This is going to be a slightly briefer review than one might expect for a number of reasons, most importantly that the film needs at least a second viewing to be able to begin to fully absorb and appreciate it. Additionally, I did not see it in IMAX, but will do so in a week’s time. I will doubtless add to these comments.
The elements that struck me most vividly from this first viewing were the soundtrack and the structure. This first was quite remarkably imaginative, and was truly multi-functional from being used as if we were Oppenheimer with the sounds, exaggerated or lacking comp0letely, were a fine chart of his emotional state, allowing us to empathise with him, even when his actions did not truly warrant this. The sense of him as a deeply flawed and troubled character was marvelously conveyed, both by Murphy’s performance (looking disturbingly haggard in scenes of his later life, emphasized, I felt by the judicious use of B & W) and the script.
The running time a tad over three hours has occasioned some comment but, unusually, I did not feel it was over-long. There was a superb grasp of dramatic drive to maintain interest, along with a forst-rate script, which, like Succession, had the essential quality of being richly and effectively concise so that just enough was said to convey what was necessary but there was zero speechifying or unnecessarily verbose explanations. I suspect it would have been too easy to have this sort of padding, particularly when dealing with the scientific concepts. In fact, interestingly, this aspect was a very minor one; there was not an attempt to explain to the non-scientific exactly what they were trying to do. We were given, I felt, just enough information to allow our emotional and dramatic involvement without being bogged down by having to get our brains around astonishingly complicated and sophisticated scientific concepts.
The use of flashbacks and B & W sequences was sophisticated, effective and I am sure I missed a number of subtleties on this preliminary viewing. It will be interesting to see how I feel after viewing number 2.
I am much looking forward to the second viewing, and will be interested to see the effect of this in IMAX. I think seeing it in two formats, in the order that I have done will be fascinating.