Would a "common denominator" person really watch that movie and afterwards be confused about anything that happened? What aspect would they remotely be confused about? What aspect would be "deep" to them?
From what I saw, it was nothing but the most basic character drama combined with some "suspenseful" races against time thrown in here and there. For the second half it turns into just one of those movies where the political/social message is effectively just beaten into your face, there's no subtlety at all.
They took no risk that the viewer wouldn't get their message, they make it plainly obvious. In my mind it's a perfect example of "the new literalism". It's almost up there with stuff like Don't Look Up, Snowpiercer, The Big Short, Parasite, etc. These movies mostly solely exist as a conduit through which a political/social message can be force fed to you, in the form of a movie, rather than existing as an actual movie.
i CERTAINLY agree that theres tons of new literalism in Oppenheimer. i was mentioning that Oppenheimer is not catering to the lowest common denominator in order to get an Oscar. Oscars trade on belabored basic character drama and many of the things you listed. mostly depends on directors who the academy think are "deserving" at the moment
Oppy did incredibly well because of it's memed Barbenheimer marketing wave. i dont think the 3 hour great man movie was lowest common denominator movie. sure, you and i might think it was basic and laughed when Einstein showed up, but my bar for lowest common denominator is a Happy Madison production
Would a "common denominator" person really watch that movie and afterwards be confused about anything that happened? What aspect would they remotely be confused about? What aspect would be "deep" to them?
From what I saw, it was nothing but the most basic character drama combined with some "suspenseful" races against time thrown in here and there. For the second half it turns into just one of those movies where the political/social message is effectively just beaten into your face, there's no subtlety at all.
They took no risk that the viewer wouldn't get their message, they make it plainly obvious. In my mind it's a perfect example of "the new literalism". It's almost up there with stuff like Don't Look Up, Snowpiercer, The Big Short, Parasite, etc. These movies mostly solely exist as a conduit through which a political/social message can be force fed to you, in the form of a movie, rather than existing as an actual movie.