The creation of the atomic bomb is one of the most divisive scientific advancements in history, and with it, comes the question – just because can, does that mean you should?

Changing the face of war, and potentially the fate of the world, forever, Oppenheimer details the story of the man who led the team behind it all, and his own moral panic as his invention was brought to life.

Here’s how Christopher Nolan and the team brought this moment in history back to life, creating a billion-dollar movie that became the most celebrated film of 2023.

The story of Oppenheimer begins with a book – the Pulitzer-prize winning ‘American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer’, written by historian Martin J Sherwin and biographer Kai Bird.

Acquiring the rights to the book, director Chrisopher Nolan penned the script himself. Nolan has built a career on the stories of hesitant and morally-torn protagonists, with his past works including the Batman Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, Interstellar, and Dunkirk.

Oppenheimer was his most ambitious movie to date, focusing on the ethical tear of one man who was given a task that would forever change the world – the “father” of the atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer.

At the forefront of America’s The Manhattan Project, physicist Oppenheimer created a team of genius minds that would create the bomb at the Los Alamos Laboratory.

In the official production notes, Nolan stated he hoped to ‘take the audience into the mind and the experience of a person who sat at the absolute centre of the largest shift in history.’

He said: “Like it or not, J. Robert Oppenheimer is the most important person who ever lived. He made the world we live in, for better or for worse. And his story must be seen to be believed.”

The fusion bomb they intended to design was made to have enough power to wipe out cities and miles at a time. Its creation triggered a worldwide arms race that still exists to this day, with those in possession of such weapons potentially able to destroy countries or even the world at the push of a button.

In actual fact, when the first ‘Trinity Test’ bomb was detonated in 1945, there was a small chance it could have set the world’s atmosphere alight and destroyed the world in an instant.

He said: “There was no mathematical or theoretical basis on which they could completely rule out that possibility, however small. And yet, they pushed that button, anyway. It’s an extraordinary moment in human history. I wanted to take the audience into that room and be there for that conversation, and then be there when that button is pushed. It’s just the most incredible moment, if you think about it. The risk of it.”

Nolan wrote the screenplay over the summer 2021, and was picked up by Universal Pictures, in their first working partnership with the filmmaker.

In order to bring the Oppenheimer cast to life, Nolan first focused on his leading man – Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer.

By that point, Murphy had become a long-standing collaborator with Nolan, having appeared in five of his films. The three films that made the Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, and Dunkirk.

However, this would be his first leading role.

Nolan said of the decision: “I’ve been very fortunate to work with some remarkable actors early in their careers, and Cillian is one of them. The first time I worked with him, he was very new to things, but it was clear he had extraordinary talent, and we connected personally, professionally, and creatively.

“So, I’m always looking for ways to work with Cillian. It was wonderful to be able to pick up the phone and say, ‘This is it; this is the one, this is the time for you to be the lead, you get to take on a character that’s going to use every aspect of your talent and challenge you in ways you’ve never been challenged before. And he was up for that. It was really a dream come true for both of us.”

Murphy said his decision to take on the part was a no-brainer. He said: “My feeling ever since [The Dark Knight trilogy] has been, if Christopher Nolan asks you to do something, no matter what the size of the part, you just turn up.

“I was not expecting him to call and ask me to play Oppenheimer. But he did. When I got off the phone, I just sat there rather stunned. I felt very lucky. And then we got to work.”

Joining Murphy on the cast was Emily Blunt, who played Oppenheimer’s no-nonsense wife, Kitty. Blunt describes Kitty as “complicated, volatile and bewitching”. A three-time divorceé in an era that looked down on it, Kitty was an accomplished scientist in her own right.

She said: “What I really was drawn to with her is that idea of a woman who refused to conform to the sort of feminine ideal of the time, why you need to get married and have children and support your man and that’s your job and that’s all you’re allowed. She just had this defiance against the system that felt so modern.”

Matt Damon, who played United States Army Corps of Engineers officer Leslie Groves Jr in the film, came out of a self-imposed hiatus for the role, solely on the agreement with his wife that he would only accept a job if it came from Nolan.

Robert Downey Jr, fresh from his tenure as Tony Stark/Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, was approached by Nolan to play Lewis Strauss, a founding commissioner of the 1947 Atomic Energy Commission who somewhat became the intellectual rival to Oppenheimer due to their conflicting ethics and moral standpoints.

The role offered Downey Jr. the opportunity to hone his acting skills in a different way, diversifying his work into more ‘serious’ content away from the blockbuster hits he became known for. With his own complex feelings on the creation of the bomb, and his distrust of Oppenheimer due to the physicist’s previous ties to the communist party, proved to be the perfect vehicle.

Finally, completing the core characters was the mysterious and troubled Jean Tatlock, Oppenheimer’s mistress whose death remains a source of debate to this day.

Pugh stated it was the combination of Nolan and Murphy that prompted her to agree to the project.

She said: “Cillian Murphy is an actor that I have been watching for quite some time and have been desperate to work with for ages. You’d have to be mad to say no. It felt like I was playing sports with some of the best athletes, so it was truly one of the best experiences that I’ve had.”

The rest of the ensemble cast is also made up of recognisable faces and long-time Nolan collaborators.

This includes Josh Hartnett as Ernest Lawrence, a Nobel-prize winning nuclear physicist; Kenneth Branagh as Niels Bohr, a 1922 Nobel winner whose work provided the basis for understanding of atomic structure; Benny Safdie as Edward Teller, who helped create the hydrogen bomb; Tom Conti as the legendary Albert Einstein; and David Dastmalchian as William Borden, the executive director of the U.S. Congress Joint Committee on Atomic Energy.

Ruth De Jong was hired as production and set designer, with her previous work including Twin Peaks, There Will Be Blood, and Yellowstone.

Despite focusing on an era almost 80 years on, De Jong was encouraged not to focus on finer details, considering Oppenheimer himself was someone who “chased the future”.

There were two key locations and sets De Jong needed to create. The first was the town in Los Alamos, New Mexico. A desert village and homebase for The Manhattan Project, specifically created for the US Army’s creation of the atomic bomb, the area has now become gentrified in the years since. As a result, the team rebuilt Los Alamos as it was at the 21,000-acre Ghost Ranch in northern New Mexico. However, they used the real Los Alamos for interior elements to maintain the authenticity.

The second was the Trinity Test Site, where the trial detonation took place. The team were given special permissions to film at the exact military base, which remains active to this day. Due to the timing restrictions this caused, production created a replica in Belen, New Mexico. The elements recreated included the 100-ft steel tower, and the bunker where Oppenheimer witnessed the Trinity Test detonation.

Other filming locations included the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton University, where Einstein’s old office was redressed to look like Oppenheimer’s at the time, and the real home Oppenheimer shared with Kitty.

Ellen Mirojnick was recruited for the costumes, with Nolan handing her a photograph of David Bowie as a reference point for Oppenheimer’s loose fitting suits.

Key elements involved were Oppenheimer’s simplistically-styled suits, and his signature hat, which she had specially made to be historically accurate to the one the physicist used.

To contrast Oppenheimer and Strauss as his antagonist, Mirojnick ensured Strauss was, by comparison, intricately tailored in elaborate three-piece outfits. All of Strauss’s outfits were bespoke, according to the official production notes, and wear designed to display his ‘prosperity and success’.

In a recreation of Strauss’s senate confirmation hearing, Mirojnick and her team accurately recreated every piece of his outfit - despite the scene being filmed in black and white.

Mirojnick added for Kitty, she ensured there was a blend of fashionable pieces with more casual items to denote that the wife, who struggled with life in the desert and had turned to addiction, ‘no longer cared how she looks’.

Her biggest freedom came in the creation of Jean Tatlock, as few photographs were available of her, as such, Mirojnick ensured she wore more free-flowing clothing to depict her free-spirited nature.

Many themes can be pulled from Oppenheimer, including the ethical and moral responsibilities of the creation of the bomb in the first place.

In Oppenheimer himself, Nolan focuses on the burden of responsibility, leading him to use the quote, “I am become death, destroyer of worlds”.

While this is often heavily attributed to Oppenheimer, who did actually say this, the quote itself is a piece of scripture from the Bhagavad Gita, the Hindu holy text.

In the case of Oppenheimer, he uses it as an emblem for what he fears he has created and put out into the world.

This is later shown in the film when Oppenheimer, during a discussion with Albert Einstein, is declares he believes he’s started a chain reaction that could cause the end of the world.

In a separate conversation about his infidelity and behaviour, Kitty is also heard telling Oppenheimer: “You don't get to commit sin, and then ask all of us to feel sorry for you when there are consequences.”

However, the film also floats the idea of responsibility being not just on the creator, but also the user, with President Harry Truman saying that Hiroshima cares who dropped the bomb, not who made it in the first place, and as such places the burden on him.

But Oppenheimer’s internal struggle is cemented with the use of the on-screen text: “Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. For this he was chained to a rock and tortured for eternity.”