire government is in cahoots with the new mafia boss, Elias. Here’s a conversation between a Police Captain and Detective:

Police Captain: [Elias] knows the rules… Runs a tight ship, low profile, not like these cutthrought Russian idiots, he knows who to grease, all the way to city hall… Detective Carter [a hero character, also with a military background] doesn’t understand the rules, she’s bad for business. She’s gotta go. [emphasis mine]

Detective: Tricky business getting rid of a cop.

Police Captain: Went through the proper back-channels. Up the chain-of-command. Permission granted. It’s just gotta look clean.

Detective: Clean? You mean like in the line of duty?

Police Captain: [Nods head, “Yes.”]

Here the show is arguing that the state is just a tool used for the benefit of the powerful. It will both sanction, and participate in, the murder of a citizen, veteran, and member of its own ranks, to protect it’s monetary interests. It’s also interesting to note that the “corrupt detective” in the show actually appears to be a good person, could it be that once introduced into the system it is difficult not to be corrupted by it?

Stanley Kubrick

Nolan said “… there is only one Stanley Kubrick. I do believe he is inimitable. But you can be inspired. You can be inspired to aspire to be that confident.”

Kubrick claimed he was not an anarchist, but that doesn’t mean his movies wouldn’t appeal to an anarchist, and it seems pretty clear that he didn’t have a tremendous amount of respect for those in power. Paths of Glory is about soldiers being treated like chess pieces, sacrificed by cowardly bureaucrats to suit their selfish needs (a promotion to General, or something). I mean, Dr. Strangelove? Governments literally destroy the entire planet with their reckless games, following a set of events triggered when a General (government official) becomes obsessed with protecting his bodily fluids. In A Clockwork Orange the government brainwashes a citizen for the greater good, but when he tries to commit suicide he undoes the programming and the Minister of the Interior, now more concerned with his election campaign, offers Alex a job in return for his cooperation. In Full Metal Jacket men are broken down by the government into sex-crazed killing machines who are thrown into an un-winnable battle on the other side of the planet that further destroys their souls. In fact, I would argue that the corruptive influence of power, it’s tendency to lead to murder and genocide, and the recurring nature of such events are themes that underlie most of his films, including The Shining.