‘OPPENHEIMER’ OR ‘DAYS OF HEAVEN’

Oppenheimer opened in theaters big and small, 70mm and Imax.

After the rush calmed down, I saw it at the local Regal Theater in Bridgeport.

The multiplex included Barbie with a Photo Booth set up in the lobby.

What? No Oppenheimer photo booth?

The Barbie people were dressed for the show and the booth and looked to be having a big time at the movies.

Isn’t that the whole point, having a big time at the movies?

How to have a big movie time with Oppenheimer?

Get in the mood ahead of time by smoking a pack of cigarettes.

With so much smoking going on in the movie I started to feel a little breathless.

While the Barbie crowd was all fired up, the Oppenheimer bunch felt like church.

Since it was a 1 pm showing I expected the theater to be empty.

It wasn’t.

A quick look around showed older folks trailing in, along with dads and sons.

I followed a couple up the stairs to my seat who navigated the trek with a walker.

You’ve got to hand it to a guy who wants the full effect of the movie instead of waiting for it at home like normal people.

Ok, I could have waited, but didn’t.

Am I glad I saw it on the biggest screen?

Movie Star Close Ups

I mention the movie Days Of Heaven for one reason:

It’s the only western I’ve seen with some cowboy in clean clothes, lots for clean clothes.

And if memory serves, they were nice clothes.

And plenty of Richard Gere close-ups.

It must have mattered because that movie got an Oscar for cinematography and a nomination for costume design.

Richard Gere looked better than a steel mill worker on the run for murder should have looked?

That wasn’t the problem with Cillian Murphy’s Oppenheimer.

He looked so much like the character he played he could have been mimicking him and not acting.

And the close-ups?

I can’t remember when I’ve seen as many profile shots of the main actor in a movie looking left.

Was that Oppenheimer’s good side?

The first time I remember an actor impersonating someone was John Belushi doing Joe Cocker on SNL.

Notable impersonations since include Jamie Foxx in Ray and Remi Malek in Bohemian Rhapsody.

In Oppenheimer we see Murphy’s face on the entire screen in all of his unfocused splendor.

I say unfocused because we know from the start that he’s got lots on his mind, so he’s distracted, remote. All of those damn stars in the sky take up lots of brain space. So I’ve heard.

Did I need so many close-ups of Cillian Murphy to sell me on who he was trying to be?

The Part Oppenheimer Left Out

This is Tokyo and Hiroshima pictured together.

This is Tokyo.

No nuclear bomb cleared Tokyo, but it looks similar to both Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

This is Nagasaki:

This is Kokura:

In addition to being the primary target for the second bombing, Kokura was the backup target on August 6th had the weather been poor at Hiroshima.

The Tokyo firebombing burned sixteen square miles of the city.

Kokura survived bombings and planned nuclear attacks.

While Oppenheimer is about bomb development, these images show the results.

Flying Home

I’ve had the good fortune to read a feature film script that follows the path of WWII from Building 20 at MIT, to the Battle of Britain, to Pearl Harbor, to island hopping across the Pacific to Tinian, to Tokyo, Hiroshima, Kokura, and Nagasaki.

The story returns to Tinian, then to Boston after the war to find industrial espionage working overtime a the start of the Cold War.

A student with the special gift of being smart in the right place at the right time drives the story from MIT labs, to the suicide cliffs of Tinian and back.

In a combination of Good Will Hunting meets Forrest Gump, the young hero turns into a good luck charm for the airmen flying the most dangerous missions.

From his point of view we see the fire bombing, Hiroshima, the calm over Kokura, then Nagasaki.

He shows who he is on Tinian when he meets a young woman who fought her way off the suicide cliffs and helps her rescue kids and parents hiding in island caves before the flame throwers got them.

He is betrayed by friends and family, officers and enlisted, while staying true to himself.

Soon after the war he reconnects with his life in Boston to learn everything has changed.

It sounds like it would make a great movie in the right hands after Oppenheimer.

Luckily I know who wrote it, registered it, and has it handy.

If you know a director with the chops to bring this epic to the big screen, leave a comment and I’ll pass it along.

To me.