Oppenheimer

Oppenheimer

maybe I’m just a hater but I’m not beating the I don’t give a fuck allegations.

we see the myth, we see the creation, we see the staggering innovation. we see the singularity, the intensity, the draw of gravity collapsing a star in on itself. we see the universe, the massive scale, the incredible force, the shattering of a world and its notions at the raw might of this new discovery, this horrific miracle. we see the blindness of ambition, of scientific desire and the call of war, then the guilt and the sorrow, the cold of the fire set to rain, the ash that lingers on the tongue. but I don’t see the man, even though it’s about the man, right? it’s about J. Robert Oppenheimer, about his life, his brilliance and his turmoil and his ultimate fall, of the folly of invention that this modern Prometheus wrought upon the earth, so why then do I care so little? why then don’t I know anything about him, anything real at least? not the underlying motivation, no true understanding, no real depth of self beyond the facts. there is no internality, no uncovering, and no inspection of the other not so great things about Oppenheimer besides the bomb making. in the end it’s a great man story, a tale of American exceptionalism packaged as more incisive and critical, the illusion of excavating murky morality.

the direction is solid and effective—not particularly formally marvelous though that’s par the course for Chrissy NoNo’s style—save for the few disarming flourishes of the testing scenes and the dreamlike impressions of stars and space disconnecting like tiny bombs of titanic impact. the acting is genuinely impressive with an impeccable ensemble of minor and cameo roles and a main cast certain to nab a few award noms (for Cillian Murphy and most especially for Robert Downey Jr. in an excellent supporting turn). the non-linear narrative is…well…it’s muddled and awkward and the black & white segments are leagues more interesting than most anything that happens in color which I guess is supposed to be from Oppie’s subjective perspective while the former is objective fact, though that doesn’t really hold up to scrutiny when you consider that a biopic, no matter how well-researched, could never claim to portray factual real life as it actually occurred.

so I’m still left frozen, unmoved by the magnificent terror on display because Nolan makes the mistake of presuming my interest, assuming my care, and thus fails to do the proper legwork to foster my emotions. it’s why Oppenheimer would feel so listless to me on a writing level if not for Murphy animating him so powerfully, why Kitty and Jean are so underdeveloped and so inconsistent in action and personality, why the first act feels so rushed despite so much happening in it. everything here is of an arrogant inference, a lazy screenplay given the hint of a heartbeat by talented actors but then brought down by above average but technically minded cinematic flavor (every dialogue scene, I’m realizing, is basic shot reverse shot while every other scene is also pretty basically composed and I’m just like…this is the film people are claiming as one of the best of the century?…really??).

I’m not one for Nolan, I kind of think he’s a hack too, so take this all with a grain of salt as I was already never gonna be for Oppenheimer; it’s not my vibe, not my style, not my cup of tea. but there’s one scene that really fucking pissed me off: that burning face, those stomping feet, that shock of light, the crowding cheers hanging off of his every word, the carcass on the floor, the implication of despair only in the frame of whiteness, of closeness but barely empathy for those not there, the cost of a war won and an arms race begun. he’s guilty, ashamed yes but it’s something always held within the confines of his own familiarity, his world and not that of the hundreds of thousands dead in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, not of those innocent Japanese civilians murdered, and most certainly not of the New Mexican homesteaders displaced from Los Alamos nor the Navajo people still TO THIS DAY grappling with the agonizing aftereffects of nuclear testing and radiation poisoning.

sure, it might have easily lent itself to exploitation and making a mockery of real, lived experiences, but when you have the chance of such a wide reaching medium and such name recognition portraying a critical piece of American history, something that often obscures if not erases the plight of these people from its pages, it’s a shame not to spotlight them even if it would be rendered through the perspective of the father of the atomic bomb. that it doesn’t, that it only pays slight lip service to those truths—many of which have dedicated books, movies, museums, historians, and testimonials from people directly involved in events as well of those of their descendants that could be drawn upon to make sure that portraying these stories, these realities, wouldn’t be in poor taste or come off as exploitative—is reductive, cruel and awful, just another act of whitewashing the past, another brush of the eraser, another brick upon the wall of glorification.

screw you Nolan.

Rami Malek dropping his scribble notepad silence to spill the tea at the hearing was pretty funny ngl.

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