“Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. For this he was chained to rock and tortured for eternity.”

Oppenheimer lived up to my massive expectations I had going into it. While Nolan’s recent films have worked for me, they just haven’t been as great as the incredible streak of films he had in the late 2000’s to the early 2010’s. As I expected, this really feels like a return to form for him and his films. This movie is a technical masterclass, much like Interstellar which in my opinion is his latest all-timer. I don’t know if I can get Oppenheimer to that level yet, but it’s damn close. (This review was written before I watched it again, so now I can actually get it to that level!) This is a skillfully edited biopic, but unlike anything we’ve seen before because it takes it a huge step forward. It has a both unique and also amazing visual style. If you didn’t know by now, the black and white is objective, and the color is subjective, and that made for both a very “Nolan” way of telling the story, but also an extremely interesting way of telling the story. I mentioned the editing, but the way they edit the movie is so different than what we normally see nowadays. They will sometimes make these very abrupt cuts between conversations or montages, and they will show a visual or a graphic that has something to do with what they are talking about, and sometimes those visuals can be horrifying, and I now understand why tons of people can walk out of this movie saying that it’s a “horror” movie if they didn’t have any previous knowledge.

Additionally, this is Ludwig Göransson’s best score. Every single one of his score’s are at least great, but here he takes it a step further and implements a feeling of an “atomic bomb” in to the score, and when you mix that with that already masterpiece of a score, he creates something that is hard to explain using words. Hoyte Van Yoytema is now one of my absolute favorite cinematographers of all time. Every single frame, shot, picture, whatever you call it in this movie is incredible. The trinity test scene in particular is now in contention for my favorite movie scene of all time. It’s much different from what your expecting, but the way it’s shot just makes me beyond speechless. Plus the fact that Nolan wanted to use actual explosives… and he actually did use actual explosives, it just makes the movie that much better when you know it’s actually real. There are also so many emotionally captivating moments. For example, the ending montage was so good and so gut-wrenching that I couldn’t get up from my seat. You really feel the weight that the characters are feeling, but somehow by the end of the movie, I wanted it to go on forever because the movie was such an amazing escape from reality because of how interesting the writing and the dialogue was, and how interesting Nolan’s style was, and so much more.

This movie screams Oscar’s all around, and there is no way this movie won’t win at least 2 or 3 categories, but i’ll be really surprised if it doesn’t get nominated for almost every single category. Especially the performances. There is a lot of competition with Barbie, but I just have a slight feeling that Oppenheimer will win. Cillian Murphy is so good that you feel everything he’s feeling, while also being interested in everything he’s doing. Also, it’s all in the eyes. Additionally, Robert Downey Junior cannot escape from that Oscar nomination, and if the Oscar’s were today, there would be a 96% chance of him winning. Matt Damon is a bit of a meaner character, but he adds some nice humor to this incredibly depressing biopic. Emily Blunt’s great, Florence Pugh’s great, and actors like Benny Safdie and Josh Peck are ones I did not expect to be in this movie, and they really surprised me with both being in the movie, and how good their performances were. My only issue with this movie isn’t really an issue, it’s just probably my theater, but I feel like the sound design at the beginning was a little rough. It wasn’t bad, and again it’s probably my theater, but I couldn’t hear a lot of the dialogue at the beginning, so I couldn’t fully understand everything.

Still, the opening scene is an incredible introduction to Oppenheimer as a character, and even though I couldn’t hear some of the dialogue, I was still invested in what was going on. But by the time the second and third acts happened, I was not just on the edge of my seat, I was not just so invested in what was happening that I forgot I had to pee, I was just mesmerized by the dialogue, the cinematography, the score, the performances, the editing, and so much more. I didn’t talk about the third act yet, but it’s one of the best of all time. Your dealing with the consequences of what happened during the trinity test, and it’s some of the most riveting dialogue me, or anyone else has ever seen. I was truly blown away by it. I’m hearing many people say this movie has the “Return of the King” type ending where it has 6 or 7 different endings, but I didn’t care one bit because I wanted the movie to go on and on for the rest of eternity. Not even joking, I could genuinely watch this movie over and over. I don’t know why though because it’s an incredibly depressing and horrifying courtroom drama biopic. Christopher Nolan is back, and maybe better than ever.

“When I came to you with those calculations, we’d thought we might start a chain reaction that would destroy the entire world. I believe we did.”