Cillian Murphy burns bright in Christopher Nolan’s opus Oppenheimer

Christopher Nolan has been touted as the heir to Stanley Kubrick ever since Inception wowed audiences in 2010, and with his latest film Oppenheimer, he may well have succeeded him.

Oppenheimer is the film Christopher Nolan has always threatened to make; equal parts intimate portrait of a defining historical figure and equal parts metaphysical examination of the human spirit.

Nolan has said his great unmade project is a biopic about Howard Hughes, with Jim Carrey playing the reclusive tycoon, but Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio beat them to the punch with The Aviator.

With Oppenheimer, Nolan has finally chased that demon out of him and has made the masterpiece of his career.

The film is a total technical marvel, from the impeccable costume design, art direction, sweeping landscapes, and Ludwig Göransson’s propulsive score all adding up to create a film that demands to be seen on the biggest screen you can find.

Universal screened the film for critics in 70MM at the Irish Film Institute, and the attention to detail crammed into every single frame is extraordinary.

Oppenheimer is a film that will reward multiple viewings, and while the IMAX experience will be what most Nolan fans will plump for, seeking out a 70MM screening of the film comes highly recommended.

Dunkirk is a film that could have been made by David Lean, and Oppenheimer feels like Nolan’s stab at making Lawrence Of Arabia – by pretty much every metric, he has succeeded with flying colours.

Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema is worth singling out for praise, with his work an integral part of the film’s success.

Van Hoytema most recently served as cinematographer on last year’s Nope, and the lensman has a prodigious sense of making the big, sweeping, and bombastic shots feel like a David Lean film and on the other end of the scale, create the tension of a Lumet chamber drama.

Of course, the film is no slouch in front of the camera, either.

Corkman Cillian Murphy gives the performance of a lifetime as J. Robert Oppenheimer, known as “the father of the atomic bomb,” and it would be nothing short of a travesty if he doesn’t walk away with the Oscar next year.

Murphy has always been an incredible actor, and his performance here represents his finest hour.

Murphy is either present or looms large over every scene over the three-hour run time, and it is a testament to his acting ability that you are left hanging on his every word.

Known for his incredible cheekbones and soulful eyes, Murphy’s turn as the renowned theoretical physicist feels like the role he was born to play.

In playing Oppenheimer, the audience has to believe that this is a person who is at war with themselves and the institutions surrounding them.

The Peaky Blinders star makes it look effortless.

The Corkman is surrounded by an arsenal of A-tier actors with Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Matt Damon, Kenneth Branagh, Rami Malek, and an unrecognisable Gary Oldman helping round out the cast.

The film is a showreel for every actor involved, with most of the cast turning in career-best work, but the true revelation is Robert Downey Jr.

Downey Jr’s generation-defining role as Tony Stark has left people wondering what will the star do next, and his response is to turn in one of the best performances of his storied career.

Nolan fans will be pleased to hear the film still plays around with a non-linear story structure, which means a lot of cutting across various periods of the Oppenheimer story, and each time Downey Jr shows up, in what is essentially the villain role, your ears perk up.

His motormouth, smooth, smarmy style fits right into the world of Oppenheimer, and his sparring partner Alden Ehrenreich also deserves praise for being able to volley the ball back to Downey Jr with ease.

Viewers walk away from Oppenheimer with a complete portrait of what made Oppenheimer the man tick, and the moral grey areas that haunted him.

The film goes into detail about the ethics of using nuclear weapons in times of war and the political climate of wartime America, and at times the film is more akin to an international relations college paper than your traditional summer blockbuster.

A dash of surrealism is sprinkled in for good measure, with one haunting sequence sure to evoke memories of the classic BBC nuclear war drama Threads.

That is the genius of Nolan; he walks a very fine line between popcorn blockbuster fare and heady, intellectual debates, and merges the two in a way that would make Kubrick proud.

A common refrain among film fans in the modern era is there is scant originality in the studio system, the superhero landscape is all-encompassing, and truly great films are not given the chance to find their audience.

Films like Tár, Babylon, and Oppenheimer demonstrate that bold, creative risks are still being taken at a studio level, and the spirit of auteur filmmaking that audiences were blessed with 50 years ago is still very much with us.

With Oppenheimer, Nolan has not only made the film of the year; he has made the greatest film of an already-glittering career.