Left image via Universal Pictures / Right image via Warner Bros //

Literally our only gripe with the veteran director…

Up until 2012’s Dark Knight Rises, director Christopher Nolan was on a seemingly never-ending string of perfect films. Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight and Inception, it seemed like he really couldn’t commit a wrong. Then enters the end of his Batman franchise, and alas, we saw the first of what was to become one of his biggest recurring flaws to date: His sound mixing. For some unknown reason, the dialogue in his films started becoming insanely hard to hear, with it being borderline indecipherable at times. It’s since become something of a calling card of his over the years, and now, he’s finally explained what the hell is going on.

Speaking in an interview for his latest film, Oppenheimer, Nolan addressed critics of the dialogue in his latest blockbuster, explaining, “I like to use the performance that was given in the moment rather than the actor re-voice it later, which is an artistic choice that some people disagree with, and that’s their right.”

Sounds like a bit of a cop out. Thankfully, it seems even other filmmakers have called Nolan out directly for his sound mixing, with Nolan revealing that several of his peers had reached out after the release of 2014’s Interstellar, confessing, “I actually got calls from other filmmakers who would say, ‘I just saw your film, and the dialogue is inaudible.’ Some people thought maybe the music’s too loud, but the truth was it was kind of the whole enchilada of how we had chosen to mix it,” while adding, “I was a little shocked to realise how conservative people are when it comes to sound. Because you can make a film that looks like anything, you can shoot on your iPhone, no one’s going to complain. But if you mix the sound a certain way, or if you use certain sub-frequencies, people get up in arms.”