Oppenheimer reared its head again in the news. And so my little comment this AM grew into a bigger one.
Thank you, Spike. Absolutely. I’m weary of hearing “Well it’s just a film. You wanted it to be different film.” Yes I did. I think there is a responsibility that comes with such a film. Analogies to other issues people care about but would appalled by the omission of–here the demotion of the mass killing event to basically a subplot in the life and loves and angst of a great man–these analogies are easily made if you think about it for about 5 seconds. People would be up in arms. Here, it’s just the Japanese people, who “deserved” it. Then let’s get back to the news cycle where we decry Putin for killing another 50 civilians..
Films now tend to be increasingly about themselves, about their own success at being art, and the audience esteems them according to the terms they set, and that their marketing decrees. I find that a sorry thing. And cynical. Films can be about our actual life, our history, our lived experience. What happened in Japan for instance.
Oppenheimer is not interested in that possibility. It wants to tell the story of American ingenuity in the face of EVIL. Its careerist- egoistic main plot is straight out of Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead (Oppenheimer = Howard Roark). Even down to the painful rejoinder to Robert Downey’s character when he is defeated. This is Rand’s same rejoinder to Roark’s nemesis, Ellsworth Toohey (sp?), the parasitic critic dying to know what Roark thinks of him. “I don’t think of you..” Snap!
Did the film truly embrace the reality of Hiroshima/Nagasaki? Or did it simply necessitate a 3 minute scene where Oppenheimer stammers in front of people and gets some PTSD. That’s the bone thrown to reality.
Films can open out and be large and relevant. Clearly they are having a harder time doing that, in a viable way. The only reality Oppenheimer bears witness to is this preening self-regard; no doubt part of the story, but not THE story. “I am become Death” isn’t a harrowing misgiving, it’s a sexy tag line. Perspective might require you to pick up the Bhagavad Gita, and who has time for that.. Oppenheimer is about today’s self-preoccupation, not yesterday’s big mistake.
There is a bigger reality to witness if you just lift your head and look; it’s there for a while anyway.