Before I had an opportunity to watch this movie, if you asked me to comment with as many words as I want when you mention a name, and you say "Oppenheimer", I would have exhausted my quota of words with two: atomic bomb. Thanks to Christopher Nolan, I now have a lot more to say.
Nolan gets into the first 45 minutes of his 3-hour-plus film so much that I have a feeling that I'll never finish. The primary trajectory is an inquiry hearing, but with flash backs and flash forwards, toggling between colour and black-and-white (both beautifully photographed by Hoyte van Hoytema), Nolan informs, entertains and enlightens, among other things.
The opening note show an Oppenheimer (Callian Murphy) "troubled by the versions of universes". Quantum physics is compared to music sheets: "can you hear"? A very important character then appears (I sensed Best Support Actor), one that a critic brilliantly characterise as "to Oppenheimer as Salieri is to Mozart." Need one say more? Lewis Strauss (an almost unrecognizable Robert Downey Jr, not the slightest trace of "I am....... Iron Man) appears in the inquiry to explain his relationship with Oppenheimer. We then see Oppenheimer's Berkeley teaching days. The FBI and Communism are briskly brought into the picture. Then Jean (Florence Pugh, Black Widow's sister if you follow the Iron Man thought association), the first girl that means something to him (but unlikely his first girl, as we find out gradually how much a "womanizer" he was). As if the narrative is not busy enough, we see some beautiful cowboy country and heavenly horses, and hear "combine physics with New Mexico, my life would be complete". Back to science. When hit by the historic news "they split the atom", Oppenheimer's first thought is "bomb". The woman of his life then emerges, Kitty (Emily Blunt) who soon becomes his wife and bears him a child. Then, a colleague tells him "it's not you are self-important; you are actually important".
That was just the first 45 minutes of this movie.
With the appearance of inimitable Matt Damon as Leslie Groves the military man in charge, we're finally in business. After a crisp exchange "why didn't you have a Nobel Prize" and "why aren't you a general" Oppenheimer and Groves come to a quick and decisive understanding: the one hope they have is in Hitler's despise of Jewish scientists. It's a race (no pun intended) where they are presently ahead of the Nazis, but not for long if they do not act decisively. "I can't run a hamburger joint, but I can run the Manhattan Project", Oppenheimer asserts and Groves agrees. Despite the name, the Project is actually in a place in the middle of nowhere, Los Alamos, New Mexico. "Build him a town, fast" Groves issues a crisp order to his subordinates. What follows is not unlike early scenes of The Magnificent Seven. But putting together a team for the Project is more difficult, convincing a lot of fellow scientists who, among other things, do not trust Americans. Once the project is underway, we are treated to scientific discussions galore, which fascinate me (a total illiterate despite efforts to educate myself with the great Isaac Asimov's books on the quantum theory, black holes etc. Written for the layman) but puts a friend to sleep. Mixed in the pot are things like Russian espionage stuff and erotic escapades with Jean.
Now we are at the midpoint of the movie.
I am going be brief from here on. "Hitler is dead but Japan fights on" leads to extensive discussions, involving why two bombs. The reply: the first to show the power and the second to show we can continue using it. Simple logic! What about human lives? What human lives? The movie does not show any visuals of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Only brief discussions about them.
The sequence on testing of the bomb is, in this movie, most akin to what you would expect from a block-buster thriller. The countdown to ignition is punctuated with an exchange between Oppenheimer and Groves, huddled in the shelter, in which the latter expressed his curiosity on what he heard one of the scientist alluding to earlier, atmosphere ignition. Oppenheimer nonchalantly explains that based on the scientific calculations, there is a small chance that the chain reaction becomes uncontrollable and sets the atmosphere on fire, thereby wiping out the human race. The probability is near to zero, reassures our top scientist, which draw out the understatement of the year from Groves "Zero would be nice".
The final third of the movie picks up the fragmented inquiry scene hitherto, becoming a Salieri/Mozart (aforementioned) type of confrontation between Strauss and Oppenheimer, very watchable thanks to the two supreme actors. Talking about which, this movie boasts of a star-studded cast, some cameos, some a bit more. This list of who' who includes Jason Clarke, Kenneth Branagh, Dane DeHaan, Rami Malek, Gary Oldman, Casey Affleck.
I would be very interested to see how many Oscar nominations this movie will receive in January.
Nolan gets into the first 45 minutes of his 3-hour-plus film so much that I have a feeling that I'll never finish. The primary trajectory is an inquiry hearing, but with flash backs and flash forwards, toggling between colour and black-and-white (both beautifully photographed by Hoyte van Hoytema), Nolan informs, entertains and enlightens, among other things.
The opening note show an Oppenheimer (Callian Murphy) "troubled by the versions of universes". Quantum physics is compared to music sheets: "can you hear"? A very important character then appears (I sensed Best Support Actor), one that a critic brilliantly characterise as "to Oppenheimer as Salieri is to Mozart." Need one say more? Lewis Strauss (an almost unrecognizable Robert Downey Jr, not the slightest trace of "I am....... Iron Man) appears in the inquiry to explain his relationship with Oppenheimer. We then see Oppenheimer's Berkeley teaching days. The FBI and Communism are briskly brought into the picture. Then Jean (Florence Pugh, Black Widow's sister if you follow the Iron Man thought association), the first girl that means something to him (but unlikely his first girl, as we find out gradually how much a "womanizer" he was). As if the narrative is not busy enough, we see some beautiful cowboy country and heavenly horses, and hear "combine physics with New Mexico, my life would be complete". Back to science. When hit by the historic news "they split the atom", Oppenheimer's first thought is "bomb". The woman of his life then emerges, Kitty (Emily Blunt) who soon becomes his wife and bears him a child. Then, a colleague tells him "it's not you are self-important; you are actually important".
That was just the first 45 minutes of this movie.
With the appearance of inimitable Matt Damon as Leslie Groves the military man in charge, we're finally in business. After a crisp exchange "why didn't you have a Nobel Prize" and "why aren't you a general" Oppenheimer and Groves come to a quick and decisive understanding: the one hope they have is in Hitler's despise of Jewish scientists. It's a race (no pun intended) where they are presently ahead of the Nazis, but not for long if they do not act decisively. "I can't run a hamburger joint, but I can run the Manhattan Project", Oppenheimer asserts and Groves agrees. Despite the name, the Project is actually in a place in the middle of nowhere, Los Alamos, New Mexico. "Build him a town, fast" Groves issues a crisp order to his subordinates. What follows is not unlike early scenes of The Magnificent Seven. But putting together a team for the Project is more difficult, convincing a lot of fellow scientists who, among other things, do not trust Americans. Once the project is underway, we are treated to scientific discussions galore, which fascinate me (a total illiterate despite efforts to educate myself with the great Isaac Asimov's books on the quantum theory, black holes etc. Written for the layman) but puts a friend to sleep. Mixed in the pot are things like Russian espionage stuff and erotic escapades with Jean.
Now we are at the midpoint of the movie.
I am going be brief from here on. "Hitler is dead but Japan fights on" leads to extensive discussions, involving why two bombs. The reply: the first to show the power and the second to show we can continue using it. Simple logic! What about human lives? What human lives? The movie does not show any visuals of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Only brief discussions about them.
The sequence on testing of the bomb is, in this movie, most akin to what you would expect from a block-buster thriller. The countdown to ignition is punctuated with an exchange between Oppenheimer and Groves, huddled in the shelter, in which the latter expressed his curiosity on what he heard one of the scientist alluding to earlier, atmosphere ignition. Oppenheimer nonchalantly explains that based on the scientific calculations, there is a small chance that the chain reaction becomes uncontrollable and sets the atmosphere on fire, thereby wiping out the human race. The probability is near to zero, reassures our top scientist, which draw out the understatement of the year from Groves "Zero would be nice".
The final third of the movie picks up the fragmented inquiry scene hitherto, becoming a Salieri/Mozart (aforementioned) type of confrontation between Strauss and Oppenheimer, very watchable thanks to the two supreme actors. Talking about which, this movie boasts of a star-studded cast, some cameos, some a bit more. This list of who' who includes Jason Clarke, Kenneth Branagh, Dane DeHaan, Rami Malek, Gary Oldman, Casey Affleck.
I would be very interested to see how many Oscar nominations this movie will receive in January.