One’s enjoyment of a movie can be proportionate to one’s expectations.

I was eagerly anticipating “Oppenheimer” for several reasons.

The film is based on the book, “American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer” (2005), by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, who received the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Biography-Autobiography.

“Oppenheimer” is directed by the critically- and commercially-acclaimed film-maker Christopher Nolan (Five-time Oscar nominee: picture, director, “Dunkirk,” 2018; picture, original screenplay, “Inception,” 2011; original screenplay, “Memento,” 2002; also, Director: “Tenet,” 2020; “Interstellar,” 2014; “The Dark Knight Rises,” 2012; “The Dark Knight,” 2008; “Batman Begins,” 2005; “Insomnia,” 2002). Nolan wrote the screenplay for “Oppenheimer.”

“Duck and Cover” drills of the Cold War were part of my Baby Boomer generation. At Fullerton Elementary School (1955-1957), Whitehall-Coplay School District, and Lanark Elementary School (1958-1962), Southern Lehigh School District, students practiced hiding under classroom desks. It was supposed to protect us in the event of a nuclear attack from the Soviet Union.

Also, I recall seeing cardboard boxes of United States government-issued Civil Defense rations, medical supplies and other items stacked in the basement of Southern Lehigh High School as of my senior year (1968).

The Bomb was an ever-present mythical and sometimes actual dark cloud over the heads of Baby Boomers (those born in the U.S. from 1946-1964), not unlike the dark rain cloud hovering over Joe Btfsplk, a character in Al Capp’s comic strip, “Li’l Abner” (1934-1977).

The World War II era has always fascinated me, no more so when an interview with Drew Barrymore for the movie, ”Ever After: A Cinderella Story” (1998), at The Greenbrier resort, White Sulphur Springs, W. Va., afforded me the opportunity for my mother and me to tour the Greenbrier Bunker, a secret facility (decommissioned in 1992) built to house a U.S. government in exile, including meeting halls for the House of Representatives and Senate, in case of a nuclear attack.

“Oppenheimer” is not, pardon the pun, a bomb. It’s an extraordinary film, has exceeded box-office expectations, and should receive a passel of Oscar nominations.

However, for this movie-goer, “Oppenheimer” is disappointing, long-winded and an abomination for its errors, omissions and misrepresentations of historical figures.

Julius Robert Oppenheimer (1904 - 1967), known as the “father of the atomic bomb,” was an American theoretical physicist who directed the Manhattan Project’s Los Alamos National Laboratory during World War II. The Manhattan Project, begun June 18, 1942, employed 130,000 workers and cost $2.2 billion. The “gadget,” as the atomic bomb was dubbed, was tested July 16, 1945, in the New Mexico desert.

The U.S. wasted no time in dropping its first atomic bomb Aug. 6., 1945, from the “Enola Gay,” a B-29 bomber, over Hiroshima, Japan, leveling five square miles of the city. A second atomic bomb was dropped Aug. 9, 1945, on Nagasaki, Japan. An estimated 220,000, mostly civilians, were killed. Japan surrendered Aug. 15, 1945. Germany had surrendered May 7, 1945.

“Oppenheimer” makes scant mention of the effect of the atomic bomb other than some symbolic shots of a charred body and facial flesh being burned off.

“Oppenheimer” makes no mention, from what I could glean, of the downwind effect of radioactivity from the Los Alamos atomic-bomb testing. The documentary film, “Downwind” (2023), purports to chronicle the effects of nuclear weapons testing in Nevada from 1951-1992.

In the “Oppenheimer” screenplay, Nolan, noted for his nonlinear film-making, toggles back and forth between the recruiting of Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy) for the Manhattan Project; the Trinity test at Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico; the marriage of Oppenheimer to Katherine Puening (Emily Blunt); Oppenheimer’s relationship with Jean Tatlock (Florence Pugh); a closed-door 1954 hearing held by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission that led to Oppenheimer losing his National Security Clearance, and a Congressional Subcommittee Hearing in 1959 to consider the appointment of Lewis Strauss (Robert Downey Jr.) of the Atomic Energy Commission as Secretary of Commerce in the cabinet of President Dwight Eisenhower. Each of these storylines is shown in a non-chronological, disorganized, impressionistic, fevered pitch or perfunctory way.

Cillian Murphy is superb as J. Robert Oppenheimer. You can see worlds of wonder in his beautiful blue eyes. His gaunt face, gentle manner and thoughtful performance grounds the movie. Look for an Oscar actor nomination for Cillian Murphy.

Robert Downey Jr. is remarkable as Lewis Strauss. There are no vestiges of Iron Man here. Look for an Oscar supporting actor nomination for Robert Downey Jr.

In Nolan’s clumsy and self-indulgent screenplay, I never forgot that I was watching a movie. Oh, I thought, there’s Matt Damon (Army General Leslie Groves, who oversaw the Manhattan Project), Tom Conti (Albert Einstein), Benny Safdie (Edward Teller), Casey Affleck (Col. Boris Pash), Rami Malek (David L. Hill), Kenneth Branagh (Niels Bohr), Gary Oldman (Harry S Truman) and Allentown native Dane DeHaan (Maj. Gen. Kenneth Nichols).

Moreover, Nolan goes eavesdropping rogue to depict lovemaking scenes between J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy) and Jean Tatlock (Florence Pugh) as he shockingly inserts them making love during an Oppenheimer closed-door interrogation scene as Katherine “Kitty” Puening (Emily Blunt) sits nearby. I didn’t need to see that. The world didn’t need to see that. I felt embarrassed for the actors. The scene took me right out of the movie.

The frenetic soundtrack by Ludwig Göransson (Oscar, original score, “Black Panther,” 2019) doesn’t help matters. It’s intrusive at all the wrong moments and seems to be having a fine time of its own, using up all the notes, instruments and effects known to musicians.

“Oppenheimer” opens with this statement: “Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. For this he was chained to a rock and tortured for eternity.”

At another point in the movie, Oppenheimer quotes Vishnu, from the Hindu scripture, the “Bhagavad Gita”: “I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.”

“Oppenheimer” never reaches those lofty observations. “Oppenheimer” is almost as out of control as some scientists feared the first atomic bomb test at Los Alamos might be in igniting the earth’s atmosphere.

More successful movies in similar genres for this movie-goer are “A Beautiful Mind” (2001), director Ron Howard’s Oscar-winning movie (picture, director, adapted screenplay) starring Russell Crowe as mathematician John Nash, and “The Imitation Game” (2014), director Morten Tyldum’s Oscar-winning movie (adapted screenplay) starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing who headed Great Britain’s World War II Nazi Enigma code-breaking project.

Strangely, as I watched “Oppenheimer,” I kept thinking about director Wes Anderson’s “Asteroid City” (2023), with its atom-bomb test plume rising just over the horizon, and “Barbie” (2023), which radiates radioactive pink.

Director Christopher Nolan has gone nuclear with “Oppenheimer” with a film that seems to implode upon itself, possibly intentionally so.

Ultimately, I found “Oppenheimer” frustratingly obtuse, obfuscating and obscurant.

The legacy of J. Robert Oppenheimer remains. The War in Ukraine has brought threats from Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to use tactical nuclear weapons.

Duck and Cover.

“Oppenheimer,”

MPAA rated R (Restricted: Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.) for some sexuality, nudity and language; Genre: Biography, Drama, History; Run Time: 3 hours. Distributed by Universal Pictures.

Credit Readers Anonymous:

“Oppenheimer” filming locations included Los Alamos and Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Zurich, Switzerland.

At The Movies:

“Oppenheimer” was seen at the IMAX at AMC, AMC Center Valley 16. I was very disappointed in my movie-going experience. First, the dialogue was difficult to understand, possibly because the music was mixed too loudly or because of the sound problems in quality or volume in the IMAX theater. After I saw the film, I read that director Christopher Nolan doesn’t use Additional Dialogue Recordings (ADR), whereby an actor re-records dialogue in a recording studio for scenes already filmed. Second, there’s no cinematic reason to see “Oppenheimer” in IMAX. “Oppenheimer” is said to have been filmed in IMAX 65 mm and 65 mm large-format film, including sections in IMAX black-and-white film photography. Why I needed to see black and white scenes in IMAX is beyond me. And the color, swirling depictions of atomic bomb explosions and particles looked more like stock footage than anything particularly spectacular.

Theatrical Movie Domestic Box Office,

Aug. 11-13: “Barbie” continues as the box-office queen at No. 1, four weeks in a row, with $33.7 million in 4,178 theaters, $526.3 million, four weeks.

The most recent film that was four weeks in a row at No. 1 is “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” which grossed $574 million domestically as 2023’s top-grossing movie, which ”Barbie” is expected to surpass.

Meanwhile, “Oppenheimer” moved back up one place to No. 2, with $18 million in 3,761 theaters, $264.2 million, four weeks.

3. “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem” moved up one place, $15.7 million in 3,950 theaters, $72.7 million, two weeks. 4. “Meg 2: The Trench” dropped two places, $12.7 million in 3,604 theaters, $54.1 million, two weeks. 5. “The Last Voyage of the Demeter,” $6.5 million in 2,715 theaters, opening. 6. “Haunted Mansion” dropped one place, $5.6 million in 2,860 theaters, $52.8 million, three weeks. 7. “Talk to Me” moved up one place, $5.1 million in 2,379 theaters, $31.3 million, three weeks. 8. “Sound of Freedom” dropped two places, $4.8 million in 2,803 theaters, $172.8 million, six weeks. 9. “Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One” dropped two places, $4.6 million in 2,135 theaters, $159.5 million, five weeks. 10. “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” dropped one place, $899,000 in 790 theaters, $172.6 million, seven weeks.

Movie box office information from Box Office Mojo as of Aug. 13 is subject to change.

Unreel,

Aug. 18:

“Blue Beetle,”

PG-13: Angel Manuel Soto directs Xolo Mariduena, Bruna Marquezine, Susan Sarandon, Harvey Guillen, Gabrielle Ortiz and George Lopez in the Action, Adventure, Science-Fiction film. An alien relic bestows a suit of amour and its powers on a teen-ager.

“Strays,”

Rated R: Josh Greenbaum directs the voice talents of Will Ferrell, Dennis Quaid, Jamie Fox, Isla Fisher, Will Forte and Sofia Vergara in the Adventure Comedy Live-Action Animation film. An abandoned dog teams up with strays to exact revenge on his former owners.

Movie opening dates on Internet Movie Database as of Aug. 10 are subject to change.

Three Popcorn Boxes out of Five Popcorn Boxes