Christopher Nolan says some people left ‘Oppenheimer’ screening “absolutely devastated”

Christopher Nolan’s newest feature film, Oppenheimer, a biopic about the “father of the atomic bomb” J. Robert Oppenheimer, will hit cinemas worldwide on Friday, July 21st. The film features Cillian Murphy as the titular role, alongside a star-studded cast including Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Robert Downey Jr and Florence Pugh.

Ahead of the movie’s release, director Nolan has shared how early audiences have reacted to the thriller, noting that some left the movie “absolutely devastated”.

During an interview with Wired, Nolan said: “They can’t speak. I mean, there’s an element of fear that’s there in the history and there in the underpinnings. But the love of the characters, the love of the relationships, is as strong as I’ve ever done.”

Nolan explains: “It is an intense experience because it’s an intense story. I showed it to a filmmaker recently who said it’s kind of a horror movie. I don’t disagree”. Nolan shot the film with IMAX film cameras, with sections in IMAX black and white.

He continues: “As I started to finish the film, I started to feel this colour that’s not in my other films, just darkness. It’s there. The film fights against that.”

Oppenheimer is the sixth project Nolan and Murphy have worked together on. It also overtakes the Matthew McConaughey-led 2014 space epic Interstellar as Nolan’s longest runtime for a film.

Oppenheimer is out on Friday, July 21st. Watch the trailer below.

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