‘Oppenheimer’ Film Review
Each frame is a work of art, a visual totem of the universe and mankind’s unbridled need for destruction.
In one of the early scenes of Oppenheimer, a seismic appraisal of man's need for self-destruction, Einstein says "God doesn't play dice with the universe." And indeed J. Robert Oppenheimer was always connecting the random and the patterned, chaos and synchronization, the cerebral and the corporeal. Christopher Nolan doesn't structure his films by chance or luck, either.
The shifting between color and black and white, denoting different phases of Oppenheimer's life, and the visceral, cryptic images symbolizing the whirling dervishes of thought traveling at lightspeed in Oppenheimer's mind, give masterful representation of a man who was himself self-destructive. A man of many erudite interests and considered the father of the atomic bomb, he died at just 62 from lung cancer because he was a lifelong chain smoker.
UNDERSTANDING SCREENWRITING: Cars and People
Oppenheimer is centered around J. Robert Oppenheimer, a Jewish theoretical physicist, and leader of The Manhattan Project whose mind was an island unto itself. Cillian Murphy embodies the unstable genius, his ice blue eyes sometimes making him look maniacal, their color such a transparent blue that they look like oceans or the sky. He plays the egotistical Oppenheimer as someone who is as complex as his theories. The brim he constantly wears makes him look like the Indiana Jones of physicists and a daring job he has. Emily Blunt is Kitty Oppenheimer. She's his conscience and Blunt plays her with a died-in-the-wool bluntness that's associated with the Depression Era and WWII. She's a woman who has nothing to lose and everything to lose.
The only weak part of the film Florence Pugh's character Jane Tatlock, Oppenheimer's lover. There's never any real fire between them, despite Pugh being nude a couple of times, and she’s very underused. In reality, Jane supposedly struggled with her sexuality but that isn't touched on here. The rest of the cast is a who's who of Hollywood faves, from Josh Hartnett to Casey Affleck. Robert Downey Jr. as Lewis Strauss is phenomenal. His voice is the voice of harsh reality at the intersection of invention and destruction.
Ludwig Göransson’s enigmatic score is a second character in the film. Its ominous, rich tones perfectly mirror Oppenheimer's optimism, doubt, distress, anxiety, and self-hate. It also sonically represents the magnitude of what Oppenheimer has done, a dark lullaby and dirge for humanity.
Memo to Studios – July 2023
Christopher Nolan is the master of the non-linear storyline. Memento. Inception. Interstellar. He's a man constantly in search of answers, whether it's for a mystery or secrets of the universe. With Oppenheimer, he plumbs from the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin and creates a phantasmagoria of a man haunted by his genius, which is a gift and a curse, after he creates the first atomic bomb.
The film spans the late 1930s to the late 1940s. At 2 hours and 49 minutes, the film never drags. Each frame is a work of art, a visual totem of the universe and mankind’s unbridled need for destruction. Kodak created black and white film stock specifically for IMAX, a first, and it really serves to underscore the sociological and emotional shift in Oppenheimer’s life. Hoyt van Hoytema’s cinematography is breathtaking, with some scenes looking genuinely heavenly or hellish.
Oppenheimer, a Universal Pictures release, hits theaters on July 21, 2023. IMAX is the best format to see this in. It was made for the biggest, loudest experience possible.
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Sonya Alexander started off her career training to be a talent agent. She eventually realized she was meant to be on the creative end and has been writing ever since. As a freelance writer she’s written screenplays, covered film, television, music and video games and done academic writing. She’s also been a script reader for over twenty years. She's a member of the African American Film Critics Association and currently resides in Los Angeles.
