I think I'm going to have to see it again in the theater to know, definitively, how I feel.
While my initial impression is that it's no doubt a masterpiece - at times it felt truly iconic, like an instant Oscar classic - yeah, I doubt I'll rewatch it in full again on cable or wherever, unlike a number of Nolan's other films. There are sequences I'll revisit a ton, but man this thing is packed with way more political back-and-forth than I was expecting, especially the last 45 minutes or so. I definitely got the overall gist, I just need to see it again to really track and appreciate those parts of the movie.
Overall, though, Murphy should have Best Actor sewn up - that was a performance for the ages - and I loved the rest of the (incredible) cast so much as well. The cinematography and score were of course top notch too, but there was one, massive distraction that also makes a second viewing a necessity...
The past few days I've seen so many mentions on Twitter, of 70mm screenings having issues, and thought surely none of that will happen at ours, considering we're seeing it at one of the most popular theaters on the planet, the Chinese Theater IMAX, one that Nolan himself personally helped calibrate for this movie. But sure enough, right after Oppenheimer's big victory speech, when he starts to lose it in front of the crowd in the bleachers, the sound went completely out. Only, there was a good 30 seconds where we thought it was a purposeful choice by Nolan, as Oppenheimer exits the building, sees the couple crying, the guy throwing up, etc. That moment played so incredibly well in utter science - like, it was legitimately poignant - but then when it cuts to the White House, Oppenheimer is led into the Oval Office, and Truman starts speaking - and there was still no sound - the audience started to fidget (even though the silence still kind of sort of worked at first). Another 20 seconds passed and people started yelling for them to stop the projector, turn it off, etc, but it kept playing with no sound.
Finally - and this was pretty hilarious - one part of the theater started doing exactly what the audience in the bleachers had just been doing on screen - stomping their feet and clapping - and pretty soon the entire theater joined in - all 900 or so people stomping, clapping, and laughing - and the theater finally turned off the movie. It took another five minutes or so before they had it fixed, and when it came back it was the laser IMAX projector, not the full-frame, 1.43:1, 70mm one. For whatever reason, they also had to restart it from the scene where Truman's announcing the bomb over the radio, so we saw that scene twice, along with Oppenheimer's speech twice. Turns out, the sound blew out from the 70mm projector when there's that loud explosion noise during the speech, and Oppenheimer is freaking out, but it's crazy how it was almost *more* effective after that moment, when there was no sound, and we didn't realize it wasn't intentional.
A friend we were with used to work with to Nolan a ton at Warner Bros, and before the movie they said Nolan doesn't live too far away from the theater, will actually drop in on certain showings of his movies opening weekend at the Chinese, and just stand at the back, so I kept wondering if he might have there when the sound went out. Who knows, but it was funny to imagine, and definitely a memorable movie/experience regardless.
