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One of my big gripes with the film Oppenheimer was the blast itself, obviously a climactic moment in the film. It looked like someone set off a bunch of chemic
by api 4mo ago
One of my big gripes with the film Oppenheimer was the blast itself, obviously a climactic moment in the film.
It looked like someone set off a bunch of chemical explosives. That’s not how it looked in real life. Totally bizarre decision. I don’t know if they were trying to avoid effects on purpose of go gritty and retro or something but the “unearthly cosmic horror” feel of the first a-bomb blast is important. It’s what led Oppenheimer to recite “I am become death, destroyer of worlds.”
- rpastuszak 4mo agoI’m of a similar opinion, Lynch created a better depiction of it in twin peaks season 3.
- nateburke 4mo agoPenderecki did most of the heavy lifting there
- rpastuszak 4mo agoHa, my almost neighbour from Kraków (from the times I still lived there)!
- dralley 4mo agoBecause that's exactly what it was. I agree with you, the puritanism around special effects doesn't make sense when there's plenty of high quality archival footage out there, and instead of using that or CGI to look similar, you do something that looks completely wrong.
- chasd00 4mo agoI felt the same, my thinking at the time was they didn’t want the bomb to steal the show. The movie was about the man not the machine. /hah very articulate of me for this early in the morning
- Cthulhu_ 4mo agoI suppose that's true, but it's still positioned as the focal point or climax of the film I think. But Nolan intentionally hamstrung himself by eschewing CGI in favor of practical effects. I mean in theory you could do a practical effect of a nuke but that requires detonating a nuke; the west hasn't done that since 1992, the last nuclear detonation was done by North Korea in 2017.
- tencentshill 4mo agoDont worry, the US will be doing it soon too https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2026/05/21/why_president_trump_ordered_the_resumption_of_us_nuclear_testing_1183976.html https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2026/05/21/why_pre...
- small_model 4mo agoWith the films budget they could have sourced a small nuclear bomb the size of the original Trinity test and detonated it just for the movie. Just make sure the camera is rolling as it's a one take shot.
- vjvjvjvjghv 4mo agoIt’s pretty morbid but I think I would go watch if there ever was a public nuclear above surface test again. I hope it will never happen.
- thrownthatway 4mo agoI would too, and I think it should happen. I’m in Australia, so it’s only a (relatively) short drive to Woomera. We should make sure our (the West’s) nuclear deterrent still actually works, and put the fear of God back in to everyone. And also demonstrate how relatively benign the fallout from a thermonuclear weapon is, ie. relatively little radioactive material is generated from modern nuke. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_nuclear_tests_at_Maralinga https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_nuclear_tests_at_Maral...
- dylan604 4mo agoThis is something that happened[0]. Not sure about that site, but a search returned a bunch of similar sites with no domains I was familiar. [0] https://www.storyhunt.io/en/articles/the-atomic-parties https://www.storyhunt.io/en/articles/the-atomic-parties
- mjamesaustin 4mo agoI don't think I've ever read a story that encapsulates the vibe of Fallout more than this one. Thanks for sharing!
- ceejayoz 4mo agoYeah, Nolan's well known for practical effects - to the extent of actually driving a 747 into a warehouse! - but this is one spot where that approach failed hard.
- butlike 4mo agoI'm never watching this movie again. The dead silence to 100dB boom was unreasonable, dangerous, and amateurish filmmaking. And not the least of which Atomic bombs aren't that loud.
- x______________ 4mo agoThanks for the spoiler (it's rare coming across a good one in public... lottery vibes)