Synopsis:

The overly long, over-edited Best Picture award-winning film by Christopher Nolan has been cut down to an hour-and-a-half-long story focused on The Manhattan Project. The oppressive omnipresent score by Ludwig Göransson was removed, with only three tracks put back in. The rest of the music is from other artists. For scenes with no music, new sound effects have been added. Intercutting of shots and scenes has been greatly reduced.

Intentions:

"Oppenheimer” was a disappointing movie to watch for me. It is a film filled with great performances but was ruined by a 3-hour runtime, pointless black-and-white footage, and events taking place after 1945 that nobody cares about. Nolan’s constant cross-cutting between timelines made for an aggravating experience. The constant inescapable music meant that I could not even fully enjoy the acting in a given scene. The Trinity test occurs at the 2-hour mark when it seems like the climax of the movie. My intention was to fix all of these problems.

Change List:

Nolan’s film intercuts between five different eras in his life: 1. The student Oppenheimer and his academic life to making the atomic bomb. 2. The meeting with Strauss where they discuss the hydrogen bomb. 3. The security clearance hearing of Oppenheimer. 4. Strauss’ Senate hearing. 5. Oppenheimer in old age receiving a presidential award. The only part I kept was #1 from 1926-1945. The movie ends with the Trinity test and then a short epilogue. The bomb test was re-edited to be more exciting and dramatic. Flash cuts, cross-cuts, and non-linear jump cuts have been mostly removed. I did keep a couple of Nolan’s montage scenes because they were too difficult to repair. As everything post-1945 was cut, that includes the performances of Robert Downey Jr., Alden Ehrenreich, Casey Affleck, Jason Clarke, Gary Oldman, and more. The biggest change other than cutting the runtime down was removing the score. This was the most difficult part of the process but it had to go. It won an Oscar but it’s not a very fun album to listen to and in fact, parts of it are grating to the ears. I did retain three tracks but put them in different places. The majority of the new music comes from other sources. The new music gives the movie more of a serious tone. Removing the score meant also removing many sound effects which had to be put back in. This is a custom 5.1 surround mix. A new subwoofer or bass channel had to also be created. This release will also have a Dolby stereo faux surround soundtrack that can be selected if desired. Cringy or lame shots and scenes were removed. Some had too many flash cuts and could not be saved. Others had weird nudity or sex and added nothing to the story. Florence Pugh scenes have been reduced. Oppenheimer's attempt to murder his professor with cyanide has been removed. The entire movie has been color-corrected. I took out the unattractive blue hue that all of “color” footage had which made it look almost black and white. The movie is now more traditionally colored and edited. There are no format or film stock changes in this cut as there are in the original. The entire movie is in the letterboxed 2.20:1 format. On-screen titles have been added where needed to add context. I hope that this version will be much less confusing for viewers.

Additional Notes:

As the sex and nudity have been removed this cut could be rated PG-13. However, there are several "f-bombs" that could potentially make it R-rated.

Other Sources:

The majority of the score was removed and replaced with music by Nico Lujan, Tommy Lucas, and Ethereal World Cinematic Music. New sound effects were added throughout from my personal library. My voice was added for one shot.

Special Thanks:

Thanks to the fan editing community. Thanks to the late Joseph Sargent who directed the 1989 film “Day One” as it was an inspiration for this edit.