4 Attachment(s)
Why Nolan's Oppenheimer Is About More Than A Deadly Invention
Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan's chronicling of the creation of the Atomic Bomb by infamous physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, will be about more than his deadly invention after all. The biopic primarily focuses on Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy) and his team of scientists as they work with prominent figures in nuclear weapons development like United States Secretary of Commerce Lewis Strauss (Robert Downey Jr.) and Lieutenant General Leslie Groves (Matt Damon) on the Manhattan Project at the University of California. The movie has received much attention so far for its stunning, dramatic trailer, in which recreations of the A-Bomb explosions communicate the horror of their design quite realistically.
While the tease of Oppenheimer's explosions represents Nolan's best work yet in terms of practical effects, there is another story that runs parallel to the Manhattan Project that sheds more light on the "father of the Atomic Bomb." While working tirelessly in the Los Alamos Laboratory to document the effects of nuclear weaponry, first as a weapon of mass destruction and then as a wartime deterrent, Oppenheimer became a subject of much controversy. His experiments and their repercussions were under such scrutiny from outside forces that they threatened his marriage to Katherine Oppenheimer (Emily Blunt), as well as his livelihood.
Why J. Robert Oppenheimer Was Investigated By The FBI
According to American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, on which the movie is based, after the Manhattan Project ended in 1945, Oppenheimer was investigated by the FBI. The case wasn't as black and white as the Oppenheimer trailer, however. As anti-Communist sentiment took hold of the nation in the '50s, Oppenheimer's association with the Communist Party (beginning in the '30s when the Manhattan Project was brainstormed) placed him on J. Edgar Hoover's watch list. Doubts about Oppenheimer's loyalty increased to the point where the physicist was even thought to be a spy for the Soviet Union.
Not only was Oppenheimer associated with the Communist Party USA, but so was his wife, his brother Frank Oppenheimer, and even a colleague named Haakon Chevalier, who taught French literature at the University of California. It was Oppenheimer's frequent meetings with Chevalier, beginning in 1941, that increased the FBI's interest, particularly since one occasion included the Communist Party's California state secretary William Schneiderman. It didn't help that Oppenheimer was on the American Civil Liberties Union Executive Committee, though to be a Communist front, earning him a spot on the Custodial Detention Index.
How The FBI Investigation Can Help Nolan's Movie
Oppenheimer could be Nolan's most important movie yet with the inclusion of an FBI investigation that offers something more to Oppenheimer's life than just the A-Bomb. It directly highlights how science became perceived as untrustworthy at the federal level and how scientific theories became labeled as dissent. The FBI investigation, combined with Oppenheimer's refusal to give up his security clearance, directly led to the Oppenheimer Security Hearings by the United States Atomic Energy Commission in 1954. These had a profound effect on not just him but scientific influence on public opinion. After that, the physicist was exiled from government work and the world he had helped to build.
The FBI plot also adds an extra aura of intrigue and paranoia that have been hallmarks of Nolan movies like Inception and Memento. After Tenet's disappointment, Oppenheimer is Nolan's perfect return, mixing the director's other staple elements like scientific ideas, a muted aesthetic, and a focus on practical effects with real historical dilemmas like he did in Dunkirk. As Oppenheimer aims to comprehensively illuminate the creation and impact of the A-Bomb, it must also look at the personal and professional struggles Oppenheimer went through in order to make the world aware of his creation's terrifying potential.
