Why Oppenheimer Deserves His Own Movie [video] | Hacker News Reader

Why Oppenheimer Deserves His Own Movie [video]

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77 pointsarihantparsoya102 comments

The movie is based on this Pulitzer Prize winning book:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Prometheus

It doesn’t get mentioned much but is highly rated on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/American-Prometheus-Triumph-Tragedy-O...

I read it earlier this year and thought it was great. Imagine my delight when I found out there was a movie coming out in July!

99% of the time when a book I enjoy gets a major studio movie treatment the result is garbage, though. So I imagine the opposite of delight.

When I first learned of the movie, I thought it would be a small/indi film that I'd have to dig up from my local library archives. Then I learned it was going to be a "blockbuster" and had mixed feelings - still pretty excited! I'm sure there will be about a dozen "that's not how it was in the book" moments but whatever, can't be worse than the last movie I saw at the theater (Dial of Destiny)

The Martian is an excellent movie based on one of the best scifi books. Gives me a lot of hope for the Project Hail Mary movie.

To my understanding the Martian was originally written as web serial, right?

I haven’t seen the movie. Not personally my type of film although I’ve heard good things.

I finished The Martian and then immediately discovered there was a movie coming out in two weeks. That was pretty cool.

No movie was ever going to do the book any justice. The journal-like structure of the book turned every chapter into an adventure, whereas the movie was just a space movie.

It was a very good space movie, though.

It doesn't replace the book, of course, but I thought it stood fine on its own.

There is also an opera about Oppenheimer called Doctor Atomic by John Adams that came out that year. (I have seen it mentioned surprisingly little.)

The finale to Act I has what is probably the most famous aria in the opera, "Batter My Heart": https://youtu.be/uYiokai3FW4

It's quite an experience to see this at the Santa Fe Opera, at sunset, outdoors, right down the road from Los Alamos.

American Prometheus is the first real book I read as a 5th grader doing a book report on a scientist. It inspired me to become a scientist myself.

Kind of off-topic but this movie was shot in 70mm IMAX (and similar) film, and some scenes are shot in the first-ever 65mm black and white film, and it has no CGI effects. It's only playing in 70mm IMAX in 30 theatres globally[1], most of them in the US. Normally IMAX feature releases only play for a few weeks, so if you are a film nerd at all it's worth checking if this version is playing near you.

IMAX was once supposed to deliver the best image quality possible. Nowadays, digital cameras are superior to 70 mm film in every possible way, especially color accuracy and dynamic range. It is really time to stop this pretentious analogue nonsense.

Film still looks better than digital. Quality of film is has many aspects, some of which are really more aesthetic aspects than purely technical. Watching a film from film really just has this feeling which digital can't reproduce.

As someone who has shot a lot of medium format film and digital, what I've gathered is it's the Wabi-sabi imperfections of film—the dream like quality that can be captured in camera—that people appreciate the most about it. People like it precisely because it is inaccurate. Both are just tools and have their appropriate uses.

70mm though has so much resolution, its probably better than a lot of digital sensors I’d expect.

Sensor size matters just as much as resolution, and this is because a small sensor with a higher resolution is going to collect less light than a large sensor with a lower resolution. This property applies to both film and digital where film grains and digital pixel sizes are analogous.

I hate this.

Have you seen a film shot and projected in 70mm IMAX on an IMAX GT screen?

Doesn’t matter.

Nolan’s vision specifically accounts for film. He’s been very vocal that the most accurate way to view the movie as he envisioned it is via 70mm IMAX.

“For Nolan, the “best possible experience” to view “Oppenheimer” in theaters is the IMAX 70mm film presentations.” [0]

I think I’ll watch it as the director intended it to be watched.

[0] https://apnews.com/article/oppenheimer-christopher-nolan-0f8...

As correct as this should be, I'm careful with Nolan's recommendations. If you view his movies as he intends you literally don't understand the dialogue.

I respect the man but it sucks that his vision is only available to a small % of the population. I’d have to fly to a different country to get access to an IMAX 70mm

Yeah, that's what I have to do unfortunately (of course doing/seeing other things to the trip too).

To be fair, in most cases only cinema enthusiasts really need to concern themselves with what the director's ideal presentation is. The overwhelming majority of people probably couldn't even recount to you which movies they've seen in which formats.

For someone (like yourself) who is aware of and interested in the differences in presentational formats, it does suck that formats like IMAX 1570 have very few locations around the world (heck, that's even true of IMAX GT). But it wouldn't be any better for you if those formats just didn't exist at all!

Perhaps one could argue that, because the IMAX GT exists, Christopher Nolan is making filmmaking decisions that compromise how the film will end up looking on more traditional (e.g. 2.39:1) presentational formats. Or in other words, one might argue "Oppenheimer would look better on 2.39:1 if Nolan had shot it specifically for 2.39:1." But I tend to think that Nolan probably realizes that the vast majority of people won't see it in IMAX, and I doubt the compromises are significant.

This is such a tired argument nowadays. Yes, at some point it is about the directors style and artistic vision. Yes, film _still_ has some technical advantages over digital for cine, especially if the director is shooting at a larger format size. Yes, good color graders can take footage from an ARRI and make it look like a certain film stock. No, it’s not that easy to do. Yes, you lose effective resolution taking a bayer filtered image and then converting it to monochrome with the appropriate spectral sensitivity. Yes, ARRIs have a lot of dynamic range now, but they need to leave much more headroom with digi to recover the highlights. Yes, grain is pleasing, and is an important part of the way the image is perceived (see: Arris various new looks in their new camera, that directly modify how the sensor is configured for different grain styles)

The main advantage of digital in cine is that you can shoot and reshoot without dealing with the cost and logistics of film. But it’s Nolan’s summer blockbuster in IMAX format, I think they’ll be alright.

Depending on who you ask, 70mm film is equivalent of 12-20k resolution which is kind of nice given that the screen are 25m wide. You may be right on the other specific points you mentioned but I am quite excited to see this version of the movie and compare it to a typical blockbuster.

Depending on who you ask, 70mm film is equivalent of 12-20k resolution which is kind of nice given that the screen are 25m wide. You may be right on the other points but for existing theatres it's still the best in some ways.

Who are you to say how someone else’s film should be viewed…?

I'd be curious to see a von Neumann portrayal. It seems he's not in the film even though he was a part of the Manhattan Project.

Are there any good biopics of him?

I'll always recommend a first tryst with "the making of the atomic bomb" by Richard Rhodes, he won the Pulitzer prize for it and it's my favourite book of all time. He explores the history and mind of every important person involved which includes Neumann, Szilard, Bohr and Oppenheimer.

I will second "the making of the atomic bomb". Definitely the best book on the topic. The audio book on audible is well done as well.

I'll third the recommendation for 'The Making of the Atomic Bomb,' one of the best books I've ever read. It is a long, challenging read, but it is thorough and rewarding in proportion. On the topic of Oppenheimer, I came away with a deep respect for him as a project manager.

"When Szilárd told the story later he never mentioned his destination that morning. He may have had none; he often walked to think. In any case another destination intervened. The stoplight changed to green. Szilárd stepped off the curb. As he crossed the street time cracked open before him and he saw a way to the future, death into the world and all our woe, the shape of things to come."

And I'll fourth the suggestion. Excellent book.

I "came here to say this", but then thought about it and was thinking what kind of a movie it would be. The synopsis of the movie would basically be "there's this guy who knows everything, creates a few fields of science and pretty much solves any problem coming at him", not sure if that would be interesting to large audiences (although super interesting to me for sure).

I'm a but bummered to hear he's not in the movie tho, so I'm gonna just go ahead and share an anecdote about him: apparently the first time he joined the Manhattan project and met with the team in a dinner party, he basically explained them that the charges around the uranium have to be arranged spherically in order to maximize the compression of the uranium. This was already known by the team, but only after experimenting with several different shapes!

So .. your anecdote is that Oppenheimer repeated the contents of the Frisch–Peierls memorandum as explained to him by the Australian physicist Mark Oliphant?

It was about von Neumann, but I have no idea, just something I read somewhere. As with all anecdotes about him, I take them as entertaining stories.

Another one: Von Neumann was supposed to give an address on the international mathematics congress in 1950 (I think) as the keynote speaker. He was expected to deliver similar speech as Hilbert did 50 years ago. Somehow he forgot and did not prepare much, and ended up talking about operator theory and his work in the 1930s. After the disappointed audience had listened to his address for a while, someone heckled him, he apologized and promptly left the stage.

Just watched the movie. Yep, he's not mentioned at all in the movie.

Interesting though I just learn that JvN also worked in Los Alamos. All I know about him was von Neumann architecture.

Not a biopic, but an engrossing book where von Neumann is the main character is Turing's Cathedral by George Dyson. [1]

[1] https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/44425/turings-cathe...

I've read this and that's probably what sparked my curiosity!

I heard recently (on Lex Fridman's podcast with Marc Andreessen) that Oppenheimer was called a "cry-baby scientist" by President Truman, and that his groveling campaign was considered by many to be self-aggrandizing, albeit in a self-deprecating way.

Apparently, his involvement was less significant than many others in the Manhattan Project, but his name became one of the most well-known due to his public outcries, and of course his iconic quote.

I haven't yet seen the movie and I'm looking forward to it; I wonder how much of this is portrayed.

Funny enough, I'm planning a double feature with Oppenheimer and the Barbie movie. Maintaining a healthy relationship involves tradeoffs.

> on Lex Fridman's podcast with Marc Andreessen

There's two to talk.

Alternatively, have you considered that the guy organized and ran the development of the atomic bomb and that those specific podcasters might not be particularly objective in their analysis?

He both ran Project Y and contributed to it in meaninful ways. And managing the project was not simple on a technical/engineering level nor as "big science" (as Project Y essentially invented the term).

> Apparently, his involvement was less significant than many others in the Manhattan Project

He was essentially the project manager, so I'm not sure how this is possible.

Are people simply suggesting that he wasn't the one who did most of the actual science? If so, that seems like missing the point.

General Leslie Groves thought very highly of Oppenheimer, and if you got the stamp of approval from Groves, you were doing something right.

Oppenheimer was dragged through the mud during the red scare and his name is still tarnished because of that. It is ironic and a little sad that he was awarded the Fermi medal once his name was finally cleared because Fermi worked for him during the Manhattan Project. It probably would have been the Oppenheimer Medal if it weren’t for Senator McCarthy.

Oppenheimer beat Heisenberg (also a pretty smart guy) to the bomb and not by a little either. And thank whatever higher power is out there he did.

Oppenheimer was a genius both in theoretical and practical physics work. It is a shame that he doesn’t have a better reputation today. And when it comes to his “campaign”, well, he had good reasons for his concerns. The second atomic bomb dropped on Japan was dropped without the president’s knowledge! He realized that we were not ready for that weapon and still aren’t to this day.

Rumor has it that to ensure realism without CGI, Nolan enriched his own Uranium and used it to detonate an actual fission bomb. Just like Stanley Kubrick faked the moon landings by actually shooting it on the moon for authenticity. /S

> J. Robert Oppenheimer might be the most important physicist to have ever lived

What about Maxwell inventing electromagnetic theory, whoever invented the transistor, and Francis Crick co-discovering the structure of DNA?

Well, I don’t know, but for me the top spot is taken by that certain guy who used to ride on the shoulders of giants. Top spot for physics and top spot for math.

Physicist and undercover crime fighter!

Edit: I'm still hoping someone does a live action version of The Baroque Cycle.

Wait, what? Newton was involved in crime fighting? Do tell, please.

"Newton conducted more than 100 cross-examinations of witnesses, informers, and suspects between June 1698 and Christmas 1699. He himself gathered much of the evidence he needed to successfully prosecute 28 coiners."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Later_life_of_Isaac_Newton

"Disguised as a habitué of bars and taverns, he gathered much of that evidence himself."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton

The Baroque Cycle has some memorable scenes with Newton!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Baroque_Cycle

With due respect, (a) I would classify this as marketing and self-promoting hyperbole, not worth contradicting, (b) absent any objective measure, the video creator's opinion is as valid as yours and (c) as far as opinions go, Oppenheimer = most important physicist isn't the worst one to have.

> I would classify this as marketing and self-promoting hyperbole

Or probably better, "clickbait". The author actually did a video about why he started using clickbait titles; basically, his goal is to make actually educational videos and have them seen, and clickbait titles means a lot more people see them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2xHZPH5Sng

> and Francis Crick co-discovering the structure of DNA

wouldn't that be Chemistry, not Physics?

https://xkcd.com/435/

My knowledge of Oppenheimer is purely from the book Robert Oppenheimer by Ray Monk, but his title might be "the most important manager to have ever lived". He himself didn't make any big, groundbreaking discoveries (though he was close). His greatest seems to be in understanding the discoveries and organizing the work around the manhattan project. Maybe that makes him the most important, but, as you said, it seems to discredit a lot of actual physicists who made actual discoveries.

It was a critical moment in time where it mattered greatly which country completed a certain physics centered project. Other physicists were greater in their accomplishments, but were any so timely in the necessity of their accomplishments (though his may have been mostly managerial, they needed to be done by a physicist).

> but were any so timely in the necessity of their accomplishments

The physicists of the UK MAUD committee and Tube Alloys who worked for several years to convince the US that a bomb was theoretically possible and economically feasible (just) and that the Germans and Japanese were taking the challenge seriously?

It took multiple approaches to convince the US nuclear scientists of the time.

With hindsight we can see it wasn't timely as no other nation was close or even could accomplish it.

It's worth checking out the old 1980s TV mini-series: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078037/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqQAMwWly94&list=PL7TuA9EPF1...

To learn more about Oppenheimer, I enjoyed the following book: "The Oppenheimer Alternative", by Robert J. Sawyer. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/49706374

The first part is a well-researched retelling of the years leading up to the Manhattan project and the building of the bomb, through the eyes of Oppenheimer and others. The rest is a science fiction extension of what could have happened if the group stayed together and are faced with another big challenge. I enjoyed the first part even more, as an entertaining way of learning more about Oppenheimer and the other scientists involved.

Critical Assembly: A Technical History of Los Alamos during the Oppenheimer Years, 1943-1945

Highly recommended for anyone with interest in Project Y and a less "dramatic" account of Oppenheimer's role. It is technical but not insanely so. Also includes brief info on the run up to Los Alamos.

If you are patient you can find a copy cheaper, many libraries will be able to borrow out of a college as well. I've heard the softcover is poorly printed fwiw.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/critical-assembly-lillian-h...

edited to add title of book in text and additional info

I'm excited for the movie but also worried Nolan's worst habits when it comes to forcing non linear narratives are going to be present. It always makes me wonder if he's confident enough in the story when he does gimmicks.

Perhaps he's pointing at or trying to reveal a recursive view of reality, rather than a linear view. I'm thinking along the lines of Godel, Escher, Bach and also I Am a Strange Loop, both by Douglas Hofstadter.

Dunkirk didn't have any gimmicks like that so far as I can remember

?? Dunkirk is imo the best one of his non-linear narratives, with 3 storylines intertwining: one taking place in the span of one week, one in one day and the last one (the plane) in one hour.

I stand corrected, strange I don't remember that. I don't think it hurt the storytelling at least.

It was Dunkirk I was most referencing in my original comment. I found it a very disappointing film. Here's this important human story that the movie refuses to tell clearly, making the whole thing hit less than the sum of it's parts. 1917 was much more effective in its stylistic choices in my opinion.

The only "gimmick" in Dunkirk was the way Nolan sanitized it to be PG-13. You see German shells hitting soldiers, but the explosions are rendered immaculately. It carries on the tradition of British war movies being suitable for family viewing because it's important for everyone to understand the sacrifices that were made. The same criticism can be leveled at Sam Mendes and 1917.

God I hope it doesn't end up like Tenet. Has to be one of the worst movies I've watched.

I just hope the dialogue is audible.

Is the sound in the theater is going to be unbearable like other Nolan movies?

Oppenheimer has had his own movie (and opera and TV series and a ton of books as others here have pointed out).

The earlier Hollywood treatment was "Fat Man and Little Boy" with Paul Newman. It's rentable on Amazon Prime. It's not a great movie despite the talented cast and good photography. I expect Nolan to make a better movie, but FM&LB does a decent job telling the story of the relationship of Groves and Oppenheimer and some of Oppie's back story.

There is already an epic tale of him: https://youtu.be/v1vXC-vKgKg

I half expected to see this instead: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqfdoPAxiVk

I expected this (contains offensive humor): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VgSyKl9vg0

I have been fascinated and intrigued by the figure of Oppenheimer ever since I saw him in the TV series Manhattan. It's one of my all-time favourite series, even though it's not very well known.

I recently read "Escape from Earth: A Secret History of the Space Rocket" about Jack Parsons and the birth of JPL — it surprised me how "hip" communism was among the U.S. educated elite in the 1940's.

Oppenheimer's very communist brother is mentioned frequently in the book. I was not surprised to see Robert also painted with communist suspicions — it seemed not to be unusual for "thinking people" of that time.

There was though a whiff of, "Hey guys, I know we all made it, but we're the thinkers of society so what kind of government can we embrace that will help elevate the average Joe-down-the-street? Communism seems like a logical idea!"

Remarkable how suddenly it seemed no one was a Communist beginning in the 1950's. Even the JPL folks scrubbed their own histories — diminished their involvement to "was it a communist party meeting? I was only there for the drinks."

Spoiler alert: the movie sheds some light on the issue you raise in your final paragraph.

Here's another: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism

A publicly-expressed faith in communism survived longer among intellectuals elsewhere, but the example of the Soviet Union eventually wore down all but the most committed.

Does it feature the "tickling the dragon's tail" incident ???. Now that was insane lab method - Marie Curie was at least oblivious about hers.

There were two such incidents. The first with Harry Daghlian stacking tungsten bricks around the "demon core" before dropping the final brick into place. The second with Louis Slotin and his infamous screwdriver.

The whole idea of getting as close as possible to criticality with neutron reflectors was the part that was "tickling the dragon's tail". Not necessarily just the screwdriver method, which was particularly insane.

The movie "Fat Man and Little Boy" dramatizes this with John Cusack playing a fictionalized version of Louis Slotin.

I'd like a sequel but based around Ernest Lawrence set on the same timeline.

The quote “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds” is reason enough!

They could have had Thanos say it as he wipes out half the universe and it’d still wouldn’t sound as cool.

Yet, it's not an original quote at any rate - it's a reference to Bhagavad Gita

If anything that makes its use more interesting:

> J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist and director of the Manhattan Project, learned Sanskrit in 1933 and read the Bhagavad Gita in the original form, citing it later as one of the most influential books to shape his philosophy of life.

His later description of the moment is:

> We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.

"Now we are all sons of bitches"

Video of Oppenheimer saying it with context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb13ynu3Iac

To me it's really his delivery that sells the quote. The video is so much better than just seeing the words written down

Except he didn't say it[1], or at least no-one who was there remembers him saying it, and it seems like it's something he added in a later revision of his own memory.

As John von Neumann later said, 'sometimes someone confesses a sin in order to take credit for it'. It's clearly what Oppenheimer wanted.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Robert_Oppenheimer#Trinity

But he does deserve credit for it. Not solely, but so what?

Here’s a video of Oppenheimer saying the famous quote https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lb13ynu3Iac

The video is of Oppenheimer saying, "I _remembered_ the line ...".

So he said it later.

On the day, he only thought about it.

He said in a later interview that he thought about the quote at the time (and, in so recalling, actually said the line in the interview). I don't think he ever claimed to have said it at the time. Though I wouldn't be surprised if the movie had him saying it for dramatic purposes.

> Except he didn't say it[1], or at least no-one who was there remembers him saying it, and it seems like it's something he added in a later revision of his own memory.

Oppenheimer did not say he "said it". He said he "remembered" the verse.

"I suppose we all felt that, one way or another"

Btw, the quote is from the Bhagavad Gita

Linkin Park’s A Thousand Suns is one of my favorite deadlifting albums. They used his quote well on the second track:

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=YzpPy-ngAZI&feature=share

In the context of the Bhagavad Gita the quote given by Oppenheimer is actually pretty accurate if you look up the relevant passage in Sanskrit and consider possible translations: Chapter 11, Verse 30-33 [0].

A quick summary of the context in the Bhagavad Gita:

Ajurna, an aristocratic (Pandava Prince) warrior highly skilled in archery - right before engaging in a battle of two armies (two groups of cousins: Kauravas and Pandavas) for the succession of the throne - upon seeing all his close kin arranged in two opposing parties all with their unique skills and feats ready to kill and be killed - the warrior prince falls into a deep emotional turmoil. He begins to talk to his charioteer Krishnu who reveals himself to be an avatar of the deity Vishnu.

This dialogue evolves into a whole contemplation in which a part of the upanishadic cosmic view gets revealed to Arjuna/the reader; somewhat akin in style to the secular western form of Plato's dialogue (in this case the Socratic method is led by "reason" or "logos" not a sophisticated mythology like an avatar of a specific deity).

The dharma in the specific case of Ajurna, is to fulfill his caste duty of Kshatriya [1].

Or from the lens of quantum mechanics and modern history the bomb in some way or another was inevitable.

Its fine-tuned parameters (1) put in the Big Bang, the idea (2) conceived by Szilard [2] and the Anglo-American military apparatus (3) rather than merely convinced in its superiority putting the actual resources/technology into the ultimate pragmatic use [3][4] (first mover & cost/risk-reward ratio).

[0]https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/11/verse/30

[1]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kshatriya

[2]https://www.newscientist.com/definition/invention-nuclear-bo...

[3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program...

[4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werner_Heisenberg#Membership_i...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5E0r-ssYI94

In a slightly different timeline there's a blockbuster film celebrating Höss, while Oppenheimer is the personification of evil for his holocaust of Japanese civilians.

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