The Christopher Nolan obsession with time jumping hits maximum overdrive in Oppenheimer. It's a blizzard of back and forth, color to black and white (even though black and white is in the future from color which adds even more confusion), with only the added gray of a person's hair to give us any indication of when we are at, and no years ever given for reference at any point in the movie.
This could have been an intriguing story of Oppenheimer and how factors of his youth influenced his thinking and led him to the success he had in leading the development of the atomic bomb and how that ended the war against Japan. Instead there is little backdrop or insight into what was driving him, short shrift on the development and war, and the focus is mainly on the painful McCarthyism investigation and the petty double dealings of this movie's primary antagonist, Strauss.
I watched this movie at home and it took me several days to get through it because of how painfully pedantic it was. The dialogue drones on and on trying to make something dramatic out of a security clearance hearing. I just couldn't get into it. I still gave it a 6 because there are some magnificent acting performances by Murphy, Downey and Blunt but they're the only thing holding this mess together.
This could have been an intriguing story of Oppenheimer and how factors of his youth influenced his thinking and led him to the success he had in leading the development of the atomic bomb and how that ended the war against Japan. Instead there is little backdrop or insight into what was driving him, short shrift on the development and war, and the focus is mainly on the painful McCarthyism investigation and the petty double dealings of this movie's primary antagonist, Strauss.
I watched this movie at home and it took me several days to get through it because of how painfully pedantic it was. The dialogue drones on and on trying to make something dramatic out of a security clearance hearing. I just couldn't get into it. I still gave it a 6 because there are some magnificent acting performances by Murphy, Downey and Blunt but they're the only thing holding this mess together.
