Rent Oppenheimer (1980)

Brilliant 7-part 1980 BBC TV drama which is way superior to the 2023 movie & more accurate - Oppenheimer review by PV

I watched the recent Oscar-nominated Oppenheimer movie and yawned through much of it. Overlong, pompous, with CGI trickery galore. Good in parts BUT needs a big edit to slice away the flab and then some.

This 1980s TV series, made in 1980 back when the BBC actually made decent TV drama whose purpose was not preaching a woke pc agenda but TELLING A GOOD STORY WELL, is way superior to the movie. Made with US TV in Boston too, though thee days they'd demand more tickbox diversity casting no doubt and more women in main roles. yawn.

Sam Waterston is way more convincing as Oppie than Ciliam Murphy imho, even though I loved the latter in 28 DAYS LATER and PEAKY BLINDERS.

David Suchet plays an interesting complex Edward Teller so well too. Poirot, from early 1990s on, THE Poirot. See him on ITV3 most weekday afternoons, and of course playing lots of foreign terrorists in 1970s and 80s movies and TV drama, like THE PROFESSIONALS (1979).

This TV drama series made me research what happened to these characters in the 1960s and 70s too.

maybe a tad heavy on the legal courtroom scenes for me but that is a minor quibble, Music by Carl Davies (who also did the theme for THE WORLD AT WAR classic TV documentary series from the early 70s); good old-fashioned story-telling, no gimmicks, no dross, no flab or tickboxery.

Watch this. Not the very flawed 2023 movie which has been so overpraised (though not as much as popcorn dross Barbie, yet another movie nominated for Oscars to tick boxes)

4.5 stars rounded up.