'Oppenheimer’ is the twelfth film in writer/director Christopher Nolan’s legendary filmography. Is it his Mangum Opus? No. Regardless, it is a phenomenal film and his most important one to date.
‘Oppenheimer’ is an arthouse film wrapped up in the pomp and circumstance of a blockbuster. Nolan crafts a narrative in his signature non-linear fashion, and does it with such finesse at this point that, though the film jumps all over temporally, it is quite engaging and easy to follow.
The fact that some scenes are in black and white and others are in color makes it easier to delineate the narrative. The films plays more like a courtroom drama than a standard biopic in the best ways.
Ludwig Göransson, a newer collaborator of Nolan’s, delivers another incredible score that rattles the theater and inspires the kind of dichotomy of horror and wonder that ‘Oppenheimer’ sets out to convey.
Cillian Murphy gives a tour-de-force performance as the infamous J. Robert Oppenheimer. Robert Downey Jr. also gives a sterling performance as Lewis Strauss
The entire ensemble is truly fantastic, a lot of big names also make smaller but memorable appearances. 'Oppenheimer’ is not an action movie or even a conventional war film. The actual detonation of the A-Bomb makes up a very minute portion of this film- maybe thirty seconds. This is a three hour character study about a person vs. their legacy and the complicated nature of both. It is also a desperate proclamation to rid ourselves of our nuclear arsenal.
‘Oppenheimer’ is an unconventional but brilliantly executed biopic with powerhouse performances from Murphy and Downey Jr. and is arguably one of the most important films of this generation.
MY STAR RATING 4/5
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