Okay, I admit that I am as susceptable to movie marketing blitzes as anyone, even while being fully aware of them. So given a monumentally difficult choice* between seeing Oppenheimer and Barbie, I chose the one I heard the most positie buzz about. I saw Oppenheimer.

*Dude’s note – that is a facetious statement. I am putting off seeing Barbie until Tuesday ‘Cheapskate Day’ at my local moviehaus. I am not looking forward to this. I do it for you. You’re welcome.

Oppenheimer is a biopic helmed by the awesome Chris Nolan and starring the equally talented Cillian Murphy as Robbert ‘Bobby’ Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer is the titular head of the Manhattan Project, the US entry in a horserace with the Germans to create an atomic bomb. The media blitz focused primarily on Murphy’s role, with a smattering of Matt Damon and Emily Blunt thrown in for variety’s sake. What I didn’t know, however, was that those three were just the tip of the iceberg. Oppenheimer is literally exploding with talent unheralded. I will go as far as to say that some of these performances were the best of this movie.

I am…RDJ.

To wit, I point out the spectacular performance of one Robert Downey Jr. RDJ expertly played not one, but two different shades of Lewis Strauss, a Jewish-American philanthropist who eventually became a member of the US Atomic Energy Commission and who, for unclear reasons, became an advarsary of Oppenheimer.

Flo Pugh does it all. Literally.

The next pleasant surprise was Florence Pugh, powerfully playing Berkley student and card-carrying communist Jean Tatlock. Tatlock was Oppenheimers romantic obsession/sexual fixation and Pugh did indeed play the part with…ahem…gusto. I’ll never look at Black Widow’s sister the same again.

Do you really want me to point them all out for you?

Other very notable players in this movie were Josh Hartnett (good to see him again), Casey Affleck, Kenneth Branagh, Jack Quaid, David Dastmalchian, Mathew Modine, Scott Grimes, Michael Angarano and even Rami Malek had a tiny part that was fun to see. I could go on for a minute, but you get the point. And I love unannounced cameos. I may even someday do a blogpost of my favorites over the years. But I digress. The point is, it almost seems like Chris Nolan sat outside the sound stage sipping a mojito and just grabbed any actor that happened to be walking by and threw them in. I like it a lot.

So, the magnificent star-power aside, on to the movie itself. I kind of felt like it was having trouble finding itself. It was a biopic, sure. But in trying to add a little something – I guess? – to make a tough-topic biopic like Oppenheimer his own, Nolan added some stuff that I genuinely had me asking myself ‘whut the whut?’ Unnecessary to say the least. If there were more moments like…I don’t even know what to call them…the sureality?…then maybe they would have worked. But they were too few and far between and does that kind of thing even belong in a biopic? Soooo…nope. Swing and a miss.

Likewise, the aforementioned sex scenes between Oppenheimer and Tatlock were pretty graphic and, in my opinion, unnecessarily so. The relationship may have been true to actual events but honestly didn’t do anything to add to the story as a whole. If we want to tell the actual story of Oppenheimer then I get it. But if that, then why take the focus off of Oppenheimer and tell the backstory of Strauss (which was a real treat, I might add). It just seemed fractured to me.

Also, amid a firestorm of great performances (RDJ, Damon, Tom Conti and of course, Emily Blunt) it felt like Cillian Murphy’s turn as Robert Oppenheimer was kind of one-note and bland. It could be that the portrayal was an accurate characterization, I’ll grant that. But it would not be the first time Hollywood changed the personality or demeanor of a real life character to punch up a movie. I mean, were the sex scenes strictly adherent to history? Just sayin’.

Was Oppenheimer a blast…or a bomb?

Answer: Neither. Am I glad I saw Oppenheimer? Sure, if only for the surprise of seeing a new cameo every 5 minutes. Was it all it could be? Nah, not even close. It didn’t go far enough into the underbelly of the Manhatten Project, the politics (of which there are plenty) and the players. I’m sorry, but Oppenheimer the man just didn’t come off as that interesting a character. And having a one dimensional focus character makes the 3 hour run-time a slog at times. So, a little bit of a dud, not an actual bomb. Is that irony? Not really but it sideswipes it. As biopics go, I wont be rewatching this on the regular like I do Cinderella Man. Giving it a3.5/5.

And…I’m going to see Barbie at the bargain shoppers cheapskate show tonight. Sometimes feeling something…anything…is better than feeling nothing.

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