Oppenheimer 2023

Barbenheimer: Part 1 of 2

This is the kind of film I really don’t want to criticize, because we don’t get nearly enough other stuff like it. However, mr. Nolan has been in need of an intervention for a while now, and unfortunately all of the issues that have been plaguing his films since The Dark Knight Rises show up to some degree here. Visually it might just be his best film, and there’s some tremendous acting in here, particularly by Murphy and RDJ. However, it makes the common biopic mistake of treating its subject matter like a Wikipedia entry, thereby not focussing enough on character and perspective. As a whole, the film feels more like a long extended montage, I don’t think there are many scenes that go on for longer than 60 seconds. There’s a strong ‘and then this happened, and then this happened’ feel to it, which definitely keeps up the pace, but it refuses to stop and let an emotion or idea simmer for a while. There are moments where you get a look into Oppenheimer’s mind, but because the film wants to cover too much ground, it’s (like everything else) reduced to quick snippets. It’s the kind of approach that’d work for a 6 hour long miniseries where you can spend more time with the characters, not for a 3 hour film. I can already tell that I won’t retain much from this, in fact a lot of it is starting to blur together in my mind. There are also issues with some of the dialogue and exposition, such as moments where characters who are experts in their field talk in a way that feels dumbed down for the audience, or just straight up inauthentic. Einstein is given a couple of cheesy lines, college professors and students interact in a way that would never happen, Oppenheimer gives a lecture in what’s (according to the movie) supposed to be Dutch when it’s really German; you have to be way more careful with that when you’re making a serious drama. Finally, there are once again major issues with the sound mixing. I actually really loved the score, but occasionally it’s blaring at such a volume where it drowns out important dialogue in the mix. I’m lucky enough to have subtitles, but Nolan desperately needs to get his ears checked, or maybe he should’ve asked some advice from Benny Safdie since he’s pretty great with experimental sound mixing. My overall feelings are almost identical to the ones I had regarding Tenet; Nolan needs to rethink his approach to writing, editing and mixing. This film as a whole doesn’t work, but there are still more than a few admirable qualities to it.

Edit: I rewatched this at home to see whether my feeling would change. I still stand by what I wrote in July, though the sound mix seems to have been improved for the home media release. It sounds more balanced and I didn’t miss one line of dialogue this time around. I’m slightly raising my score because of that, but besides that I still think it’s unfocused, overedited, awkwardly staged and scripted etc.

5.5/10

Maybe I should stop watching movies all together.

There I was, about to invest three hours into a movie about a man I thought to be one of the most interesting characters in human history, and it left me totally underwhelmed. In fact, I quit at the 2:20 hour mark.

This is not "The story of J. Robert Oppenheimer's role in the development of the atomic bomb during World War II." This was more about american communist paranoia, about political intrique then it was about a build up to an event that changed the world. And even that, the Trinity test, was a massive dissapointment to lock at. It didn't look like an atomic explosion but rather just a giant gasoline fire, which it probably was. No fascination or awe or even fear, on my part about the power of nature they just unleashed. Why not make a movie about the project, the challenges, the difficulties when all you can show us of Oppenheimer is - what really ? What did he actually do, what were his contibutions other then sitting in meatings and hearing others talk.

I would like to say the acting was great but I can't as there are hardly scenes where anyone has more then two lines of dialogue in a row. Or longer scenes at all for that matter. You try to put yourself in one scene and it switches to the next, and the next and so on. Add to that jumping throught timelines and you can be left utterly confused. Which will probably be the reason it get's tons of Oscar's.

For me it's a soulless, lifeless and, dare I say it, boring movie stuffed with a massive cast that seemed so wasted on this.

[Edit] THIS MOVIE IS 3 HOURS LONG???? THREE HOURS???? Dear god one hour felt like an ETERNITY in the theater.

Unfortunately walked out because I got overstimulated cause it was a lot louder than expected, and also really fucking boring.

Visually stunning movie. Absolutely gorgeous. The effects done in camera, the cinematography, the acting, everything is just so much fun to look at. Christopher Nolan knows how to make a damn good looking movie. Hats off to the team that made this thing.

But writing wise... damn, it underperformed.

Other commenters mentioned that this feels like a Wikipedia entry or a montage of 60 second clips, and damn they are right. The writing just did. not. hit. It was hard to follow any of Oppenheimer's personal life and to actually feel anything for him or any of the people in his life. I don't expect a movie to hold my hand. But I do expect pace to be managed well and to have a bit of breathing room to be able to process stuff. This did not give you the time to do it lmao.

Also the characters just... didn't interact in an engaging way. Less than 20 minutes into the movie I was already checking my watch to see how much more of this I had to sit through! I didn't know half of the characters' names, or half of their relationships to each other, or why they were even relevant. Like the best example of this is Oppy and Einstein's interactions. They have beef, but it's hard to understand why? There's like... two interactions before the one hour mark that total less than a minute of on-screen time together. Einstein gets a few words in there and it's just very very unclear why they hate each other, or how they met, or what any of their background is. It's confusing!

Also let's talk about Oppenheimer's motivations. As a literal communist, I should empathize with Oppy and understand where he's coming from. But I don't! Because he's a fucking idiot! When he's talking with other leftists, he mentions "Isn't ownership theft?" and the person in the communist party is like "It's property, actually" and he's like "Well sorry I read all three volumes of Capital in original German" and he's like... just a dick??? But also no fucking leftist who is going around having read all three volumes of Capital talks about that shit! That's just dumb! And the entirety of his leftist politics are portrayed in a way that make him look like an egotistical maniac with dumb politics! One minute he's starting a union and pro-labor, another minute he's dropping all of that in order to be a dog of the US government! There's obviously an enormous jump happening there. Like something very, very clearly and very, very majorly changed for Oppenheimer there, and the film spends a grand total of 30 seconds in a single scene having him transition from brilliant labor activist to US government dog.

Also there are time jumps! Lots of them! The choice to jump back and forth between the McCarthyist interrogations of Oppenheimer and the past do. not. make. sense. They are hard to follow, extraordinarily boring, and absolutely ruin any sort of pacing the movie might have! There are several points in this movie where Oppenheimer starts to be fleshed out a bit more as a character or starts to be given more space for us to see what he's really like. And then it's randomly cut off and flashed forward to these utterly irrelevant black-and-white interviews. Oppenheimer has a leftist past! Of course he does! The movie literally shows us that! And instead of just telling things in a regular narrative way, the movie splits things up confusingly for absolutely no good fucking reason, and ends up showing us and telling us the same information twice! That is shit writing! If you cut all of these scenes you would be missing nothing from the movie, and you'd have more time to actually tell us about the characters, instead of them feeling like one-dimensional caricatures.

I don't know any of Oppenheimer's history, and I left this not understanding any more of it! I left after an hour because it felt like two and a half because it was just this firehose of information. And Nolan didn't present it in a way that actually made a story! He just shat this all out on the screen (and it's a beautiful shit, don't get me wrong!!), and expected the audience to love it! His characters are one-dimensional, they aren't given the space, the motivations, or the background really for us to understand where they're coming from or why they do what they do. And that ends up with this being a visually stunning but really fucking boring movie that I just walked out of because I couldn't take it anymore lol.

I cannot stand seeing visually gorgeous movies produced by people who clearly have god-level talent that seem to have a complete and utter inability to get the basics of movie-making, story, correct! I have ADHD. For a lot of people, sitting through a boring movie is just boring. For me, it is exhausting. It is excruciating. I can't fidget in a movie theater, I can't move, I can't pause the movie and come back later when I'm feeling more focused. And so if a movie is boring, I just leave! And it is so fucking annoying to miss out on a chance to see a movie that is, outside of its story, fucking beautiful because its director and writer couldn't do the extremely basic job of making a movie that holds people's interest and communicates things in even a slightly clear way. God what a waste.

As some have said, this was not what I expected. I expected a film that focused on the actual scientific undertaking and technological achievement as well as the psychological, emotional, and real world turmoil of creating man's worst invention. I expected to come out of this film impressed by the science, but also as horrified as Oppenheimer himself.

I thought this would be an actual biopic of Oppenheimer. I was curious to see what type of life he lived that would eventually lead him to the Manhattan project, its destructive aftermath, and his future work. And I expected to come out of this film with a better understanding of how they even built this crazy thing - which despite its obvious horrific application, is still a scientific marvel that only a small handful of countries have been able to reproduce even nearly 80 years later.

But instead, this stuff was glossed over to give us 3 hours of boring political dialogue outside the scope of anything that truly historically mattered. Oh, and they gave us occasional scenes about his sex life mixed in. Because of course, when it comes to the father of the atom bomb, the first thing people want to know about him is his sex life??

Remember, just because the film overwhelms viewers with intense, suspenseful music from beginning to end doesn't make the accompanying boring political squabble scenes any less boring. Just because it tells the story non-chronologically doesn't make the script more profound, it just makes it frustrating to watch. And just because it had the budget to fill even minor roles with A list actors doesn't mean it should have. Each time another big face popped up, it pulled me out of the film (which admittedly, was not hard to do since the film was so boring).

Ironically, the film multiple times hinted that certain aspects of the bomb and its story are actually important and should be seen by all. For example, they explicitly talked about the importance of actually seeing the bomb and its destruction to fully appreciate, and fear, its power. But then the film ignores its own insight and only shows us short clips of one test while completely ignoring its destruction. And Hiroshima and Nagasaki occurred off screen! Seriously This film could have used 2023 movie making skills to re-instill fear of nuclear apocalypse (which given current international conflict, wouldn't be the worst thing right now). But it didn't even attempt to. Further, the film even acknowledges in its conclusion that the political drama was almost entirely unimportant compared to the bigger picture of the technology and its impact on the world. So why couldn't they make the film focused on that instead??

They should have just called the film "Straus vs Oppenheimer" since that's really what this film was about. They built a device that killed hundreds of thousands of people in a single strike, and which changed the world forever, yet the film portrays the political stakes of Oppenheimer losing his security clearance and Straus not being confirmed to a cabinet position as the bigger deal worth caring about (and worth a 3 hour runtime).

This was a chore to watch and I had to rewind it multiple times because I kept falling asleep. I finished the film not entertained nor did I even learn anything of value. I feel like I got robbed out of what should have been a deeply impactful film.

I'll start off by saying biopics aren't my go to, history wasn't my favorite subject in school. Oppenheimer isn't an exception. It without a doubt tells the story of an important piece of our history but as a movie it didn't keep me interested for very long. It goes for emotional but I didn't really feel much (except for the historical impact obviously). I wanted more ethical questions and less of the complex politics and law maneuvering.

It's way too long, a lot of it could have been cut out like Oppenheimer's character setup, the love interests and even (that's an unpopular opinion) the whole court room third act which was way too politically convoluted for me and straight out boring! If the movie had ended with the explosion this would have been a way better watch but unfortunately it overstayed it's welcome and lost it's steam. It's basically: buildup, payoff, buildup—.

A fabulous score with impressive sound in the theater but there's too much of it. The score was way too intense for what was showed on-screen a lot of the time and that's just distracting. There's also a few moments where I couldn't hear what was said because it's too loud. The dialogue is super fast-paced too so you can't miss a word or you're doomed not to understand what's going on.

Such a beautiful movie visually I like the WWII period aesthetics and clothes, the black & white scenes and the transition between different aspect ratios was used cleverly. The explosion scenes could have been longer but it looked amazing. The cast is stacked with stellar performances but Cillian Murphy really blew me away. A strong contender for the Oscars. Robert Downey Jr. for supporting role also.

This film gave me somewhat of an existential crisis afterwards. It's very hard to explain a film that hit you hard on a personal level. But what I will say is that the film scared me just to think about the world that we live in today. The movie takes you through so much content throughout the 3 hour runtime and is able to cram it all in without feeling like too much information is being shoved down your throat. The third act was my personal favorite because of the intense scenes and the sudden change of the film. The soundtrack is obviously top notch and the cinematography is absolutely outstanding. The performances by Cillian Murphy and Robert Downey Jr felt very emotional. By far Robert Downey Jr's best performance. All of the other performances were great as well and it was cool to see actors that you don't normally see in films anymore (Devon Bostick, Matthew Modine, Josh Peck, etc.). I had a great time with this one but one complain I do have is about the amount of nude scenes, which often felt like they didn't need to be there. Overall, it was a joy to see on the big screen.

While watching "Oppenheimer," I wondered several times whether the entire subject may not be better suited for an HBO prestige miniseries. With a three-hour runtime, the film is definitely too long for my taste, and especially in the first two hours, some scenes certainly could have been cut. However, some strong visual moments and an incredibly compelling final act made the movie-going experience an exciting one for me in the end.

There is little to criticize besides the somewhat bloated plot. For example, the female roles are written far too thinly, as is typical for director and screenwriter Christopher Nolan, and they are hardly existent at all. Just take a look at the Wiki entry for the film; there are currently 50 actors listed, with only five of them being female. In my view, the fact that it is historical material can only partially account for this. And if you have only a few actresses, then at least the characters of Florence Pugh and Emily Blunt should get something more to do.

The performances themselves, however, are almost all very strong. Cillian Murphy is, unsurprisingly, a convincing leading man. Matt Damon and Robert Downey Jr. also put in strong performances. Only in one scene with President Harry S. Truman, who is played by a notable actor I won't spoil, did I have massive problems acting-wise. Looking at the script, meanwhile, I would say that Nolan doesn't exactly get too deep. You shouldn't expect an analytical character study of Robert Oppenheimer. Furthermore, it is rather obvious who Nolan believes to be "the good guys" and "the bad guys." But I don't want to criticize that too much, as it makes the movie more accessible to a larger audience.

Ultimately, I can't give this movie anything other than a strong recommendation, if only because of the thrilling last hour. Those who have no problems with Nolan's style will certainly enjoy "Oppenheimer". However, I would also very much like to see a miniseries about the "father of the atomic bomb".

I feel like a lot of movies, especially this one, could be improved if directors would put themselves in the audience's shoes rather than just making whatever bloated, overwrought film that they envisioned from the start. I imagined that the film was going to be more about Oppenheimer and the making of the bomb itself, his personal struggles with it, etc, and the movie did get into that, but then it went into a whole giant secondary storyline about Oppenheimer's supposed Communist ties and whether he was actually loyal to the United States. Nolan needed an editor because I thought it was just too much ground to try to cover in a single film, and it was a real challenge from a viewer's standpoint to stay engaged for the duration. Of course, it seems like the content of the movie was just too straight forward for Nolan's liking, so he had to give us all this choppy storytelling, cutting from scene to scene and timeline to timeline, which made the film hard to follow and gave it a disjointed feeling. Sometimes directors are their own worst enemies in that way. I loved the cinematography. I will say that while the almost silent, surreal scene just after the test bomb went off, was a really nice touch, when the audio came back in full force, and we heard the bomb go off, it scared the shit out of me. I'm glad I went and ponied up the money to see it in the theater, but it was long. and Nolan and Co. tried to fit too much into the film. The highlights for me acting wise were Robert Downey Jr, Cillian Murphy and Gary Oldman as Truman.

Once I was done watching this, part of me was surprised about the high average rating, but as I read comments from viewers who gave it 8/10 stating they found the movie boring or underwhelming, understanding ensued. At some point in his career, Nolan must have hit the jackpot with mainstream audiences, such that they—thinking he can do no wrong—will view any of his work through rose-tinted glasses, compelling them to hand out a higher grade than one matching their perceived entertainment value. His 2000s titles feel like passion projects, and although Inception is the only one I'd call myself a fan of, most indeed deserve high praise. Something happened later, the Marvelization movement I suspect, and authenticity went out the window to be replaced by pandering.

It's funny to contemplate that a three hour movie feels rushed, yet this did. As others have mentioned, it is a messy burst of snippets allowing little time to connect with the characters, or draw any emotion. By the end I still didn't have the main character pegged down, and this Oppie even comes off as unpleasant, which I'm sure was not the intent. While RDJ was delivering his lines I found myself thinking "good job man, you really nailed that! Show them you're not just Iron Man", almost applauding. You know you're getting bored with the narrative when your focus starts to shift on an actor's performance.

Many reviews point out there are too many characters and I can only concur. Some are briefly introduced out of nowhere, then briefly reappear a while later and you're like "wait who's that guy again?". And Florence Pugh's boobs—why? Gratuitous nudity isn't something I associated with Nolan, and just further highlights the pandering approach he's been reduced to.

As someone interested in quantum physics, I thought I could at least derive some enjoyment out of that and maybe learn something. Unfortunately, that aspect of the movie was glossed over and dumbed down, to avoid patronizing viewers I suspect.

With Oppenheimer, his first biopic, writer/director Christopher Nolan once again proves he’s up to the challenge of balancing a difficult subject matter with a very tricky character piece. The slow, careful process of scientific discovery is rarely friendly to film, and shy, socially-awkward introverts do not often make for compelling leads, but in this case Nolan juggles both and steps away smelling like roses. As he’d already done on more than one occasion, in decidedly different flavors.

Here we track the career of a famed theoretical physicist, thrust into the limelight as the so-called “father of the atom bomb” during the crush of World War 2 and then dismissed by an ungrateful government after he’d outlived his usefulness and started asking difficult follow-up questions. Oppenheimer’s frustrated early career, meteoric rise to fame and equally rapid fall from grace are depicted almost simultaneously, in a rush of confused, overlapped memories. This style of all-at-once storytelling, in which foreshadowing coexists with its own outcome, is reminiscent of the time-blurred motifs we’ve already seen in Tenet, Inception and Dunkirk. Here it serves as a compelling way to digest a lot of information in a very short amount of time, especially when paired with a head-spinning series of metaphorical visual effects and an entrancing musical score. I’ve read the book this film was based upon, a daunting 800-page tome, and after the first hour I felt like I’d just read most of it all over again. This time with a little extra dramatic pizazz.

It’s an impressive display of top-notch filmmaking, proficiently depicting a historical scenario in which everyone already knows the ending and climaxing with a tense, powerful visualization of the Trinity tests which first loosed the power of violent nuclear fission upon the world. I loved every moment, but then, I was already deeply invested in the subject and had done some homework. My wife, far less prepared, was also far less enchanted. I think this may be more of a knock on Oppenheimer the man than Oppenheimer the film. A complicated, often misguided individual who, for all his brilliance within the hidden world of molecular physics, was inherently flawed and broken in a human sense. Nolan makes no apology for this, baring the person (and his many blemishes) to the screen with no filter, and the results aren’t always pretty.

Perhaps a bit too long, especially in the painfully bitter, sixty-minute postscript, but I’m not sure where I’d want to see a cut. Certainly not a feel-good audience pleaser, Nolan’s latest is an exhausting experience, but also rich, thoughtful and rewarding.

“I believe we did.”

Final review of 2023

Out of all the movies I saw in 2023, this movie has not left my mind since leaving the cinema auditorium when I watched it back in July.

After giving it a long thought and consideration, this might be Christopher Nolan's best movie. It’s not an easy watch with the subject matter and pacing, but that didn’t stop it from being a massive hit with critics, audiences, and, surprisingly, the box office. This three-hour-long talky movie managed to beat out every single blockbuster this summer. I have never seen anything like it. I worked at my cinema on the opening day of this movie and Barbie, and I have never seen it so packed since Avengers: Endgame. Everybody dressed up for the double feature event of the summer. The atmosphere was electric, and everyone was happy. It was a good day.

Oppenheimer is fantastic! It is a three-hour-long historical drama that is dialogue-heavy, which may sound off-putting, but I found it all engaging. People have best described it as a mixture of Oliver Stone's JFK and David Fincher's The Social Network.

It won't be for everyone, and that's all right.

I have to say, this is the best I have seen from Cillian Murphy, whose expressive face can convey so much fear and painful regret. His eyes are his most powerful tool as an actor, and Director Christopher Nolan knows this. It is one of my favourite performances from 2023, and nothing that I have seen has topped it. I try not to care about the Oscars because I don’t like to be disappointed, but I hope he gets nominated and wins. He has my vote.

However, it’s not only Cillian who deserves the credit, as the entire cast did a brilliant job despite their small screen time.

This is also the best I have seen from Robert Downey Jr. in a long time, as he delivered a superb performance. He plays Lewis Strauss, a narcissistic cry-baby whose facades he puts on slowly crumbs as the film progresses. He delivers an utterly fantastic monologue midway through the film about ego, loss of power, and fury. He has played Iron Man/Tony Stark for so long that you forget what an actor Downey can be. Same with Cillian, I hope he gets nominated and wins.

It's a huge cast, and there wasn't a single bad or mediocre performance in sight. Everybody showed up to work and gave it their all.

Emily Blunt is terrific as Kitty Oppenheimer. The Testimony scene is one of the best scenes in the film, where she stops being the victim housewife, collects herself, and commands the room. But another scene that doesn’t get mentioned is when Oppenheimer and Kitty meet for the first, then ride together on horses, and have a special connection. It was a sweet and memorable scene.

The rest of the supporting cast - Matt Damon, Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett, Benny Safdie, Jason Clarke, Rami Malek, and Alden Ehrenreich were all stellar. Also, this might be random, but Jason Clarke reminds me of Gene Hackman. It’s just a thought I had.

A special mention to Gary Oldman as Harry Truman, Tom Conti as Albert Einstein, and Casey Affleck as Colonel Pash, who made an impression on me in the little time we had them. Oldman is excellent at playing sinister and cold subtly, where we see President Truman drop the act and tell the hard truth about his role as President and what his decisions can do to them, mentally and emotionally. It was a chilling and eye-opening scene. Conti is phenomenal in his six minutes of screen time, where the bond between Oppey and Albert is adorable and heartbreaking. I say heartbreaking because we see the horror and disappointment on Einsten’s face from the outcome. But Casey Affleck made me feel so uncomfortable, as he had a dangerous air in his scene. He brilliantly plays a ruthless and remorseless Cold War intelligence agent. He gives the vibe of “if you are lying, you’re dead.”

It’s mind-blowing (to me) how massive a cast can be, and nobody was wasted or forgettable. It’s one of the best ensemble cast for any movie ever.

The score by Ludwig Göransson is so powerful to listen to. The sheer weight of this theme that it almost brought a tear to my eye. I had goosebumps all over my body when ‘Can You Hear the Music’ and ‘Destroyer Of Worlds’ started playing. It’s the perfect score to listen to if you are studying. Ludwig Göransson is one of the best composers working today.

The Trinity (nuclear test) scene is one of my favourite scenes of the year, with masterclass directing and pacing. The build-up to it, the dread, and the anticipation of the bang was an otherworldly experience. My hands were sweaty, and I was leaning so far back into my seat; it was so tense. I never felt that in my 24 years of life. And the silence in the room was defying until the bang eventually caught up.

Or how about the gymnasium scene after the Trinity Test? It might be the most impressive scene in Nolan’s filmography. It’s a horrific scene where you feel the horror that Oppenheimer is experiencing, knowing what he had done. It scared me more than any horror movie tried to do. Everything from the haunting visuals, the sound work, the editing, and Cillian's acting made the scene effective.

And the ending, the best ending to a movie this year. It ends on a chilling and terrifying note that is relevant today. The last frame is unforgettable.

Director Christopher Nolan is one of the best filmmakers working today. The story is not told as a conventional biopic but rather as a fragmented one, often circling the timeline of events. Nolan delivers a meaningful and riveting visual feast with rich characters and dialogue.

Everything on the technical side is an achievement. The visual effects and cinematography were stunning and inspiring for any upcoming filmmakers to learn from. The makeup and hair team also deserves a shout-out, especially towards the end, with some convincing old-age makeup.

Beautiful direction, acting, writing, and score. The best of the best!

Overall rating: Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.

I hope you all had a great 2023, and I will see you in 2024! Take care!

"Oppenheimer" is a cinematic tour de force that showcases the best of what film can offer. Directed by Christopher Nolan, the film is a masterclass in storytelling, performance, and technical prowess.

The film's narrative is both dense and intricate, weaving together elements of courtroom drama, romantic liaisons, laboratory epiphanies, and lecture hall personality cults. It's a testament to Nolan's skill as a director that he's able to balance these disparate elements into a cohesive and compelling narrative.

Cillian Murphy's performance as J. Robert Oppenheimer is nothing short of extraordinary. He captures the complexity and torment of the character with a nuanced performance that is both restrained and expressive. Robert Downey Jr. also delivers a titanic performance, further cementing his status as one of the most versatile actors of his generation.

The cinematography, courtesy of Hoyte van Hoytema, is a visual feast. The film uses the large-format IMAX film system to capture the splendor of New Mexico's desert panoramas and contrast the external coolness and internal turmoil of Oppenheimer. The film's photography is a testament to the power of visual storytelling, with each frame meticulously composed to convey emotion and narrative information.

The film's score, composed by Ludwig Göransson, is a haunting and evocative soundscape that perfectly complements the film's narrative and visual elements. The music underscores the film's themes of creation and destruction, adding another layer of depth to the film.

In conclusion, "Oppenheimer" is a film that showcases the best of what cinema can offer. It's a testament to the power of storytelling, performance, and technical prowess. It's a film that will undoubtedly be remembered as one of the highlights of 2023's cinematic offerings.

I went prepared for a long film, a dense story, many great actors, good scenes and great sound. I left in awe. It is that great.
Don't go see it if you think this is a quick action flick about a bomb, it's not. Just check the source material for this movie and you'll get an idea of what Nolan did in this movie.
"The bomb is NOT the only thing this movie is talking about and in my opinion that makes this so much more profound." I agree with https://trakt.tv/users/seanmsu, read his comment, it is very good.

The storytelling is well adapted, with dialogues and monologues well written and better delivered!
The mixture between personal, political and scientific information while the movie was going was perfectly balanced for me.

The emotion and the enthralling is achieved, which was to be expected with such a great cast.
I do see Oscar material here, but I'm not well versed to point out those things. Still, I would risk Cillian for acting; Matt or Robert for support; and sound, cause it delivers!

My 9/10 comes exactly from the sound. I would say music, sound and speech are 90% excellent. The other 10% is when sound effects go over the top, I get the idea is to bring emotion, but in IMAX you burst your ears. Same sound effects kill or disturbe some dialogues, which will make me go a second time, cause it was near imperceptible.
With all these complaints I still give it a 9/10 cause the use of sound/silence in this movie is masterfully done.

The visuals are very good, and greatly combined with sound and perspectives.
The light burning white and the gradients in many scenes, give the right feeling to the moment and take you through the story adding up to the context that is ongoing in the moment.

Contrary to many opinions I read here and elsewhere, I do love the back and forth in time; the usage of black & white to portray the past/future. The stitching of each scene kept me hooked and the story advances and drops curiosities to discover later.
Story well told!

Christopher Nolan delivers an emphatic characterization of the most dreaded scientists in history with aplomb

My Rating : :star::star::star::star: (85/100)

Oppenheimer is a deep, engrossing and captivating piece of cinema, powered by a remarkable sound design , intense drama and strong performances. It delivers a sense of horror and tension which binds the entire narrative of 3 hours, with powerful people people talking most of its runtime. This Nolan film apologetically as usual packs in a lot of information, names and complexity which might need a second viewing to get a complete understanding and may be overwhelming for people watching a Nolan film for first time. Cillian Murphy gives a performance which gives him the oscars next year. He just sinks into the character with a facile demonstration of how well versed he is with his craft. Oppenheimer might not be Nolan's best work but its one the best biopics I have seen in recent years.

A gripe for me was the use of Bhagwat Gita while a character is having sex, this demeans the spiritual beliefs of Hindus to a certain extent. I could be more critical of it considering that scene wasn't necessary in the entire context of the film or it could have been hidden from the final cuts running in India. However a filmaker as huge as Nolan, could have been more sensitive to deliver such a scene. Oh I get it, its just a movie but there a difference between usual cinema and Nolan's films. We learn a lot from him filmography hence a concern. However, special mentions to Robert Downey Jr, Matt Damon and Emily Blunt for their fantastic support performances in the film.

Overall, Oppenheimer delivers a biopic with great and overwhelming detail, scorching score and powerful visuals of the chain reaction it lead to. There's no denying how dangerous the power could have been if it was only in the hands of the US. Now 9 countries including India and Pakistan are nuclear powers. If you want to understand the origin, then don't miss this film. Recommended.

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I'm not going to lie...the Trinity test left me a little underwhelmed. Which is a bit of a problem, because that was the payoff to the first two hours of build up. Overall this movie's structure and pacing were just a bit odd to me. Everything leading up to the test feels primarily character driven, almost slice of life-esque. And for such a long movie, the slices are actually quite thin. Things move fast, with whirlwind character introductions that don't leave much of an impression in many cases. Only a couple of character names stuck with me, which did raise some issues in later sequences when characters are being referenced by name alone. Of course, that doesn't apply to Oppenheimer himself. Cillian Murphy doesn't disappoint, delivering an incredible performance. In fact, all of the performances are excellent, benefiting from strong dialogue that kept me engaged even through the sections when the conflict felt somewhat thin. There's only so much tension that can be extracted from the actual efforts of the Manhattan project, as the conclusion is largely known to the audience. Yes, there are secondary/tertiary conflicts throughout the opening hours, interpersonal and political, but they don't drive the story. It's not until the final hour when Nolan reveals that the movie will have an antagonist and more traditional conflict after all. It's set up as a twist of sorts and for the most part it works. I do think I enjoyed the final hour more than the first two. Technically speaking Nolan never disappoints. The production design is excellent and the cinematography/directing includes some fantastic shots. I probably won't go out of my way to re-watch this anytime soon, but it was still an engaging watch built on a central performance that will likely be an Oscar contender.

This one is definitely going to be a hot take, i didn't find the film to be masterpiece, in a cinematic sense, but it was indeed a masterpiece for me in an intricate way of how subjectively they've portrayed the character study of J. ROBERT OPPENHEIMER. The film solely focuses on the titular character and the hardships, emotions, trauma he had to go through whilst making one of the biggest arsenal that'd change history's course forever and what happened after. The 3rd person POV in B&W & the 1st person POV in color gave rather an amusing perspective. While Nolan has indeed veered away from his usual "cerebral - gimmicky" way of storytelling, the audience must be focused on the film so that they may get what is happening and when it is happening, and maybe brushing up on the whole Manhattan Project history and the aftermath trial would also be nice as i noticed that the majority of the audience were infact bored off of their asses during to not getting the history right or the realisation of the impact the event had. I did felt like the chemistry between Cillian & Blunt was off in many places and even her accent came out of hiding in many places, while Cillian & Pugh's one-off interactions were interesting but that was that. Yes indeed Cillian spurned out a masterful performance but it was RDJ who knocked it out of the park for me. His portrayal of the polarized Admiral Lewis Strauss was nothing short of a wonderful performance. What the film lacks is not the starcast, or the perfectly woven screenplay or character study, but it was the hype that all the so-called Christopher Nolan fans who'd only seen mostly THE TDKR TRILOGY & INTERSTELLAR & INCEPTION were actually expecting something like that from him. I think it's due time that Nolan pivot into making more notarized drama's like this where the performance & screenplay can be hard-hitting instead of just giving out thrills & cerebral storylines. OPPENHEIMER is indeed a film that i believe will stay relevant for years to come.