Anyone Seen Oppenheimer?

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UB 40

Lifer
Jul 7, 2022
1,344
9,789
62
Cologne/ Germany
nahbesprechung.net
I don’t like the kind of story telling of actual Hollywood cinema at all. Though there are some Directors I like - e.g. Tarantino - and know about, not so Nolan, never saw one of his films, so no comments on that part.

Oppenheimers live and work appears quite ambiguous in many ways, but one thing I am sure of, is that he wasn’t a lunatic. But a scientist of his time, who in the end looked for the responsibility of his doings as he refused to go further in the development of the so called superbomb.

By the way the Nazis had been light years away from developing an A-bomb in 1944. They neither hadn’t the knowledge to build a bomb, nor the right amount and quality of uranium-materials, a developing race was a farce.

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What we face now is the danger of a sinking threshold in using the smaller so called tactical nuclear bombs. 100 of those small territorial bombs ignited for example in a war between India and Pakistan, each comparable to a volcanic eruption in regard to the masses of dust thrown in the atmosphere, could lead to a global nuclear Winter. With temperatures sinking by about 4 degrees Celsius it could damage global food supplies.
 
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sablebrush52

The Bard Of Barlings
Jun 15, 2013
20,390
47,678
Southern Oregon
jrs457.wixsite.com
I have enjoyed virtually all of Nolas pics and this topic is a good one. Given that, I think it would have to try hard to be bad.

Also, If you like the subject, timeframe and characters, I can't recommend enough the TV show "Manhattan". It's well worth the investment of time and money to purchase if you can't fit for free.

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Loved Manhattan. Was pissed, mightily pissed, that it didn't get picked up. Must have been that it was extremely well made, a had intelligence.
 

sablebrush52

The Bard Of Barlings
Jun 15, 2013
20,390
47,678
Southern Oregon
jrs457.wixsite.com
It's not just you.

People have been complaining about it for years.

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The pushback has made no difference. If anything, Nolan has doubled down, insisting that not being able to hear or understand what characters say forces audiences to "enter the world of the film more completely because greater attention and concentration is required", and high music dB levels are "more immersive" . Yadda yadda


...even after being told BY those audiences it doesn't work that way.


That's some GradeAAA Prime #1 narcissistic bullshit, right there.
Clearly Nolan's choices when mixing work for the majority. With Dunkirk, there was so much to see and visually process that the dialogue kinda didn't much matter to me.

That said, poor balancing isn't just a Nolan trait, it's getting pretty common. Maybe it's a style?
 
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captpat

Lifer
Dec 16, 2014
2,389
12,416
North Carolina
smaller so called tactical nuclear bombs.
One should be careful about conflating a particular weapon size with its desired purpose or effect resulting from its use, be that strategic, operational, or tactical. As an example, the Russian doctrine of "Escalate to De-escalate" suggests using a small nuclear weapon to achieve a strategic aim, which is causing the NATO forces to withdraw from a conventional conflict. Obviously, there would be associated tactical effects local to ground zero, but the purpose of employment is to achieve a strategic objective (albeit with a "small" nuclear weapon).
 
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May 9, 2021
1,686
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Geoje Island South Korea
Back in the 80's, I remember watching the TV series, called Oppenheimer, Sam Waterston (he of "The Great Gatsby" & "The Killing Fields") played the part of JRO.
It was pretty good as far as I remember, although I would've been 13 or 14 at the time.
 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,592
Plan to see it. The trailers are well filmed and impressive. The actor who plays Oppenheimer lost an unhealthy amount of weight to play the role, almost looks like a different person when interviewed.

The only scene in the trailer that made me wince and shake my head was that with Albert Einstein. Actual film clips of Einstein nearly always show his hair somewhat wavy and totally unkempt, as if he's just gotten out of bed.

The actor playing him has obviously just came from the make-up trailer and his hair is perfectly coifed like a Vogue models. Why would they do that? They could have downplayed the messiness of the hair if that looked derogatory (or something), but to go to the opposite pole is creepy. It's like someone playing Mick Jagger wearing a monocle.
 
Jun 9, 2015
3,970
24,797
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Mission, Ks
What we face now is the danger of a sinking threshold in using the smaller so called tactical nuclear bombs. 100 of those small territorial bombs ignited for example in a war between India and Pakistan, each comparable to a volcanic eruption in regard to the masses of dust thrown in the atmosphere, could lead to a global nuclear Winter. With temperatures sinking by about 4 degrees Celsius it could damage global food supplies.
As long as the nuclear winter cancels' out the rising global temperatures of climate change we'll be ok. 😒
 
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Egg Shen

Lifer
Nov 26, 2021
1,131
3,796
Pennsylvania
I hate Nolan’s Bat films, from the casting, to picking boring villains, to that they were basically just action movies where the actors wore costumes, to allowing Bale to talk in that “I’m constipated and trying to take a dump while I read my dialogue” voice. However I think this will be good despite him, not because of him. Of course I will be streaming it as I don’t want to be where the cruddy general public gathers en masse much these days.
 

canucklehead

Lifer
Aug 1, 2018
2,862
15,355
Alberta
That said, poor balancing isn't just a Nolan trait, it's getting pretty common. Maybe it's a style?
My wife was complaining about that last weekend, so many movies lately are like that. She was watching Avatar 2 (Whales in Space) and had to keep turning the volume up and down, the "action" scenes were far louder than the dialogue (such as there was).
 

proteus

Lifer
May 20, 2023
1,463
2,442
54
Connecticut (shade leaf tobacco country)
Crazy how close we came as a world to the reality depicted in dyatopian series The Man In The High Castle - the premise being America lost. The winners Japan and Germany split up the world and America. Everything America stands for - gone. Creating a device capable of destruction so massive the world had never seen it before kept that from happening and ended the war. What kind of device will need creating to end the next world war?
 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,592
I'll reserve my opinion to see the film, but I agree most directors get ahead of themselves and try to do too much to win awards. The idea of simplifying and finding the meaning in the narrative rather than elaborating everything and changing the genre several times through the film is like a disease.

In the days of yore, one good platform performer could hold an audience for hours, one voice with nothing but language to hold them up. With the power of film and close-ups and superb acting, the sky is the limit, but few directors know that. It's a brassy, coarse, braggart, bellicose world out there, and humanity has little to do with it.
 
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kcghost

Lifer
May 6, 2011
15,035
25,469
77
Olathe, Kansas
If you pass on this check out the Oppenheimer serial that ran on MasterPiece theater on the local PBS channel. It was damn nigh excellent!!