150 Word Review: 'Oppenheimer' (2023)
The real Dr. Manhattan
The past and future mingle in Oppenheimer. As Einstein said, time is an illusion.
Christopher Nolan's ambitious study of the infamous father of the a-bomb, physicist Robert Oppenheimer, is split into two. One part is a colorful WW2 drama about a group of misfit geniuses in a race against evil. The other explores what happened in the years after the U.S. obliterated Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These post-war scenes are shot in black and white as if Oppenheimer had exposed the whole world to X-rays.
The cast is a parade of veteran actors waiting for their spotlights. Cillian Murphy's Oppenheimer is brilliantly mopey and self-centered. Robert Downey Jr. brings charm to Lewis Straus, a jealous rival rotting on the inside. Emily Blunt's Mrs. Oppenheimer deserves her own movie.
Nolan directs cerebral crowd-pleasers, but Oppenheimer is too emotionally distant. He observes his subjects—and their moral choices—from afar, wearing protective goggles.
WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: ‘Grave of the Fireflies’ (1988)
A LITTLE MEME TIME:
Benny Safdie’s Dr. Edward Teller watching the first atomic bomb test in Oppenheimer.
Well, I haven’t seen it yet, but I’m taking your word for it.