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'...how terrible is wisdom when it brings no profit to the man that's wise?'
J. Robert Oppenheimer is a perfect intellectual foil for Nolan. Oppenheimer is Nolan's most accessible work, and it showcases his sincerity towards the subject matter. It's a universal fact that humans can't get emotionally attached to abstractions, it's the experience that people react to. Nolan creates an experience where he takes his audience to a journey to witness the story of Oppenheimer, encapsulating his life from youth till his old age. It takes us into a time period where the existence of a bomb was just an abstract thought, the abstraction turning into a terrifying reality as the movie progresses. People having even a little context of the events or a familiarity with scientific history are going to derive a lot of joy with the references this movie throws.
Nolan continues to play with narrative structure, by cross cutting frequently into various timelines, and ultimately resulting in a circulatory framework (as he usually does in his movies) with respect to beginning and end coming full circle, to be accurate it's more helical than circular. There is a constant dread of inevitability throughout the movie, not just around the formation of bomb but also the subsequent arms race. The entire execution of Trinity Test at Los Alamos is done in a way that I felt the dread when the bomb finally detonated, despite a packed theatre there was pin drop silence, it's crafted in such a way that you feel that you're there and thereby also feeling the anxiousness despite knowing the outcome. The aftermath of detonation, that is unleashing something so disastrous and uncontrollable that it's impossible to undo it and the weight of that responsibility and the subsequent guilt is showcased incredibly by Cilian Murphy. All the supporting cast brings in their A-game to the movie, with RDJ standing out. Gary Oldman is really unrecognisable as Truman, he simply dissolves.
Technically it's a masterpiece. This is Jennifer Lame's second collaboration with Nolan as Editor and she really outdid herself compared to the editing in Tenet, interweaving Oppenheimer's hell-ish visions with the non linear structure masterfully. Nolan has never ever missed with music score in his movies and the same is applicable to Oppenheimer, Ludwig Göransson's score simply becomes the bearer of narrative structure, it's brilliant and goosebumps inducing. Hoytema's textured cinematography gives the movie it's required visual look, be it deserty Los Alamos or claustrophobic spaces. The dialogues are some of the best in Nolan's Filmography. If I had to nitpick then I'Il say that the pacing in third act could've been improved, but again American Prometheus is a huge book to adapt in just 3 hours Christopher Nolan is the name you can trust for having a solid opening and ending. The ending of Oppenheimer takes the form of crescendo of visuals and score rising in intensity, leading to a sudden dark cut, whose reverberations are felt once it's over. It's the most impactful Nolan film.
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