Unlike directors like Wes Anderson, Tim Burton, and Terrence Malick, it's really difficult to really pin down Christopher Nolan's creative style. In other words, it's much harder to watch a film and immediately be able to say, "Yep, this is totally a Christopher Nolan film." However, his films are unique in more subtle ways, their DNA written not necessarily with visual elements, but his signature structural, narrative, and cinematic elements, all of which tend to push the boundaries of the medium.

Even a cursory glance at his list of favorite films reveals how greatly they influenced his work. The experimentation of Kubrick and Reggio, the attention to architecture, and the juxtaposition of humanity and technology, of the natural and the artificial, of peace and war all echo Nolan's creative sensibility.

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey; dir. Stanley Kubrick (1968)
2. Koyaanisqatsi; dir. Godfrey Reggio (1982)
3. The Thin Red Line; dir. Terrence Malick (1998)
4. The Spy Who Loved Me; dir. Lewis Gilbert (1977)
5. Blade Runner; dir. Ridley Scott (1982)

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