Christopher Nolan taught me how to keep my audience engaged

I went to the cinema yesterday with a couple of friends of mine.

And you’ll never guess which movie I went to see. It’s definitely not one of the 2 only movies which people are currently talking about.

In fact, there’s been so much media attention on these movies lately that I’m guessing you already know which movie I went to immediately after reading the subject line of this email.

And chances are you’re right.

I saw Oppenheimer yesterday. I’ve been a Christopher Nolan fan for a long time now. So I just had to.

We even got the full IMAX experience as well.

And It was an amazing experience. Even though we sat in the 3rd row, which I once again experienced as definitely being too close (especially for IMAX), the 3 hours flew by as if they were nothing.

Oppenheimer has some flaws, not saying it doesn’t. But it does a lot of things right. Absolutely perfectly.

It’s a 3-hour long film, but it doesn’t feel like it’s 3 hours. At most, it felt like an hour and a half.

The film opens, as any good movie does, with forward movement. There’s stuff happening. But this time there’s a lot of stuff happening. So much so that you don’t really know what’s happening.

Many curiosity loops get opened, some of which only get resolved (or even mentioned) at the very end of the film.

There’s constant tension as well, enhanced by the wonderful audio experience, which keeps you on your toes at all times.

But the most important thing. The factor that makes this 3-hour-long movie work is something Christopher Nolan had been experimenting with back when he directed TENET.

TENET is unique. It’s a wonderful piece of art. It’s an experiment. A failed experiment at that, but even a failed experiment has its value.

Let me ask you a question. Do you remember the name of the main character in TENET? I’m guessing you don’t.

And in fact, I don’t either. That’s done intentionally. The main character doesn’t have a name. He’s even mentioned in the credits as The Protagonist.

The whole of TENET was an experiment to see whether you could create a film without a central character. Without a transformation.

Traditional storytelling would tell you that every story is nothing more than a person going through a transformation. No matter how elaborate the plot looks. It always boils down to someone starting their adventure one way and coming out a different man. Either physically, or spiritually.

In every story, it’s the combination of Plot & Character that keeps the audience engaged.

At any given point in the film, either something should be happening that moves the plot forward. Or something that changes the character.

TENET was an experiment to see whether you could keep the audience engaged solely through the power of the plot. No character development whatsoever.

Ultimately TENET fell flat and didn’t turn out a film many people remembered.

But it did teach a lot about how to keep the plot moving at all times. How to keep the audience engaged.

And you can see this applied to Oppenheimer perfectly. Oppenheimer does have both plot and character. But where it truly shines is the plot. There’s never a dull moment. Never a moment where your eyes wander off-screen.

Business works the same way. A business that’s stagnating is a business that’s dying.

And your audience feels it.

Always be working on something. Always be adding value somewhere. Keep sharing progress updates. No matter how little progress you’ve made.

Even mistakes you made are progress. Share them as lessons you’ve learned.

These are both your plot & your character.

Share your personal transformation. Share your business transformation.

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