Oppenheimer dazzlingly revisits a important man and his project

Barbenheimer is here! An estimated 200,000 people saw both this weekend, and while I won’t get out to see Barbie until Tuesday, I did see Oppenheimer this weekend with some buddies from work (in IMAX, of course). Christopher Nolan has slowed down since his Batman days, releasing just 4 films in the last decade. While not always successful (2020’s Tenet lost a bunch, with its big budget), they are always talked about. This film will definitely continue that trend, and hopefully bounce back in the box office too. Initial estimates are certainly looking good, despite its R rating for some nudity and a sex scene.

The film is the story of J Robert Oppenheimer, “the father of the atomic bomb.” The movie bounces around a lot, following a timeline before the war (Oppenheimer in school at Cambridge and then Germany, and his first teaching gig at U of Cal-Berkeley), while also looking at his “trial” to lose his security clearance due to ties with Communists in the mid-1950s, and another timeline in the late 50s following politician Lewis Strauss, who played an integral part in Oppenheimer’s post-war career. Thankfully, Nolan easily differentiates these 3 storylines, so it is easy to follow.

Born in the USA of Jewish immigrants from Germany, Oppenheimer had a condescending attitude to others, due in no small part because of high sense of self, and while the film does show all of the important moments in his life that historians should know, especially his time leading the Los Alamos project and organizing the Manhattan Project, we also see his personal life with girlfriends, his wife and kids, and the many friends (and enemies) he makes before and during the war. The most exciting moments obviously come during the war effort. When news breaks that German physicists have successfully discovered nuclear fission, scientists in the USA immediately realize the potential for that breakthrough in a bomb. Though Germany has many brilliant minds in quantum physics, and they have at least a 12 month head start in their nuclear bomb program, Oppenheimer theorizes that the USA can catch up, due to the fact that many of Germany’s scientists are Jewish, and thus Hitler is less likely to give them his full backing. Oppenheimer immediately fights to get a team of the most brilliant people he can think of, and gets the government to pour money into his project (ultimately $2 billion worth, in 1940s money!).

In typical Nolan fashion, the movie is beautiful to watch and craves to be seen on the big screen. For those who worry about sitting through a 3 hour film: it is a “quick” 3 hours, always moving. I didn’t notice the length at all. I urge you to get out and see it, for an important moment in history, the ramifications of which we are still dealing with today. ★★★★½