Oppenheimer - Soul in Cinema

Thoughts On: Oppenheimer (2023)

The story of the man behind the A-Bomb.

The grandiose Nolan blockbuster of the year; it was more than I expected it to be, but predictably limited. Through Nolan's style Oppenheimer successfully conveys a powerful historical and scientific story. As a historical drama, it has more than triumphed in bringing attention to elements of the science behind one of the most impactful happenings in human history. Like Interstellar, this cannot be knocked for its popularity and educational elements. It is inspiring to see Nolan continue to trust that mass audiences bear the intellect to grip the likes of an introduction to the idea of quantum mechanics. Alas, while I respect his pushing of the audience's intelligence, he over-assumes his capabilities in holding their attention.

Oppenheimer is too long; Nolan was undisciplined in his screenwriting and casting. Memento came out more than 20 years ago; its structure was interesting at that time because of the character it enhanced. Multiple, colliding timelines have no real place here with the characters at hand. The narrative is framed as a reflection on, and judgement of, Oppenheimer's life. The structuring just complicates this notion, over-bloating the run time. There are too many characters as well. Much energy is given to establishing them in the first hour, and it becomes exhausting to see how each characters' role is resolved in the last hour. The courts scenes and screentime given to Robert Downey Jr, in my opinion, are a distraction and waste of time. Put all of that in a few minute montage and the narrative's message is not at all changed; much to the opposite, its impact would be enhanced as the experience of the central part of the movie would be intensified. Long story short, while many have flocked to see Oppenheimer, I don't believe many will be re-watching it in years to come - and this would be because of its structure and run-time.

The soul of Oppenheimer is in its central arc, and the relationship Oppenheimer is shown to have with his wives. The movie is made in a moment, and forgive my explicitness, but this moment comes as Oppy fatally orates the famous line (I have become death, destroyer of worlds) as he slips into his wife Jean. Before exploring this further, I will raise my last gripe with Nolan's screenwriting and casting. Midsommar is one of my favourite films thanks to Florence Pugh. In the script and, more pertinently, on the screen, Nolan fails to utilise her to the highest effect. Pugh spends far too much of her time in dark and red hues of light, naked and without photogenie. What a shame it would be to see awards handed out for simple nudity. Jane is the true archetype and imago of destruction in this narrative; Nolan demotes her to a temptress with his visualisation. Foolish. If Oppenheimer becomes death, then it is only with Jean as his counterpart, and if there is any destruction he can claim, it is of the life of his ex-wife. This is the soul of the film.

While the ending could be cut, the final meeting with the president is one of the best parts of the film. Oppenheimer is put in his place; the story of the A-Bomb and the lives it destroyed is not all about him. He was a mere tool in a larger war and need not claim moral responsibility for a history far greater than him. Alas, he struggles with the bomb and its destruction as a fabrication that mirrors the true struggle he has with the death of Jean. Oppenheimer, if you watch closely when they screen images of the destruction of the nuclear attacks, cannot look at the obliteration his science allowed. He was also not there to see his wife die; he chose to walk away and remain silent. It is his charisma and ability to affect people that made him who he was. As much of a genius as he was in regards to physics, it is shown that his ability and aspiration to lead and overshadow others is what grants him success. Without his wild and confrontational social abilities, it could be argued that Oppenheimer would never be able to summon the support of others as he does throughout the film. Alas, this macroscopic effect of his character is beyond his understanding and something of a divine happening. The human drama that exists within his soul, and not in his ascension beyond himself, is with Jean. He becomes a force of death through his charisma and cunning. With Jean, he moved into the shadow of his supreme meaning to realise his greater calling. His second wife knows this.

Supreme meaning, to Carl Jung, was beyond God. It was the end of everything; the reason for all, and the force that makes everything happen. We can call it destiny. Jung believed we could live in the shadow of this supreme meaning; being the opposite of our highest self and walking parallel to the path set before us by the highest powers. The A-Bomb was Oppenheimer's destiny and his highest achievement. Alas, he came to it by straying from his path. He was not loyal to his government and used his charismatic and intellectual powers to manifest destruction in a dark room and upon the body and mind of a woman. Men who have been to this place, some small place where great danger lies, can begin to realise their true powers. While it is one thing to have an impact on something so impossibly large, such as a world war, that you have no capability of ever understanding it, it is something entirely different to contain yourself in a small space with no distractions, just one other who bares their entire soul to you. With complete access and sight into another, and no distractions, no interference, Oppenheimer is allowed to see, very acutely, what his powers can achieve. He does not kill Jean, just as he does not drop the A-Bombs on Japan, but he played a most crucial role that no president can disavow. I loved how his wife asserts this to him, refusing to allow him to release thought or responsibility for his ex-wife's death anywhere external. His responsibility dissipates in the scale of a world war, but has nowhere to go within the confines of those dark rooms, and his own life. And yet he is never allowed to quit; he must go on to complete his journey toward supreme meaning.

This is the true drama and soul of Oppenheimer as a film. This is the story of a man who achieves greatness and witnesses the cost. He steals light and brings it to the dark, and is rewarded with divine suffering. This Promethean aspiration reminds one that meaning is supreme. Reason beyond rhyme, the construction and realisation of meaning, and then the subsequent belief in it, pulls us and satiates the soul. Oppenheimer finds peace, managing his suffering, with his eyes closed, in not looking, in not seeing and owning the destruction he manifests as death itself. He is a man who possesses divine knowledge of destruction, yet strives closer to supreme meaning by separating himself from the destroyed. For this he suffers. Knowledge and power is borrowed, therefore its consequences are beyond us. Suffering is earned; the most perceptive and powerful can draw the most out of the world. And in suffering, it can all begin to make sense. Peace is a belief in meaning granted by the sense suffering instils within our souls.

So, the grandiose Nolan blockbuster of the year; good, but a familiar disappointment to one who loves cinema for its deeper spirit. Nolan does not have strong knowledge of photogenie (poor Miss Pugh), therefore he does not have the greatest capacity to evoke senses from the soul in cinema. His cinema is thus cold, scientific and quite dry in places. He makes good films, but he must grow if he is ever to be regarded as Kubrick, Bergman and Tarkovsky are in my books. I think he would benefit greatly by studying Spielberg, and also a little Ari Aster if he is to re-cast Pugh again.