Oppenheimer (2023) (Christopher Nolan's doing his film again)

[Minami Minegishi]

How's that having your cake and eating it? That is pretty much the standard opinion on the issue

Is it?

[dontpaintyourteeth]

this'll be shit, i reckon

[dissolute ocelot]

Was at the cinema again just now and saw a different trailer with more bombs and less dialogue. Did Nolan see the reactions to the first trailer and think "Shiiiiiiit, better put out another one"?

Surely you'd go see the film because you want to know about Oppenheimer not because you want to see lovingly recreated nuclear blasts? Or is this basically a fireworks display in IMAX form?

[Minami Minegishi]

Surely you'd go see the film because you want to know about Oppenheimer not because you want to see lovingly recreated nuclear blasts? Or is this basically a fireworks display in IMAX form?

Do you see Nolan doing a biopic of Darwin or Newton?

Monkeys and apples ain't gonna get that IMAX funding yo.

[twosclues]

I like Christopher Nolan, I think he's good

[Bad Ambassador]

At my local Cineworld, this has only three showings on opening day, all IMAX only. Barbie has 11 showings.

[Mister Six]

Was at the cinema again just now and saw a different trailer with more bombs and less dialogue. Did Nolan see the reactions to the first trailer and think "Shiiiiiiit, better put out another one"?

That just how they do trailers for big films right now - usually three main ones for a big film. In superhero movies, you'll get the plot trailer, the action trailer and the comedy trailer. That way, most potential audiences are addressed.

So I guess this one has the talky trailer and the SFX trailer.

[Tiggles]

IMAX 70mm bookings now open at the BFI London and Printworks in Manchester. If im going to watch a massive bomb go off, I want to do it with the best cinematic experience available.

[selectivememory]

What would you people say are the essential Nolan films? I've seen both Dunkirk and Interstellar a few years back. I think Interstellar had some parts at least I thought were pretty interesting and imaginative, but overall I wasn't particularly blown away by either. I've absolutely zero interest in watching any comic book films, so not his Batman ones, but any others I really ought to watch? Cheers

[El Unicornio, mang]

What would you people say are the essential Nolan films? I've seen both Dunkirk and Interstellar a few years back. I think Interstellar had some parts at least I thought were pretty interesting and imaginative, but overall I wasn't particularly blown away by either. I've absolutely zero interest in watching any comic book films, so not his Batman ones, but any others I really ought to watch? Cheers

I really like his first three films.

Following - low budget 16mm b&w thing about an unemployed man who follows people around the streets of London to try and find some inspiration for his novel
Memento - modern noir mystery thriller told in reverse order, Guy Pearce can't make new memories and is desperate to find his wife's killer.
Insomnia - Al Pacino is a detective hunting creepy murderer Robin Williams in Alaska

[druss]

I'll second the recommendation for Memento. Not one to watch after a few beers though.

[13 schoolyards]

You probably only really need to see Inception to "get" Nolan (especially if you've already seen Dunkirk). But Memento is still my favourite of his films, all his big interests and themes in one very small, very tightly crafted film where every performance is spot on.

[selectivememory]

Cool. Thanks guys.

[Blue Jam]

Got to be Memento. I enjoyed The Prestige as well, David Bowie's turn as Nikola Tesla is a lot of fun.

Maybe give The Dark Knight a miss.

[PlanktonSideburns]

What would you people say are the essential Nolan films? I've seen both Dunkirk and Interstellar a few years back. I think Interstellar had some parts at least I thought were pretty interesting and imaginative, but overall I wasn't particularly blown away by either. I've absolutely zero interest in watching any comic book films, so not his Batman ones, but any others I really ought to watch? Cheers

The dream one and the memory one and the magician ones are where he's doing his best i recon

[selectivememory]

Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with Memento and explore further if I like that one.

[13 schoolyards]

I always forget The Prestige is one of his, even though it's one of my favourite films. I guess the whole retro-steampunk vibe just doesn't fit with my idea of a "Christopher Nolan film", which is basically "what if Michael Mann had kept on making increasingly convoluted thrillers after Heat"

[Blue Jam]

The voiceover at the start of The Prestige, with Michael Caine explaining the three parts of a good magic trick and explaining the choice of the film's title, is the bit for me that says "THIS IS A CHRIS NOLAN FILM! IT'S CEREBRAL AND THAT!" Put me off a bit but I ended up really enjoying it.

People described Nolan's Batman films as "cerebral" and that can fuck right off.

[SteveDave]

Insomnia - Al Pacino is a detective hunting creepy murderer Robin Williams in Alaska

I watched this last night. It felt like a TV movie and Al Pacino's face kept changing. Every now and again he was Gabriel Byrne.

[Blinder Data]

hardly got on with Tenet so a bit worried about this. his films are becoming increasingly heartless and humourless, though always a fun spectacle.

tempted to watch it on 70mm, or perhaps IMAX

a viewing guide for nolan snobs here: https://www.oppenheimermovie.com/tickets/formats/

[Thomas]

In the run-up to this I've been enjoying the Last Podcast on the Left's coverage of the Manhattan Project.

Tenet seemed to pride itself on its mechanical rigour, at the expense of its characters - and yet it also used vague copouts like 'entropic wind' to handwave inconsistencies.

The more I revisit scenes from Dunkirk, the less spectacular it becomes. Perhaps Nolan should've allowed the CGI bods to populate that sparse beach a little more fully. But then maybe he designed the film to punish people who watch out-of-context sequences on YouTube.

Maybe this will be good let's see.

[Minami Minegishi]

The more I revisit scenes from Dunkirk, the less spectacular it becomes. Perhaps Nolan should've allowed the CGI bods to populate that sparse beach a little more fully. But then maybe he designed the film to punish people who watch out-of-context sequences on YouTube.

I had to watch this twice for reasons and I find it bafflingly dreadful. So many weird decisions. Branagh hamming it up with his shitty, gravity dense, portentous statements. And because Nolan decided to eschew CGI and/or hire shitloads of actors we are left with scenes of beaches that do not show the scale of the Dunkirk evacuation. Like a bad TV drama, we have to mentally fill in how huge this thing was.

And CGI isn't necessary to show that there were many, many women on that beach Christopher.

In this they are reduced to handing jam sandwiches to Harry Styles.

I'm not saying that Atonement is a great film, but at least Joe Wright showed some level of scale.

[selectivememory]

Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with Memento and explore further if I like that one.

Update: just watched this and it was good. Was very pleasantly surprised to see so much of Joey Pantoliano in it.

Will put some of the other suggestions on my watchlist. Cheers all. But anyway, I'll stop posting about other films in the Oppenheimer thread now.

[Easy_To_Assemble]

Cookdandnolan'd

I'll probably enjoy this, as I'll mainly be invested in this as a visual feast and not much more. The story of how a world-ending Pandora's Box was created can't be done justice by a Hollywood narrative. But it will be visually arresting if nothing else, so that's a good reason to head down the cinema for me. The same reason I enjoyed Dune. I didn't cry about whether it was faithful to the books, or was too slow. Because, it looked fucking ace on a big screen. Sometimes that is a reason in itself, to enjoy a movie.

[Head Gardener]

bit of a spoiler here, sorry

[Gulftastic]

Playing the 'loads of nudity' card seems a bit desperate for a film about atom bombs.

[Minami Minegishi]

Yes but under all of that SCIENCE he's just a man like your or I.

Do you see?

Also, he's naked from choice, not because a bomb burned his clothes off, leaving him parent-less and running in terror.

Do you see?

[Sebastian Cobb]

Seeing 'age gap' twitter is fuming that a man who invented the nuclear bomb also married a woman who was 30 when he was 36, lol.

[idunnosomename]

ATOMIC NONCE

[El Unicornio, mang]

Seems to be one person who can't comprehend an actress playing a person who's pretty much the same age as she is during the events of the film (and didn't look anything like Florence Pugh anyway), and an actor playing a character across several time periods because despite his age he looks young enough to do that. Tweet goes viral and everyone goes bananas.

https://twitter.com/ginagemeni/status/1677713222865133569