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Review of the film "Oppenheimer"
Aug. 13th, 2023 12:03 pmWatching a film, much like reading a novel or staring at a piece of artwork is largely an individual experience. Everyone sees something different. No two people see the same thing or are focused on the same thing.
Often, I'll see the phrase: "We're not watching the same show or film."
And I'll think, well, of course not. Why would you think otherwise? Our brains process the information differently.
Which is why it is so difficult to write a film review or even recommend a film - because a film that blew me away, may leave someone else scratching their noggin or bored. And vice versa.
The phenomena of Barbieheimer - fascinates me partly because of the communal response to the films as a duel event, almost as if the human conscious realized upon seeing the trailers that both films were handling the same themes, but from different perspectives and completely different ways - yet, somehow coming to similar conclusions. Although, not all of us want to nor feel inclined to see both films - mainly because one or the other may not be our trope or to our liking. Watching a film that delves deeply into science and political tactics, with mostly dialogue, and a bunch of white men in rooms talking incessantly with each other, may not be your thing. Just as watching a film in cotton candy and bubble gum flavors, satirizing male toxicity, and how it cages any and all expressions of feminity in a desert bright, pinkish bubblegum world, complete with satirical musical numbers - until ultimately that feminity break free and no longer lets itself be caged, may not be your thing. (From the trailers, haven't seen the film). Both films appear to be about breaking free of cages.
It's interesting both came out at the same time - and both have broken box office records in their own right and devoured the global and domestic box office - showing a hunger for that thematic structure, if nothing else.
But again, going back to my original point, or the first paragraph of this meta or review, it's all a matter of one's perspective. I spoke to two people about Oppenheimer after I saw it, one the individual I saw it with (movie buddy) and my mother (who'd seen it the week it first came out, and had been discussing it with me ever since). I was largely spoiled coming into it - as a result. Neither of them were.
And I saw things in that they didn't see or hadn't thought of. My mother said that she hadn't seen any of the toxic male culture stuff - but she doesn't think metaphorically, and her focus was more on what was happening and less on what the filmmaker was trying to do.
Oppenheimer directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Cillian Murphy, Robert Downy Jr, Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, and various others including Tom Conti, Josh Hartnett, Rami Malek, Kenneth Brannagh, Gary Oldman, Tony Goldwyn, Matt Modine...is much like Nolan's other films a visual and auditory intellectual puzzle box of a film.
Nolan's approach to the biopic - is not to tell it in linear fashion nor in a 3rd person perspective, as most biopics and films are told. Instead he tells it out of order and in two first person perspectives, one in black and white, and one in color. Also the focus of the film isn't really on Oppenheimer - we learn nothing of his childhood, we don't meet his parents, and there's little on his romances or his kids, who are merely mentioned but barely seen. That's a daring approach to take with a biopic. Those who are avoiding the film - because they don't like biopics or don't care to know much about Oppenheimer's life - don't. This isn't that movie. I don't like biopics - and this film I loved, because it veered away from telling the story of Oppenheimer.
Instead, it went into the why of it all. Why Oppenheimer chose to lead the Manhattan Project (which was the top secret American Government endeavor to develop an atomic bomb). Why he developed the bomb. The consequences of doing that. The complicated politics and ideologies that got in the way of the scientific endeavor and development, and prevented any discussion of stopping it.
The focus of the film is on the toxic male culture, politics, and hubris that permeates our culture then and now.
The film is at times a taught political suspense thriller - that had me on the edge of my seat, a horror movie, and a devastating portrait of a generation that came perilously close to annihilating the world. It is not a celebration of the WWII generation but an indictment of them. ( vague spoilers )
This is interesting film, it plays with my head and will for some time to come. If you've not seen it - I highly recommend.
***
After the film, MovieBuddy asked if I thought Roosevelt would have dropped the bomb if he'd still been alive and President.
I said I didn't know. Although it was definitely within Roosevelt's persona to do it.
I went home and asked my mother, and she said that Roosevelt definitely would have done it. That I had to understand - back then, they had no idea what Japan would have done. It is true enough - information was harder to come by back then. It took longer, and got more garbled. And it was common knowledge that the Japanese Military and People were into fighting until the bitter end or death, resulting in a costly occupation (in both lives, time and dollars). Also, even after the bomb was dropped, the Emperor of Japan had to step forward and order them to surrender.
Yet, was dropping the bombs truly justified? This is the question Nolan's film asks us. The government told the scientists - that they just had to show a test of it, just show they had it, and that they willing to drop it - and that would be enough. Remember, this was a bomb that at the time they initially dropped it - the scientists didn't know for certain whether it would set the atmosphere on fire and start a chain reaction, detonating the world. They did not know when they did the Trinity Test - whether it would destroy the world - yet they did it anyway. And they did not know what the long term affects would be when they dropped it on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, yet they did it anyway. They did know it would be devastating, that it would kill thousands possibly millions of women and children, yet they did it anyway.
That's toxic male hubris in a nutshell.
The quote from The American Prometheus that Nolan bookends his movie with, and has stated in the middle...Now I've become death, the Destroyer of Worlds..."
Often, I'll see the phrase: "We're not watching the same show or film."
And I'll think, well, of course not. Why would you think otherwise? Our brains process the information differently.
Which is why it is so difficult to write a film review or even recommend a film - because a film that blew me away, may leave someone else scratching their noggin or bored. And vice versa.
The phenomena of Barbieheimer - fascinates me partly because of the communal response to the films as a duel event, almost as if the human conscious realized upon seeing the trailers that both films were handling the same themes, but from different perspectives and completely different ways - yet, somehow coming to similar conclusions. Although, not all of us want to nor feel inclined to see both films - mainly because one or the other may not be our trope or to our liking. Watching a film that delves deeply into science and political tactics, with mostly dialogue, and a bunch of white men in rooms talking incessantly with each other, may not be your thing. Just as watching a film in cotton candy and bubble gum flavors, satirizing male toxicity, and how it cages any and all expressions of feminity in a desert bright, pinkish bubblegum world, complete with satirical musical numbers - until ultimately that feminity break free and no longer lets itself be caged, may not be your thing. (From the trailers, haven't seen the film). Both films appear to be about breaking free of cages.
It's interesting both came out at the same time - and both have broken box office records in their own right and devoured the global and domestic box office - showing a hunger for that thematic structure, if nothing else.
But again, going back to my original point, or the first paragraph of this meta or review, it's all a matter of one's perspective. I spoke to two people about Oppenheimer after I saw it, one the individual I saw it with (movie buddy) and my mother (who'd seen it the week it first came out, and had been discussing it with me ever since). I was largely spoiled coming into it - as a result. Neither of them were.
And I saw things in that they didn't see or hadn't thought of. My mother said that she hadn't seen any of the toxic male culture stuff - but she doesn't think metaphorically, and her focus was more on what was happening and less on what the filmmaker was trying to do.
Oppenheimer directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Cillian Murphy, Robert Downy Jr, Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, and various others including Tom Conti, Josh Hartnett, Rami Malek, Kenneth Brannagh, Gary Oldman, Tony Goldwyn, Matt Modine...is much like Nolan's other films a visual and auditory intellectual puzzle box of a film.
Nolan's approach to the biopic - is not to tell it in linear fashion nor in a 3rd person perspective, as most biopics and films are told. Instead he tells it out of order and in two first person perspectives, one in black and white, and one in color. Also the focus of the film isn't really on Oppenheimer - we learn nothing of his childhood, we don't meet his parents, and there's little on his romances or his kids, who are merely mentioned but barely seen. That's a daring approach to take with a biopic. Those who are avoiding the film - because they don't like biopics or don't care to know much about Oppenheimer's life - don't. This isn't that movie. I don't like biopics - and this film I loved, because it veered away from telling the story of Oppenheimer.
Instead, it went into the why of it all. Why Oppenheimer chose to lead the Manhattan Project (which was the top secret American Government endeavor to develop an atomic bomb). Why he developed the bomb. The consequences of doing that. The complicated politics and ideologies that got in the way of the scientific endeavor and development, and prevented any discussion of stopping it.
The focus of the film is on the toxic male culture, politics, and hubris that permeates our culture then and now.
The film is at times a taught political suspense thriller - that had me on the edge of my seat, a horror movie, and a devastating portrait of a generation that came perilously close to annihilating the world. It is not a celebration of the WWII generation but an indictment of them. ( vague spoilers )
This is interesting film, it plays with my head and will for some time to come. If you've not seen it - I highly recommend.
***
After the film, MovieBuddy asked if I thought Roosevelt would have dropped the bomb if he'd still been alive and President.
I said I didn't know. Although it was definitely within Roosevelt's persona to do it.
I went home and asked my mother, and she said that Roosevelt definitely would have done it. That I had to understand - back then, they had no idea what Japan would have done. It is true enough - information was harder to come by back then. It took longer, and got more garbled. And it was common knowledge that the Japanese Military and People were into fighting until the bitter end or death, resulting in a costly occupation (in both lives, time and dollars). Also, even after the bomb was dropped, the Emperor of Japan had to step forward and order them to surrender.
Yet, was dropping the bombs truly justified? This is the question Nolan's film asks us. The government told the scientists - that they just had to show a test of it, just show they had it, and that they willing to drop it - and that would be enough. Remember, this was a bomb that at the time they initially dropped it - the scientists didn't know for certain whether it would set the atmosphere on fire and start a chain reaction, detonating the world. They did not know when they did the Trinity Test - whether it would destroy the world - yet they did it anyway. And they did not know what the long term affects would be when they dropped it on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, yet they did it anyway. They did know it would be devastating, that it would kill thousands possibly millions of women and children, yet they did it anyway.
That's toxic male hubris in a nutshell.
The quote from The American Prometheus that Nolan bookends his movie with, and has stated in the middle...Now I've become death, the Destroyer of Worlds..."