Oppenheimer review
8.4 / 10 — CineScope score
Overview
The physicist who built the bomb, and the security hearing that spent years dismantling him. A life told through the rooms where decisions were made.
The short verdict
A three-hour courtroom drama disguised as a biopic, and Nolan's most dialogue-driven film since his debut.
Story
Two timelines run against each other — the Manhattan Project and the 1954 hearing — so the science and the politics keep interrupting one another.
Direction
Nolan stages the Trinity test as an exercise in withheld sound, and lets a single footstep do the work of a score.
Performance
Cillian Murphy finally gets a lead this size and fills it entirely; Robert Downey Jr. is unrecognisable behind the pettiness.
Cinematography
Hoyte van Hoytema shoots faces in 65mm, so the film's biggest special effect is a man thinking.
Music
Ludwig Göransson's violin is relentless — the sound of a mind that will not stop running.
Pros and cons
What works
- Murphy's defining performance
- Editorially daring structure
- Sound design used as narrative
What does not
- Almost nothing about the victims' experience
- Long stretches of men in rooms
Final verdict
A serious, adult blockbuster that trusts its audience. Watch it loud, and stay for the last twenty minutes.
8.4/ 10