Nolan's Oppenheimer

[dahliaclone]

I saw it this afternoon.

Wow. Just wow.

In the thread earlier this summer about Marvel/GOTG 3, I was effusive in my praise for that movie because it checked off all of my personal boxes; 1) It made me think 2) It moved me emotionally 3) It entertained me and 4) I didn't look at my watch one single time.

Oppenheimer checked all of those boxes for me as well, plus while I had to pee for about the last 90 minutes of the movie I stayed put because I didn't want to miss anything.

Just a terrific film around. I have to presume that Cillian Murphy will get nominated for Best Actor, as well he should, but there were a lot of great performances in that movie. Talk about an A-list cast too; Murphy, Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Matthew Modine, Remi Malek, Jason Clarke...even 'effin Gary Oldman!

If you haven't seen it yet go ahead and invest the 3 hours it takes to see the movie.

Murphy
Blunt
Downey Jr.

All are pretty much locks for nominations at this point.

My personal vote would be for Alden Ehrenreich getting a supporting nom as well. I thought he was great.

 

[madguy30]

Speaking of long movies, I went to see the new Indiana Jones movie. I enjoyed the movie, but it seemed interminably long to me. It probably didn't help that I took four grandchildren, ages from 15 down to 6 with me -- two teenagers and two first and second graders, two boys and two girls. The movie was 2 hours and 34 minutes long. It should have been cut by at least 45 minutes IMO.

Yeah agree, Indy and the new Mission Impossible both lasted a bit long. Mission Impossible just seems to milk the last 20 minutes of action out. It was good and well done and all but it seems like most movies I go to could be cut down.

 

[flycy]

This is a conspiracy theory that historians have been fighting against for decades. There is no documentary evidence this was the thought process, and all the people involved always denied it.

Let me tell you a little story...

My wife and I visited Japan a year or two before the pandemic. As we always do, we compromised on our activities while there. I prefer history and high culture; she tends to prefer "urban exploration" or natural beauty. With one of "my" days we visited Hiroshima and the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.

It's a hard place to visit. Up there with the Sachsenhausen concentration camp we went to outside Berlin. Most people killed or wounded by the atomic bomb were civilians -- women, children, and the elderly with young men in military or industrial service somewhere else. Few of them individually did anything to deserve a nuclear weapon being dropped on them. They were going about their lives and trying to serve their nation, even if their nation somehow went insane in the 1930s and deserved what it received for it.

One note at the memorial enraged me, though, and it does to this day. It read something like --

"Hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians were the first victims of the geopolitical conflict between the U.S. and USSR that would come to be known as the Cold War. President Truman dropped the bomb on Hiroshima as a demonstration of American power and influence to the Soviet Union."

NO ******* WAY! **** YOU!

Truman dropped the bomb because the prospect of invading Japan was terrifying. Japan was an advanced and cultured nation before the war but, again, somehow went insane as a society. The atrocities committed in Korea, China, Indochina, and the South Pacific are every bit as bad as the ones the Germans committed in Europe and the Soviets against their own people and eastern Europe. Worst of all, they refused to admit when they were beaten to the point they were willing to commit national suicide before accepting defeat and indignity. In such a difficult situation, Truman did the rational thing we probably would have all done and decided to exhaust all other options before invasion -- so drop the big one and level a few cities of theirs.

See if that snaps them out of it.

Japan wasn't an innocent victim caught in the crossfire. They received what they deserved. Societies being unable to acknowledge and move on from past atrocities leads to present pathologies.

It is a stupid point anyways. To writ --

(1.) Truman didn't even know about the bomb until after he became president. There's this story about Henry Stinson, FDR's old Secretary of War, asking Truman to stay for five minutes after his first cabinet meeting as president and only then telling him about the Manhattan Project.

Which I bring up because...

(2.) Stalin already knew about the bomb when the U.S. dropped it on Hiroshima. He knew about the Manhattan Project in the early 1940s while Truman did not learn of it until early 1945. The NKVD had the project leaking like a sieve. There were many secret communists involved, though Oppenheimer was not one of them. There was not anything to be gained by a "demonstration" -- Stalin knew everything already.

Tour Okinawa and you'll know why it was necessary to drop the atomic bomb. Millions of lives were likely saved with those two bombs, most of them Japanese civilian. Japanese culture did not allow for surrender. It's actually somewhat amazing the emperor made that decision even in the wake of such attack. Without the atomic bomb, it seems unlikely the military establishment would have accepted defeat before death.

 

[CyclonePigskin]

Oppenheimer grossed +$80 million for the opening weekend with a 94 Rotten Tomato score. Highly probable somebody you know liked it.

 

[flycy]

My reading of the timeline of events in August 1945 has always been something like --

Japan never thought they'd "win" the war in the sense they'd be rolling into Washington, DC or New York at some point in the future (or, as much as The Man in the High Castle likes to dramatize it, at least San Francisco and Los Angeles). They knew they couldn't win a long and protracted war of attrition with the U.S., so the goal was always to force a stalemate on terms favorite to Japan and come to the negotiating table where they could keep their "Co-Prosperity Sphere" empire together.

They envisioned this coming to be through a Japanese victory in some "climactic battle" that would not win the war from a material standpoint -- again, they knew they could never win a battle of attrition -- but would raise the cost of an American victory to such a high degree and set the U.S. back maybe years until its material advantages would win the war that the Americans... would just retire.

Not worth it for the Americans at that point, right?

You can see the obvious influence of the Battle of Tsushima there. The Japanese could not win a war of attrition with the Russians, but they made the costs so high by implementing an "efficient" strategy to the point the Russians gave up the game. The plan just had two problems they never addressed...

(1.) The raid on Pearl Harbor was a tactical victory but a strategic disaster. They felt they had to, being so afraid of the American battleships stationed there, but a few months of the Pacific War showed quickly that were "role players" in the fleet compared to submarines and land- and carrier-based aircraft. Yeah, they sunk a few near-obsolete battleships -- most of which were repaired -- but so what?

The main thing it did was piss us off. Not how you want to start a war if the whole idea is to make it so the American people grow bored or tire of the war (such as we do nowadays) and quit.

(2.) They ****** up the execution. Midway was basically their plan -- but in the other direction. Build a chain of island fortresses in the central and south Pacific protecting the core of their empire, fortify them with dug-in troops and land-based aircraft, and use their mobile carrier fleet to repel any invasions. Sure, the U.S. can probably wear that down over time, but that was going to take a while and lead to heinous losses if every time you did this you had to trade carriers at a 3:1 or a 4:1 ratio or so.

Instead they tried it themselves, ****** around and found out, and their whole plan was shot. They kept trying to do the same thing over and over again the rest of the war, but it never worked. This was still their plan in anticipation of the Allied invasion of the Home Islands -- put up hellacious resistance, make the U.S. question if this is really worth the cost, and find somebody to mediate the peace.

The obvious mediator was always the Soviet Union. The Soviets and Japanese had a non-aggression pact, Japan tolerated Lend-Lease shipments to the USSR through Vladivostok without attacking them, and the U.S. and Moscow were nominal "allies" against the Germans in Europe. Japan hoped they could force that stalemate and call up our "mutual friend" Stalin and see if he'd help them talk this out.

Again, stupid plan, but they were reaching in desperation.

August 6 = Hiroshima

August 7 = message from Truman is delivered via the Swiss embassy, which was the de facto backdoor for the U.S. and Japan to communicate, that the bombings will continue until surrender

This was something of a bluff. They had only two bombs at that point. More would take months.

August 8 = Soviets declare war on Japan (which was requested by the Allies once the war in Europe was over... thinking Soviet troops would be useful to soak up the casualties that were going to come from invading Japan, though I shudder to think of a partitioned Japan like Germany)

August 9 = Nagasaki

August 10 = Japan surrenders with the single condition that the Emperor remain sovereign

Historians still debate which one of these factors -- the destruction from the atomic bombs or the final collapse of their plan for Soviet mediation -- was the stronger influence. But it was a combination of the two. Japanese military leadership had been telling Hirohito for months that the Soviets would intervene and help broker a peace deal any day now. That became impossible to assert when they attacked.

At Pearl Harbor the biggest blunder the Japanese made was not attacking the fuel storage facilities. An easy target that could have been completely destroyed with little effort. Pearl had our only significant fuel reserves in the Pacific. The fleet would have been crippled for a prolonged period if they had done this.

VE day was in May, Hiroshima in August. The Soviets had plenty of time to pivot if they were going to. The Soviets only declared war on Japan because the atomic bomb was dropped and the war was obviously about to end. Just as Japan never declared war on the USSR despite their pact with Hitler, Stalin never intended to fulfill his agreement to engage Japan. They were just opportunists and gained some Japanese islands they still hold today for the effort.

 

[besserheimerphat]

 

[Jeremy]

We ended up cancelling our Oppenheimer tickets and saw Barbie simply because my stomach wasn't in a position to sit for 3 hours without a break (TMI). Will likely wait for streaming at this point.

 

[NWICY]

We ended up cancelling our Oppenheimer tickets and saw Barbie simply because my stomach wasn't in a position to sit for 3 hours without a break (TMI). Will likely wait for streaming at this point.

So does the Barbie song show up in the Barbie movie?

 

[CychiatricWard]

Saw it last night and loved it! Storytelling was top notch, acting was phenomenal. Certainly kept my attention for the entirety. Highly recommend seeing it in theaters.

 

[Jeremy]

So does the Barbie song show up in the Barbie movie?

Thankfully only if you stay long enough through the credits.

 

[xboxfever]

I think I’ve got my wife talked into seeing Oppenheimer this weekend on the guise that we’re having a date night. I’ve never seen a movie in Imax so hopefully were able to get tickets in Imax.

 

[alenz95]

Tour Okinawa and you'll know why it was necessary to drop the atomic bomb. Millions of lives were likely saved with those two bombs, most of them Japanese civilian. Japanese culture did not allow for surrender. It's actually somewhat amazing the emperor made that decision even in the wake of such attack. Without the atomic bomb, it seems unlikely the military establishment would have accepted defeat before death.

If anyone is interested in a very very very in depth look at the war in the pacific, Dan Carlin has a phenomenal 6 part podcast series called Supernova in the East. I believe its still free on most major podcast platforms. The series covers the rise of Imperial Japan before World War I and runs through the end of World War II. Carlin relies heavily on primary source materials in telling the story. I know everyone is generally aware that the pacific theater was terrible, but its hard to really understand how terrible it was until you dive into it a bit deeper. For anyone seeing Oppenheimer that wants some additional context on that time period I would highly recommend.

 

[BryceC]

If anyone is interested in a very very very in depth look at the war in the pacific, Dan Carlin has a phenomenal 6 part podcast series called Supernova in the East. I believe its still free on most major podcast platforms. The series covers the rise of Imperial Japan before World War I and runs through the end of World War II. Carlin relies heavily on primary source materials in telling the story. I know everyone is generally aware that the pacific theater was terrible, but its hard to really understand how terrible it was until you dive into it a bit deeper. For anyone seeing Oppenheimer that wants some additional context on that time period I would highly recommend.

Malcolm Gladwell did a really good multi part pod on it as well, revisionist history is the pod and the episodes are called The Bomber Mafia.

 

[ZRF]

I basically think any movie around 3 hours is too long. Somebody needs an editor at that point.

For some movies, and in general, I'd agree. But if there is enough substance to occupy the full 3 hours then I don't see the problem. I think that's an individual issue with preference or attention span, rather than the film itself.

Personally I think it's massive achievement when a filmmaker can hold direction, focus, and the story for 3 hours without using filler to occupy time. Oppenheimer was an amazingly told story.

 

[GMackey32]

For some movies, and in general, I'd agree. But if there is enough substance to occupy the full 3 hours then I don't see the problem. I think that's an individual issue with preference or attention span, rather than the film itself.

Personally I think it's massive achievement when a filmmaker can hold direction, focus, and the story for 3 hours without using filler to occupy time. Oppenheimer was an amazingly told story.

It didn't feel like 3 hours at all.

 

[stormchaser2014]

Here's the full soundtrack.

 

[BryceC]

For some movies, and in general, I'd agree. But if there is enough substance to occupy the full 3 hours then I don't see the problem. I think that's an individual issue with preference or attention span, rather than the film itself.

Personally I think it's massive achievement when a filmmaker can hold direction, focus, and the story for 3 hours without using filler to occupy time. Oppenheimer was an amazingly told story.

Its preference. There is no reason why a biopic should be 3 hours. None. I’m sure I’ll watch it when it hits streaming and I’m sure I’ll enjoy it over the course of several days.

If a movie is 3+ hours, with previews we are talking probably 3.5 by the time the movie is over. That’s probably as long as a Cyclone Football game, and those last too long too.

 

[CychiatricWard]

Its preference. There is no reason why a biopic should be 3 hours. None. I’m sure I’ll watch it when it hits streaming and I’m sure I’ll enjoy it over the course of several days.

If a movie is 3+ hours, with previews we are talking probably 3.5 by the time the movie is over. That’s probably as long as a Cyclone Football game, and those last too long too.

When the story needs to be told in that time frame then there is. You just sound crabby, honestly. The movie was fantastic and had absolutely zero filler time, so it seems the 3 hours made sense, don’t you think?

And, this movie shouldn’t be watched over a couple days. You need to sit through this one in it’s entirety.

 

[BryceC]

And, this movie shouldn’t be watched over a couple days. You need to sit through this one in its entirety.

They said the same thing about the Irishman and it was fine over a few days.

For the record I am a little crabby. I love movies, and there are ostensibly 3 I would like to watch right now - Indiana Jones, Oppenheimer, and MI, and they are all 2.5+ hours long. It’s ridiculous.

 

[LLCoolCY]

Its preference. There is no reason why a biopic should be 3 hours. None. I’m sure I’ll watch it when it hits streaming and I’m sure I’ll enjoy it over the course of several days.

If a movie is 3+ hours, with previews we are talking probably 3.5 by the time the movie is over. That’s probably as long as a Cyclone Football game, and those last too long too.

Normally I would totally agree that no movie needs to be 3 hours. In this Oppenheimer case the pacing was superb and it really feels like 2 hours instead of 3.
I am sure Nolan and his editor could have cut a bit out maybe 15 minutes but where the fat was isn't obvious and removing any part could have easily messed with the story. In the end if a movie is 2hr45min or 3hours I'd just soon see the directors vision.
FWIW I saw it in the last row of a a full theater and noticed a hand full of people leave during the 3hours.