Movies and TV Shows

Mostly with you (and others so far in this thread). There's a good core of a movie in there, but some mistakes and fumbles and confused purpose IMO.

It felt like Nolan wanted to be faithful to the biography and hadn't himself reached some personal artistic insight about Oppenheimer the person or story himself on his own. And so, as well made as the film is, it's basically an biography put to film with great acting and Nolan's "trademark" non-linearity. Though, I wouldn't be surprised if on closer analysis (I've only seen it once) one could conclude that the non-linearity actually masks how empty most of the film is. As an illustration, having seen it a while ago now, I can't get past the fact that Nolan put the "destroyer of worlds" line in an awkward sex scene. It betrays, IMO, that there was a lack of a complete grasp from Nolan on what he was trying to do. If he didn't want the line to be dramatic etc, don't put it in the film. The sex scene was obviously contrived and made no sense.

For me the middle is where it shines, where you see Oppenheimer in action on the edge between guilt and ambitious vision, and Nolan does very well here with his naturalistic and dramatic choices. But the opening and closing acts of the film ... really not sure why exactly they are there and stand out as awkward fumbling to me (on which I honestly hope I'm missing something as to how essential the closing trail thingy had to be there).

Ultimately, the ambition of the film is to focus on Oppenheimer the person, but, however impossible a task it is illuminate his character and story, I don't think Nolan really had much to contribute on that front and so I'm not sure the film can justify itself against the alternative of making a film more focused on the broader project and context of the Manhatten project etc, where, against a broader context, Oppenheimer's inscrutable nature but also huge importance may have been more clear and interesting. For instance, my understanding is that part of his value as the lead of the project was that he was uniquely capable of understanding any of the science as quickly as anyone else as well has understanding people well enough to get what he needed out of them. This is hinted at in the film, but not made clear at all.

Now, since Dunkirk, Nolan has made Tenet and Oppenheimer which are IMO his two weakest adjacent films and career wise he's probably fallen into a bit of a slump (with maybe Interstellar and Dunkirk going down as his career highpoint?). Going all the way back to Interstellar, I don't think he's been able to construct a good closing act in 3 of his last 4 films (Interstellar's last act is probably polarising ... but I also think the closing act of Inception was off in ways too).

Beyond all of that ... I happened to end up seeing Barbie as well (well after having seen Oppenheimer) and ~~shouldn't~~ couldn't shake the feeling that though Oppenheimer was more "high brow", Barbie is probably the better and more important film of the two ... which I did not expect at all as a Nolan fan.