In Interstellar, NASA pilot Joe Cooper travels through a worm hole in an attempt to find a new home for the people of Earth. As he does, his experience of time shifts, moving far more slowly than it does on his home planet. A black hole is bending light, and pulling space with it.
Of course the worm hole and black hole behave that way in the film, because that's how they behave in real life. Director Christopher Nolan knew this, because Kip Thorne made sure of it. The famous astrophysicist helped design Interstellar’s black hole, working with a team of 30 people and thousands of computers.
Creating the most accurate film simulation of a black hole yet required Nolan and Thorne to answer some tricky questions. How do you depict a wormhole onscreen? How can a black hole allow for time to pass differently for different characters? How did a big-budget Hollywood movie become observational data in astrophysics?
The answers are no less fascinating than the film.
