'Oppenheimer' review: Christopher Nolan's epic is a crafty blast of nuclear doomsday dread

If you thought “Oppenheimer” was just going to be about the origins of the atomic bomb, Christopher Nolan is here to blow up all your expectations.

The writer/director’s ambitious and exquisitely crafted biopic (★★★½ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday) packs a whole lot of movie into three hours, with a dense narrative and an outstanding cast. Cillian Murphy turns in a haunting career-best performance as theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, and Robert Downey Jr. astounds in a way we haven’t seen in quite some time in an epic that turns a harrowing era of American history into equal parts terrifying horror show, paranoia thriller and political potboiler.

Yes, a bomb goes off – a chilling albeit awesome watch in the hands of a master like Nolan – yet it only leads to more storytelling fireworks. Nolan unfurled a plot that coalesced over multiple story lines in 2017's “Dunkirk” and he does so again with “Oppenheimer," told through a pair of tales beginning in the 1950s.

Facing obstacles to renew his government security clearance, Oppenheimer narrates his own life story in full color, from coming up in the science ranks in Europe to his high-profile work with the Manhattan Project developing an A-bomb before the Nazis and the Russians can. In contrast, the black-and-white second plot line centers on Senate hearings to confirm Lewis Strauss (Downey) as Secretary of Commerce, and the fallout from the former Atomic Energy Commission chairman’s rivalry with Oppenheimer.

It’s a slow burn at first, as Oppenheimer becomes a force in quantum mechanics but makes enemies thanks to his bristling personality and close ties to Communist Party members, including his ex, psychiatrist Jean Tatlock (Florence Pugh), and his brother Frank (Dylan Arnold). But entering World War II, those issues are brushed aside, and Leslie Groves (Matt Damon), a hard-charging brigadier general heading up the Manhattan Project, recruits Oppenheimer to be its director.

'Oppenheimer': Christopher Nolan made historical drama because he thought he'd die in a nuclear Armageddon

“Oppy,” as his friends and colleagues call him, has a secret lab and town built in New Mexico and, alongside fellow scientists, races to build a bomb. But he becomes increasingly worried about the destructive power that he’s putting in mankind’s hands. Murphy’s character utters the famous quote “Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds,” and Nolan does a grand job of putting that on screen.

The amazing ticking-clock leadup to the 1945 Trinity test, the first detonation of a nuclear weapon, melds Hoyte van Hoytema’s stunning cinematography and Ludwig Göransson’s powerful orchestral score, and the blast itself is a sense-rattling moment. But the aftermath is where Nolan digs into Oppenheimer’s moral quandaries and realization that the world has changed forever. After the fateful bombs are dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the scientist addresses cheering Americans, yet also imagines in gruesome fashion what he’s wrought.

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Murphy wonderfully inhabits the nervy intensity of a gaunt and troubled figure, who's deemed unstable and egoistical by his peers during the war and at wit’s end later, as he contends with politicos with a score to settle. And Emily Blunt brings an honest and volatile energy to Kitty Oppenheimer, a loyal champion for her husband. Nolan’s all-star ensemble (including Rami Malek, Alden Ehrenreich, Benny Safdie and many more) is top notch, though there are so many personalities that it’s hard for them all to pop, even with the extended runtime. Not so for Downey, who brings his significant charm to portray a magnetic antagonist for a change.

Stylistically, “Oppenheimer” recalls Oliver Stone's "JFK" in the way it weaves together important history and significant side players, and while it doesn't hit the same emotional notes as Nolan's inspired "Interstellar," the film succeeds as both character study and searing cautionary tale about taking science too far. Characters from yesteryear worry about nervously pushing a fateful button and setting the world on fire, although Nolan drives home the point that fiery existential threat could reignite any time now.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Oppenheimer' review: Cillian Murphy is searingly good in history epic