Oppenheimer ⭐⭐

Oppenheimer breaks the usual patterns of biographical movies to show us the complex evolution of its subject from his early studies through the Manhattan Project to his forced removal from government service. To achieve its grand scope, the director Christopher Nolan makes use of quick edits, rapid-fire scene changes, a minimum of expository scene-setting, and it still runs three hours in length. Viewers will find this either invigorating or exhausting.

Most biographical movies will have four or five big scenes that function as turning points in its subject’s life. For narrative efficiency, they will amalgamate separate people and incidents into one moment where the music can swell up to signify its importance and we will witness the subject forever changed. But real life is rarely like that, and Oppenheimer respects this by showing us all the small moments and the huge cast of people and their relationships with Robert Oppenheimer to give us a full portrait of the many facets and contradictions of the man. The music never swells up to tell you when to pay attention. Or, more accurately, the music is constantly telling you to keep paying attention. This movie has a vivid score by Ludwig Göransson based around sharp violins that accentuates the tension in Oppenheimer’s story.

And this is a personal story. Although it naturally centers around the Manhattan Project, it’s not about the science of the bomb or the process of building it, but about the people involved. It’s also about the fight to control one’s own legacy. What began as an intellectual exercise and then became a necessary pursuit in a race against evil, eventually and inevitably begets an arms race run by those unconcerned by the possible destruction of the planet or the political destruction of men’s lives.

In typical Nolan fashion, the movie uses non-linear storytelling and we regularly flash forward from Oppenheimer’s journey to a 1954 hearing on whether to remove his security clearance and to a 1959 Senate confirmation battle concerning Lewis Strauss, played by Robert Downey Jr., who was a key figure in those hearings. These hearings still have resonance today as Oppenheimer is denied any nuanced judgment on his communist associations or concerns over the pursuit of a hydrogen bomb. You were either a bomb-loving, commie-loathing, American patriot, or a weak-willed potential traitor to the nation. The film is more interested in its character’s reaction to this predicament than moralizing on its insanity.

The film was shot in 70mm IMAX (I shudder to think how much of that film ended up on the cutting room floor based on the editing pace!) and is best experienced in a large format. But there are relatively few shots that you would assume benefit from IMAX. The vast majority of the film is simply people talking to each other with a few exceptional explosions and Oppenheimer’s own visions of fission reactions which mirror the chain reaction of developments resulting from his work. But it all looks beautiful and is played well by the notable cast. I did appreciate that the large explosions in the film are all seen well before they are heard.

Whether you talk about the film size, the cast, the score, the run time, the number of scenes, or the scope, the movie can be described as “a lot!” It asks a lot of its audience to keep up. But it isn’t a mind-bender like Tenet, Inception, or The Prestige with narrative sleight of hand. It just requires a lot to give a full portrayal of Oppenheimer the man and the times he was immersed in. I think this is a major achievement of Nolan within the documentary form and avoids giving the audience any pat conclusions about its subject. Just like those other films, it may require multiple viewings to put all the pieces together.