Oppenheimer

Don’t know why I doubted the greatness of this even for a second. A sprawling and amazingly complex epic of one of the most important stories in American history about Oppenheimer or as they described him as in other words, American Prometheus. Just absolutely engrossed into the large scale and weight of this film every second through. Even with the sceintific and political rhetoric, you can still feel the weight of the tension and importance of the situation in each scene. Don’t wanna sound like this is some kind of action movie, but you can feel the stakes of this event through and through. A classic story of brilliant but egotistical people testing the limits, but to the ultimate level of stakes with the literal weight of the world on this man’s shoulders. Those stakes throughout aren’t only backed by amazing performances and a magnificent screenplay, but also technical brilliance at its finest. Cinematography from Hoyte Van Hoytema with each shot says so much. Sweeping wide shots depicting the vast landscape of possibilities and weight Oppenheimer has at the palm of his hands. Lazer focused close ups depicting the swarm of anxiety and his quivering movement surrounding him in the moments of everyone turning their back on him. Ludwig’s score is absolutely breathtaking with it carrying a heavy load of the tension built. Each string of music pulsating in the scenes feels like a fast heartbeat, directly putting you Into the drivers seat of Oppenheimer and everyone involved in the project knowing what monstrously important job they hold.  Editing is fantastic as well with lingering shots and zoom ins long enough just to capture every ounce of tension in the room with cuts to everyone around and their tense movements. Or to cut to wide landscape to see the reactions of each and every one. Quick cuts during back and forths immerse you into the stress of the fast and think on your feet energy of the room. Trinity test. Massive achievement that Nolan could accomplish that and sound design is amazing in that scene specifically. The bomb going off but taking that extended time to hear the noise of it effectively build anticipation to when that loud bang with coarse your earlobe. Acting is incredible all around and just such a random but great cast output all around. Cillian Murphy is everything in this role with the embodiment of brilliance for the worst. He plays someone as fueled by ambition because of his knowledge but egoistical and with rigid morals that don’t take consideration for others. It’s a portrayal that’s deeply nuanced and a depiction of this powerful man but also extremely human in its coverage of Oppenheimer’s human nature of ego and compulsion backfiring into guilt, regret and paranoia. RDJ is great as Strauss as well with him constantly reacting to pressure in real time which eventually bursts into that inevitable rage at the end. It’s just mastery in character progression all around from the actors but also just narrative wise and from a script standpoint with this being split into 3 acts. No matter whether you can feel the lengthy 3 hour runtime, you gotta admit the whole journey Nolan covers in this film is absolutely necessary for something as grand as this. And for me, the runtime works extremely well and the pacing couldn’t be any better. Throughout it constantly keeps you engaged with mixing political and scientific use with moral concepts and ideology. It constantly is a tug of war pull between morality and what is right or wrong to do at the weight of world destruction.  Oppenheimer is portrayed as brilliant and genius in this film just as much as sick and twisted. Wanting to save the world with his knowledge but single handedly wanting to destroy it with the ultimate power of a bomb and not taking into consideration the thousands of lives it will take. The film and screenplay throughout never lets up on questioning Oppenheimer’s moral compass and why it led to his eventual downfall of everyone turning on him. He thought he was Prometheus, a God who was above everyone and was objectively right in his ideology to back up doing this mission. That’s what led to his downfall. A grand epic thats anything and everything you could ask for and easily one of the most important films of the decade if not this 21st century. Christopher Nolan everyone.