Why you should be rooting for Oppenheimer

In director Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, the stakes are clear: freedom and democracy are on the line as the titular physicist and his colleagues at the Manhattan Project face thorny moral, ethical, and existential dilemmas in the race to develop the atomic bomb that will hopefully put an end to World War II.

This weekend, and in the weeks ahead, moviegoers face a far-less complex, but still existential choice. In a theatrical environment caught in a chokehold by superheroes, decades-old franchises, and all-powerful IP tentpoles, Oppenheimer is a rare outlier; an intellectually weighty, emotionally rich, historically important, and socially relevant would-be summer blockbuster directed with stylish, uber-cinematic panache and aimed at mature, discerning ticket buyers. And if it underperforms at the box office, it may serve as an extinction-level event for future high-minded fare in the summer multiplex.

That’s not to say we don’t or shouldn’t continue to shower attention on enjoyable, summer-centric blockbuster-style fare—definitely go see still-top-of-form franchise films like Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning Part One and especially go see IP-driven movies like Barbie, which subvert its source material as much as it celebrates it.

But if you value films that seek to thrill and challenge audiences who crave having their intellect and emotions invested in heady, meaty material, Oppenheimer presents a critical opportunity to vote with your wallets and send a message to the studios that, as much as you love superheroes, spies, souped-up cars, and toys, you’re still hungry to think and feel and luxuriate in well-crafted stories that revolve around elements other than explosions (Okay, so Oppenheimer actually revolves around a really, really big explosion, but you get the drift …)

Otherwise, cynical, bottom-line, corporate decision-making may result in fare with substance being excised from the summer moviegoing experience, and Hollywood permanently ceding the beach-going months to an endless onslaught of safe, easy-to-market, and in many cases, uninspired films, as the industry concludes that franchises and IP are the only things theater audiences will still show up for.

In a worst-case scenario, the studios—which have already all but abandoned mid-budget productions and traditionally popular genres like the romantic comedy—may even push the blockbuster mentality into a year-round agenda, encroaching on fall territory that’s still reserved for prestige films by important filmmakers. This summer, there have been glimmers that audiences are already sated after years of being force-fed would-be slam-dunks. They’ve opted to not to show up for previously predictable summer hits like The Flash and Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny. Hopefully that will open the door to more unique fare like Oppenheimer and won’t result in audiences spending even more time on the couch watching Disney+.

While the widespread embrace of streaming services and the global pandemic have to be factored into the overall disruption of the film exhibition industry, as a believer in the “history rhymes” credo myself, we should also wonder if we’re not at the threshold of a new inflection point similar to what the major film studios faced in the ’50s and ’60s when, rudderless after the collapse of the studio system and the advent of television, they convinced themselves that audiences were primarily interested in bloated, big-screen versions of popular musicals and stagey costume dramas where every dollar in the budget could be counted on-screen, for good (The Sound Of Music) and ill (Cleopatra).

But then Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda roared onto the scene with 1969’s Easy Rider, a grungy, raw, low-budget, formula-busting, zeitgeist-embracing film that opened in mid-July and became a phenomenon by both reflecting the then-current youth culture and sparking a deep cultural conversation across generations. Easy Rider upended conventional movie wisdom and sparked a filmmaking revolution that led to a halcyon, post-modern golden age that gave audiences everything from The Godfather to Gloria, from Taxi Driver to Jaws, and from Chinatown to Star Wars. And, just as the studios told themselves—then, as right now—that the age of movie stars had passed, an entire new generation of still-iconic, ticket-selling talent was freshly minted, as was a new breed of auteur.

Look, Oppenheimer ain’t Easy Rider—it’s studio-made, lavishly budgeted, massive in running time, packed with famous-name actors and helmed by one of the foremost filmmaking talents of the last two decades—but in success it could live up to Nolan’s oft-Kubrickian ethos by serving, as 2001: A Space Odyssey did in 1968, as a gateway and stage-setter for a more adventurous era in film put forth by an already accomplished director.

And make no mistake: buying a ticket to Oppenheimer is nothing like eating your cinematic vegetables. The film is a feast; a stunning, ambitious, grand, keenly acted, wildly entertaining and profoundly thought-provoking movie that stands high among Nolan’s finest work—perhaps even his masterwork—deserving to be seen on the largest screen available. But there just may be more riding on Oppenheimer than its own commercial success. In the greater scheme of things, the future of smart, savvy, deeply felt filmmaking that deserves a wide, summer release may hinge on a movie about a bomb not bombing.