Oppenheimer

⭐ 9.0/10

(Originally written by Tim)

The movie weekend of the summer is here, and even though I didn't love Tenet I did love Dunkirk, so I hoped this would be a return to form for Nolan. The hype was insane, and the internet had poisoned my feed calling this as momentous as The Godfather. It isn't quite at that level, but this is an incredible 3 hour biopic that is more legal thriller than action movie.

The hype around this movie is for this explosion Nolan sets off as part of the story, and that moment is amazing. Throughout the movie there are great effects to visualize Oppenheimer's mindset, or even how he imagines the science, and that is all done so well. I think the most incredible moments in the movie are not the explosions, but the way his unravelling is portrayed. It is tense and scary and excellent movie making. I thought a bit about The Imitation Game while watching this, which is so dry and boring, an area which this movie could have easily slipped into but didn't.

This is a long movie, but it had me locked in all movie. The movie does not talk down to you, and it sure is complicated, but I like when a movie assumes a level of intelligence. And if you can't keep all the names straight its fine, the movie is still rewarding and unlocks the potential for a rewatch. Heck, this made me want to read the history book its based on!

The acting here is great, and famous people pop out of nowhere to deliver excellent scenes and then vanish. I thought the score was tremendous, and Ludwig Goransson is quickly becoming the modern movie composer of our time. I felt like the score was true to other Nolan movies Zimmer did, with touches of Interstellar or Dunkirk, but the sound was used so effectively here to portray the gravity and moral dilemma.

The structure of the movie was amazing as well, cross-cutting at a break-neck pace, forcing the viewer to track which timeline we are seeing and how the events are ordered. There are many black and white scenes, and I love the effect it has on the story both as guideposts and artistic choices. I love Memento as well, so this feels like a direct use of something that has worked for Nolan in the past.

This was a great movie, but not 10/10 for me. I don't really have criticism, aside from the fact that it is quite long, and while I mentioned a rewatch earlier I think I would need to wait a bit to recuperate. As mentioned this is a biopic that almost becomes a legal drama, and while it is done in a very exciting way it is pretty taxing. The mental strain Oppenheimer goes through is so clear in the performance that it actually might have left me with some mental strain. But that's actually probably more of a compliment. I think it is an achievement as a movie, but the joy of the accomplishment is hard to separate from the dread of the subject.

The best part of seeing 2 IMAX movies in two straight weekends is seeing the Dune 2 trailer on the big screen. If that movie gets delayed I will become destroyer of worlds.