Today Universal releases “Oppenheimer,” directed by Christopher Nolan. The IMAX biopic stars Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atom bomb.
Nolan’s film is based on the biography American Prometheus, by Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin. This review summarizes the book. Nolan’s film does not focus on the early career of this brilliant and eccentric academic. For that, we can rewatch “The Absent-Minded Professor” (1961). Cinema can remind us of the 1940s’ heroic battles as well as more cerebral endeavors to develop instruments for detection, navigation, and propulsion.
Oppenheimer’s life holds major questions about the use of power that continue to affect the world today. His team’s scientific advances warrant a much closer look.
Early Life and Career
Oppenheimer (1904-1967) was born in New York to secular Jewish parents. Despite an attack of colitis that delayed his study, Oppenheimer graduated from Harvard University in three years, having majored in chemistry while also studying physics.
After sojourning at Cambridge University, he studied under Max Born at the University of Göttingen, obtaining his doctorate in 1927 at age 23. Before graduating, he and Born published an oft-cited treatise (in German) that simplifies molecular modeling.
He eventually accepted a professorship at the University of California, Berkeley and the California Institute of Technology after further study in Switzerland. Before starting to teach, Oppenheimer was diagnosed with tuberculosis and recuperated with his younger brother, Frank, in New Mexico. He was beloved by students but resented by some colleagues.
Although primarily a theorist,
