Oppenheimer has been dubbed the “most important film of the century” as rave reviews flood in for Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated blockbuster.
The biographical drama follows the father of the atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer, as he devises the weapon that went on to end the Second World War.
Peaky Blinders’ Cillian Murphy plays the theoretical physicist, joined alongside Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon and Emily Blunt in an all-star cast.
Describing it as one of the “most challenging projects” he has ever taken on, Nolan has opened up about the challenges of showing an atomic explosion without resorting to computer-generated imagery (CGI).
Oppenheimer led a team in Los Alamos, New Mexico, that worked in complete secrecy to develop the world’s first atomic bomb in what famously became known as the Manhattan Project.
The joint work of the scientists resulted in the world’s first nuclear explosion, near Alamogordo, on July 16, 1945. Oppenheimer had given the site the codename “Trinity”.
Ahead of the film’s cinema release on 21st July, Nolan said recreating that scene was particularly difficult, and that it has had quite a profound effect on those watching it.
“Some people leave the movie absolutely devastated,” he told Wired. “They can’t speak. I mean, there’s an element of fear that’s there in the history and there in the underpinnings.”
Fellow filmmaker, screenwriter and critic Paul Schrader has given Oppenheimer his stamp of approval in a Facebook post.
He wrote: “OPPENHEIMER. The best, most important film of this century,” Schrader wrote on his Facebook page.”If you see one film in cinemas this year it should be Oppenheimer. I’m not a Nolan groupie but this one blows the doors off the hinges.”
The film also has a near-perfect score on Rotten Tomatoes.
With 94 per cent giving it their seal of approval, Oppenheimer is Nolan’s best-reviewed picture to date.
His next best is the second film in his Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight (2008), which stands at 94 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes.
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