Hey, everybody, welcome back.
Oh yeah, very excited to dive right into this one today because I'm assuming if you're here that you heard part one of our Oppenheimer's story. Be weird if you didn't, you just chose to start here.
I mean, I hope. So maybe I feel a little at sea.
Right, Maybe I had an episode randomizer that picked this one for you. We'll go back and listen to part one first, otherwise you'll be very lost.
Probaly like it better that way, the flow, the flow is better. Yeah, we wanted to kind of dive into the women in Oppenheimer's life because we saw the movie and it's great, love it, fantastic film. Definitely go see it. But as anyone will point out to you, but not just us, but anyone will point out to you, Christopher Nolan not that great at writing women characters. Yeah, and I can see that he made a concerted effort to include some women in this film, and I appreciate that.
Hats off to you, sir, But there's still a little sketter, so kind of wanted to fill in a little more of their personalities and the role they really played in his life besides just Jean was a communist and that made trouble for him, and he was a drunk and that made trouble for him. Like, you know, that's not enough for me. I want to know more.
It's a three hour movie as it is, I know, and there's only so much, but it is I think we have discussed it's a common problem that sure, this movie doesn't have time and shouldn't have to focus on the side characters. I mean, you know, like Josh Harten's character doesn't get much more time either. But the problem is there aren't any movies out there telling Getty's story and story so and.
Sadly it wouldn't be that interesting of a movie, probably because of the kind of limited lives that women were forced to them. That's the thing that get frustrated, because I'm like, you wouldn't want to necessarily watch a movie about the women of Los Alamos sitting around waiting to not hear from their husbands what they're up to.
I'd watch Greta Gerwig do it.
I would watch Greta Gerwig. She would find a way, she would find a way. But all that to say is, you know, I mean, it's not women's choice that they have the boring part of history. You know what I'm saying, Like, these ladies were trying to make their own way and do cool things, and they got sidetracked by the way the world was. And that's very frustrating and it makes me be like, yeah, I hear you. You don't want
to hear a movie about it. But that's part of my problem, is that you don't want a movie of their lives because.
Of well anyway, and again, I think once we often dig into that history and you unearth as much as you can, you find out there was interesting stuff going on, very true, and either it wasn't well recorded or it just wasn't well thought of for a long time.
But you know what I do.
I want Credit Rwig to do a movie about the women of Oppenheimer, and then I want Christopher Nolan to do Ken spinoff, and I want to see those. Just imagine they can't same weekend release date again for both of them. The time the time talk about saving Hollywood.
Listen, but what Ken is it? Ken minto Makino, He goes.
Backwards there, Ken's time distortion experience.
He's got all these tattoos all over him. I would actually buy them Memento Ken little tattoos all over him. Say hi to Barbie.
He's got it written across his chest upside down.
Take a look at it.
All right, all right, well we are going to talk about those movies, yes, But first, in the first part of this episode, we're going to finish up the story of uh of Robert Oppenheimer and Kitty his wife. I think we get a little back in the gene again. And then of course our friend Ruth Tolman so lots left to tell very exciting stuff. And again, if you haven't seen the movie, this I think is a little more spoilery than the stuff we mentioned in part.
One, but it was more fun to watch it not knowing.
Yeah, yeah, but you know, see the movie. Either way, I say, we just dive in and get started.
Let's do it. Hey their French condition, Well, Eli and Diana got some stories to tell. There's no match making a romantic tips. It's just about ridiculous relationship. I loove. There might be any type of person at all, and abstract concept or a concrete wall. But if there's a story worth the second clans, we'll put it in a show. Ridiculous Romance, A production of iHeartRadio.
So apparently in her drunkenness, Kitty would get a little graphic about her sex life, and she made comments about how she had to teach Oppenheimer about foreplay and that sex could be fun. He previously was not aware, and he was like, oh, I thought it was for science.
It's probably very mechanical. Uhh science joke maybe in his approach, and she was like, hey, we could have a good time with this.
Uh huh. You put the one in the zero that's.
Sex, So that works too well, honestly, go ahead.
So klausen Strasinski take this information to show that maybe Robert's relationship with Gene Tatlock wasn't really as sexually charged as we've heard it or seen it portrayed in the movie, because he's just again, he's not this like passionate sexual guy necessarily until Kitty got her claws in him, right well, and in.
The film when you see Gene, they're either having sex or they just had sex, right. So it's just very like, if you were just to watch the film and not look at any research, you might think, oh, Robert and Jean were like passionate sexy sex times he and Kitty were like just a good merit, like she was just the right wife for him or something. But that's not necessarily the case. So anyway, So.
And here's a little bit about just something that I loved in the movie. Even Kitty's detractors, even tho all the people who talked shit about Kitty, could not deny that when she was called in as a witness in her husband's security clearance hearing, she was his greatest defender. She was total superhero, badass Mary Poppins coming in there. That's right, shutting it down. The Secretary, Verna Hobson said, quote, so many times I've seen her pull herself together when
you didn't believe she possibly could. That's right, despite her being drunk or on pills or whatever, depressed, whatever was going on with her, when she needed to, she stood up and she would kick ass.
That's right.
Probably a lot of people underestimated her for that one hundred Oh she's just a drunk, she can't do nothing, and then she's like a han A second, ahem. First of all, let me tell you this, I.
Mean pretty much she talked circles.
Around the investigators. If you saw the movie, you saw this scene and Kitty impressed all of Robert's friends.
With her performance, right, Like, even people who were like, she's the worst possible wife for them, I see her, she sucks, were like she was a tower of strength during this time. She was a better witness than Robert. Like they were like she was the one.
And years later when Oppenheimer was given his medal and the government was like, oh, sorry, buddy, you know how feelings right, like, I know we sued you and investigating for trees and all this stuff water under the bridge across. Even then, she held a damn grudge until the end. She wasn't taken that bullshit apology, none of that.
Which makes me think of earlier when the neighbor was like, she's fiercely loyal. She is like a little lion. And I'm like, that's exactly when she like, once she decides you're on her team, she will fight yeah for you until tooth and nail.
Now, after Oppenheimer's security clearance was revoked, their daughter Tony was diagnosed with polio, so they moved to the US virgin Island of Saint John. While she recovered, Robert and Kitty ended up discovering a shared love of sailing. So they built a beach house there and they sailed together every summer. So they were like, we used to ride horses,
now riding boat. Yeah, they're like, whatever, I just want to be on a particular, a very specialized landscape and whatever thing is best suited to travel that landscape.
Yes, I'm into it. I'm in it.
Then you know. And then they go to Alaska and they're all on snowmobiles all the time, all right, Florida and they just can't they can't get over their shared love of fan boats.
I was just like, they're in bathing suits at the grocery store. I don't know where you go with that.
No, No, they're in Australia. They're hopping around in kangaroo pouches.
Amazing. I would do that, just like I think a kangaroo would immediately kick my face in.
I love a specialized former transportation in a particular and singular landscape. That's their thing.
Well, that was their new thing. They had some lovely summers together, sure, but on January sixth, nineteen sixty seven, Robert Oppenheimer was diagnosed with inoperable cancer, and he died a little more than a month later on February eighteenth, So it did not take.
Long from smoking, I'll add, Yeah, he was a heavy smoker. Yes, yes, was. I believe throat cancer right, think you're right.
I think you're right, And per his wishes, Kitty had him cremated and she dropped his urn off the coast of Saint John, within sight of their beach house. In May of that year, their close friend Robert Serber, who we've mentioned several times, his wife died by suicide, very tragically. A few months after that, Robert Serber and Kitty Oppenheimer were living together. So she found her another man, I guess,
and Kitty got him into sailing as well. In nineteen seventy two, they purchased a boat and they planned to sail through the Panama Canal to Japan. Wow, which sounds amazing. But Kitty had an embolism and she died on October twenty seventh, nineteen seventy two. Decadent Review points out in Atomic Love Story they kind of wrap it up by saying, oh, she found another man close to hand and married him, And Decadent Reviews kind of like, that's a little bit
of a judgment that's being called about her. Nobody says after Kitty dies, Robert Serber takes up with a student like a young woman much younger than him, and Decadent Review points out, nobody says, oh, Robert Serber found the closest woman to hands. It has the same ye disparagement of him be being a companion as thinking for her. So just to keep in mind that everything we know about Kitty was said in a time when a woman who was very opinionated and outspoken was not a maybe
a well respected woman. People didn't like women like that. So everything we read about her now we read it differently, I think, and so it's harder to kind of jive all these ideas of her together.
I think everyone was so conditioned to think that was like abnormal behavior, like, oh, oh, she's telling people she doesn't like that when you do it, that's what's wrong with.
Her, right, not a lady? And yeah, not quiet. It's not a die away myths, you know what I mean.
And that also may have contributed to her being difficult to like or being a brusque and mean person. You know. That's that sort of builds on itself. It's a little self fulfilling when you say, Oh, she's because she's opinionated. She's so nasty, right, And then she's like, well, then yeah, I am nasty because everyone thinks I'm so opinionated and they're cruel to me. So yeah, I think it's it's a vicious spiral to get stuck in.
It is. So it just you decide you don't have to like Kitty or anything like that. I'm not sure I would have been friends with her, but it is something that's interesting to think about, just from hindsight, how we read people in their time versus now, you know, kind of stuff like that. But Robert and Kitty did have two children, and I was kind of curious about the kid.
Yeah.
According to Nuclear Museum dot Com, Tony Oppenheimer never really got along with her mother. She had two unsuccessful marriages, and she was deeply depressed by her father's passing. She was also denied a security clearance to become a translator for the UN. Oh, and that kind of brought up a lot of trauma from her dad's security clearance hearing in fifty four. So she was really depress and lots
of things going wrong for her. When she died by suicide at the beach House in Saint John in nineteen seventy.
Seven, oh Man. Now, their son, Peter Oppenheimer, did not do well in school. He did really terribly, even though he was very smart, but he had a lot of anxiety, and he also got teased a lot about his dad, especially after the security hearing. Peter once wrote on the chalkboard in class that quote, certain people in the US government should go to hell. He's not wrong.
Still then or now.
Yeah. Apparently Robert Oppenheimer was told by a family friend that he should get some psychological help for his son for his anxiety when he was a kid. But Robert was offended at this idea because the friend, Pat Shirr, said that Oppenheimer quote could not have a son who needed help. I think that's one of those masculine pride issues. No son of mine needs psychological help. He's fine, He's a healthy What I.
Find so fascinating about this is that Robert Oppenheimer was really interested in psychology. Yeah, gene Caatlog worked with kids in psychiatry. Ruth Tolman was a psychiatrist, a psychologist. He had a lot of respect for that field. But at this time period, of course, if you had to see a therapist, it meant you were a crazy part like you were beyond you were beyond crazy. Yeah, if you needed a therapist. So it's just like a really weird of I don't know weight to put on therapy at that time.
He has an intellectual probably very much thought like, oh that's for lesser mortals maybe, yeah, you know if you yeah, I mean not just like you must be super crazy even need a therapist. But well, we're smart, we have control of our brains, right, because we're so well educated and well read, like we can reason our way out of which I know a lot of us still think. I thinking of myself today, why can't I just think my way out of this psychology problem? You know? And
you can us. The whole idea is that it's not something you can you can't outsmart yourself. But I know, I'm sure that Robert Oppenheimer was very much like a mind over matter person.
True.
And if look, if you're my son, if you're a little Robert Oppenheimer and you're having trouble with your anxiety, here's the formula to get rid of it.
Right well, and I wonder too again, time period wise they're still very Freudian in that all your problems are because of your childhood and your parents. So I wonder if how much of that was like, I'm not gonna send my son to learn about why I was a shitty dad.
Yeah, right, I already know I'm a shitty dad. I don't need to pay you thirty thousand dollars to tell me that.
I don't need some doctor to tell me I wasn't involved enough for my kid's life. So probably a number of reasons why that offended him. And but he was definitely like uh uh.
Peter himself once said, quote, my father's true tragedy was not that he lost his clearance, but my mother's slow descent into alcoholism. Cut that word slow.
Now, this lends a lot of credence to the drunken. Yes now. And I was going to say Robert Serber throughout this book American Prometheus, you know, he said Jean Tatlock, Robert Oppenheimer loved her the most, But of course at the time he had already been with his wife, Kitty, so did not make him feel better to say he loved Gene more than Kitty. So it's okay that I'm with Kitty. Oh, I wonder, I wonder, I don't know,
speculation station. And then I also wonder if he said, oh, she was not drunk, she just took pills like everybody's so, but he was with her. You know, you have feelings for her, So he might have been trying to, you know, do a little bit of repair on her image or something out of love, out of affection of Kitty. But you know, he might not be a reliable narrator for.
Who she is. Well. It could also be very similar to his son and psychiatry, where he's like, she doesn't know, she's not an alcoholic. We're better than that, right, you know, we're superior to that sort of base human issue that's lesser people have. She drinks a lot, but it's something that we're smart enough to get through, right, you know, she's fine.
She's okay.
Yeah.
Right. But anyway, for the fact that Peter said, yeah, my mother had a slow descent into alcoholism. You know what cut slow, it won't slow.
Yeah.
And also Tony apparently as a kid was constantly cleaning up after her mother. She would clean up her empty glasses and her beer bottle or whatever, and that's what kind of caused Tony's rift with her mom was that she started getting really upset about all that and not liking having to do all that and have it drunk mom or whatever. Right, So, because the kids say it, I kind of believe.
It, Yeah, it does.
It doesn't kind of believe that she is maybe a pretty bad alcoholm.
But you know, when it comes to Peter, mostly wording to Nuclear Museum, he has quote been so positive about his parents that his children are often taken aback by media portrayals of Kittie Oppenheimer as cruel and unrelenting. So even even you know, her grandkids are like, come on, waiting, Dad only says the nicest things about you know, maybe she's Yeah, right now, Peter Oppenheimer is now a carpenter and he lives in total seclusion on Paracaliente. And so
we say, lets nobody bother him. You know, he's like eighty something years old.
Okay, leave that man alone.
That man alone.
Hashtag protect Peter.
Yes, he's had it hard enough.
I really think so. And that's what I wonder too for him, if he's like, all right, I have plenty to say about my parents, but everyone already said every bad and good thing about them. I don't need to add to it. I'm just gonna say they were great, fantastic, no fuck off, Like I don't want to talk to you or anyone else.
Well for sure, for sure, I mean got to be so tough. He was the most talked about man in the world for a long time. Yes, Oppenheimer. And what a what a shadow to live under, right, right, I mean, no matter what?
And so, And it makes me sad to think that Peter and Tony and I don't know if they were close or not, but it seems like they lived pretty separate lives, right, And it makes me sad to think that the only other person in the world who could understand what it was to be Robert Oppenheimer's kid. Yeah, they weren't close to you know what I'm saying. Yeah, I feel like that would bring you together, but I don't know. And who knows. Again, we don't know that
much about them. They might have been fine together.
But the other thing, and I'll say we've sort of deliberately, I think, not gotten into this conversation too much on this show. But the other thing that can't not be a huge part of their psychology as they become adults and move into the world. Is knowing that their father created the atomic bomb, you know, and shortly there and was, you know, in some linear fashion, directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, horrific deaths and whatever.
There's a whole lot more to say about the merits of that, the reasons for that, and of course Oppenheimer's involvement, why he was involved, and what he felt afterwards, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So much to say that we don't need to get into today. I do recommend seeing the movie where there's a little more, just like, I don't know, it sort of even still leaves that to interpretation, but I'm thinking that can't not be part of their
identity as well his kids. It has to be, Yeah, my dad's the guy who made the nuke.
Especially after all of the photos of what happened in Japan, Yes, and what really that weapon wrought. Yeah, after you see that, how do you not have that connected to your father forever? I mean, or do you I don't know, you know, like because you know your dad is your dad. It's a very specific character in your life, So who he is to other people is kind of separate. You're like, who's that guy? You know what I mean. Like I've felt that way about my dad Sometimes I'm like, oh,
they know somebody different than I know. You know what I'm saying, And that's just how it is. But you know, it must be really hard to reconcile just and I think that that was what was so great about the movie was kind of showing how much everybody wanted him to do this project. They wanted this, they asked him for it, they were begging him for it, they were pressuring him for it. But then once it happened, nobody really wanted to take responsibility to those consequences and be
attached to that literal outcome. It really is. I don't know, it's really hard. You could we I mean, we could argue for hours and hours about whether or not it was right to make it. You know, it's a very fascinating topic and the movie will make you feel it.
Yeah, that's the truth. And speaking of the movie, mm hmmm, I think we've said everything that we can say at this point about Robert Oppenheimer's life and his three the main three women that he interacted with romantically that that really had an impact on him as a person. So I'm very excited that we get to uncover all that.
I was so happy to do a deep dive into all their lives. They're very fascinating women. You can see why he was attracted to them. They were smart, and they had a quick wit about them, and you know, they could hold their own with Robert Oppenheimer. And I think that says a lot.
And for all his problems, he wasn't a big piece of shit.
No, not an overwhelming piece of shit or anything.
I mean, they're talking about the time period.
I know, Well that's I mean, there's some stories where like he invited like a young female student over to his house with Kitty at some point, and you know, he's trying to entrance this girl, so he's kind of saying cutting things about his wife. Oh so there's like some some anecdotes like that. It's nothing so insane that you'd be like, what a monster, you know what I mean, But like it's just fifties husband shit, you know, like
I'm just kind of I don't know. There was a little bit too with Robert where I still admire him in some ways, and I like that he was attracted to women who were very strong and smart and had
a lot of personality and character. But he's also kind of one of those guys who's very attracted to that, and then once he's got them, he kind of wants to stamp out those things about them right right, because he's like, you're supposed to do something else now that you're married to me, or now that you're you know what I mean. Like I'm not trying to say he's like, don't work or something, but he just had an idea about how it was supposed to be, and he didn't
have any problem with the way it worked. But so these ladies are fully oppressed by their lives and he's not really recognizing that.
We've come across that a lot in our history shows sometimes where it's just, you know, we realize that these people were just as much victims of the culture, Like you know, he had it embedded in his head as well as like, well, well, once we're married, you know, men act a certain way, women act a certain way, you know, And it's that same just perpetual systemic issue
that everyone's sort of born into. And I almost wish that if if I could go back in time and shake Robert Oppenheimer, if I could change one thing Robert Appenheimer did, it'd be to let him understand that he could be married to an intelligent woman who's his equal, right, you know, That'd be the one thing I would change about all the things in Robert Oppenheimer's life. Wow, Wow, Like I don't want to go step in on butterflies here so well.
And I think too, this is such an interesting like this Berkeley enclave of like kind of rich, very intellectual, sort of superior kind of academics that are all fucking each other's wives. Yeah, you know, it's something very similar to Bella Park or you know, any of these other periods of time where it's like all these people are
together and they kind of aren't. The marriage about is sort of you know with so it's even weirder that it's like you maybe view marriage is like who's a good partner for me, rather than whom I'm in love with I'm passionate about or something. I can get that anytime, but like who i'm as a good partner for me? And I'm not sure you ever really picked a good
partner for him? Quote unquote, and people certainly had their opinions about Kitty being good or bad, you know, depending on which part of the story you're in.
Yeah, exactly.
As and sometimes she was kind of, you know, a bit of a distraction, so you know, but again it's you can't divorce that from how they felt about living their lives. I mean, fully, Gene committed suicide. I don't think you had that much to do with Robert, you know, it had a lot to do with everything else. You know, it was or she was murdered, obviously by a children. But I could tell it. I could see, I could see her being if she was already that depressed, if
she was feeling that constrained, right, not that unusual. I mean, Kitty's drinking problem probably had a lot to do with that feeling too, which is another way to kill yourself, right, just more slowly. I don't know. Well, Ruth's the only one who fucking handle her shit. You got out, she did, all right, handled.
It all right. Well, Okay, we talked about this story, and there's more to talk about, because of course we double featured, not on the same day, but the same weekend. We saw Barbie and Oppenheimer now we're going to take a little break and we're gonna come back and just the rest of the episode, we're going to talk about those two movies. Whenever. We'll start with Oppenheimer since we just learned his life, and then move on to Barbie.
But we just had such a good time and I think such an interesting time watching both that we've got a lot to say.
I know, right, Yeah, you could talk about those movies forever.
Yeah, so let's let's talk about those movies forever for right after this commercial break, we'll be right back, all right, Welcome back to the show, everybody.
You want to talk about Barbie and Oppenheimer. To the double feature of the.
Year, the biggest double feature of the year, the two movies that saved the box office this month. There's always one that saves the box office every once in a while. Yeah, but let's we saw both. We saw Barbie first, then we saw Oppenheimer again. Seventy millimeters imax, big, huge, beautiful screen.
Since we just learned about Oppenheimer, let's start there. Okay, Okay, first of all, I'll give you my Nolan background, because I know a lot of people fellas especially who start talking about Christopher Nolan movies can get a little into it, and I love Christopher nolan movies. I really do. The Prestige Right and Dunkirk are among two of my favorite of his movies. They're so good. I'll say it, you know what, I'll say it, Okay. I love Nolan's Batman
trilogy and The Dark The Dark Knight is. It's great. It's perfectly great.
I think we just got a thousand hang on, it's so good.
I think when you pull Heath Fledger's performance out of it and just look at it, you know, there's a couple of messy parts, is all I'm saying. There's some stuff that doesn't make sense, and I think morally it's a little ambiguous and kind of wants to have its cake and eat it too. Personally, I think Batman Begins is my favorite of the trilogy. It's so good. Yeah, but we're not here to talk about Batman. We're here to talk about Oppenheimer. It's very Nolan in terms of
its direction. It clips along. I love the way that his scenes don't end, they just bleed right into each other. And I think that's a big part because of the music doesn't cut at the end of a scene, it keeps playing right into the next one. It's almost montage. This for a historical biopic, This movie moves fast. And that's what I was saying earlier about the IMAX, where I'm like it was almost too big for me to really dial in on what was being said and the
story that was happening. That I'm so glad we saw it there because it was beautiful, But I kind of want to watch it on my phone at a certain point, right, it's be like zero distractions, blinders on, like, let me only just look at this tiny little screen and hear what they're saying, right, yeah.
Right, which he doesn't like you to hear what they're saying all the time given the sound mixing. Yeah, sometimes from an own film, I will say, I was he doesn't do biopicks. Really, is this his only a biob.
This is his? I mean, yeah, I think it's only biopic. It's his as far as I know. Second non fiction after Dunkirk.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah, everything else has been sort of sci fi or you know, some sort of pseudo fantasy like The Prestige or something which is kind of sci fi too.
Yeah, I guess I would, Yeah, well I did really like that he did this one, particularly because of his little weird shit. He likes to play with time lines, yeah that, you know, he always does that in his movies in one way or another, either it's going backwards
or whatever. And in this one, you know, he's kind of he's showing you the security hearing, He's showing you Lewis Strauss's confirmation hearing, right, and then also of course the Atomic project in the forties, so you're kind of flipping between all of these different timelines and different periods
in this man's life. And what worked about it for me is that, you know, you're kind of starting off at the security hearing and they're all like, well, let's look at this piece of shit that made the atomic bomb, Like how you know you're real, you're this communist lover, and they're really mean to him in this security hearing. And then the next scene or as you say, the next kind of part of the montage that sort of bleeds directly into the next scene, somebody going, you're the
man to do this, and you have to. You're going to save the world. You have to defeat Nazi Germany, you know, like they're at they are really laying on him for this project. So it's it kind of I think it really does a good job at putting you in his headspace, or his I guess Christopher Nolan's idea of what his headspace must have been, where he's like, I'm remembering very nearby in my mind, was y'all begging me to do this? And now you're really pissed at me for doing it? And I can't. I am too,
you know, but like I can't. I don't know how to respond to this, and it's very frustrating and contradictory and very scapegoaty feeling. Yeah, which, of course it's exactly what he was. So I think he does a really good job of kind of putting you in that mind space, that psychological space totally.
And I think that's kind of what the movie is mostly all about, because again we're not I don't think the movie is here to answer these big questions. Was it a good idea for the bomb? Was you know, was it the right thing to do in terms of you know, the argument? Of course, the largest argument is by dropping the two A bombs on Japan, we stopped a land war that would have claimed many millions of lives. So, but look where we are now, which of course is kind of sort of at the end of the movie too,
what was the long term damage? Is that worth it? But instead of trying to answer those questions, the movies much more like, well, let's just look at this guy and what might it have been like to be him? What might it have been like to be the guy who did that? How do you sit with that? How do you live with that afterwards?
Yeah?
And then also at the same time, like you said, the very people who were begging you to do it have now turned around and said, how dare you sir?
Oh could you have done that?
What a monster? You must be crazy?
Yeah, and it's fascinating to the element of security that you're talking about a little earlier with in terms of Russia was our ally, but everybody knew at some point this war is going to end and they're not going to be our ally anymore. Like there's it's not not a question, you know, And so all of that kind of hiding and fear from our own allies was a real problem. Of course, you still had German scientists involved.
That was you know, literally I think he even says in the movie anti Semitism is our best bet because we can go get all these great German scientists that are Jewish that are not allowed to work for Hitler. Basically that Hitler's like, purge these guys. So he's like, let's go get them and make them work for us.
Oppenheimer, yourself is Jewish. I don't think we mentioned that.
That's right. He is Jewish. I only was a practicing no, no, it's very religious, but he was Jewish. But there was still a lot of feeling that like, oh, well, it doesn't matter if Hitler sucks, and you know he sucks, and you're very mad right now at your home still your home country, and there's going to be that feeling and you want to help your home country and not me. So I don't know, you know, there's a lot of that kind of like again distrust, I mean, straight up restraint,
you know, amongst all relationships. He had to be really careful. And it's kind of a foreign feeling to me because of the big war of our time, of course, is the War of Iraq, and you know, we could not be more distant from that war.
There is no the propaganda of the Iraq war was don't even worry about it, guys, guys, we got this over here. You know, support the troops, uh huh, put the yellow ribbon on your car, buy stuff and yeah, and that's and that's all you need to do, and not this the World War two right mentality of we're all in this together sacrifice. You know you're gonna feel it at home when we go off to war and you dealing with that is you supporting your country? Right? So different or even.
The sense of even you know, you're in the middle of no, I don't know, you live in a small town in Maryland or something, but people are still like loose lips sink ships. Like you can't be talking about stuff you hear on the news, right because you don't know who you're talking to and who they're going to tell and what they're going to say. And it was just a lot of this like fear of spies listening.
And you know, it's just such a I had a hero, I guess because we already had computers and they're like everybody everything, I don't have to tap your phone or whatever. You're telling me everything through like there whatever. But anyway, it's just so weird to think about. It was such a different paranoid such a paranoid time, and you get caught up in that shit and it changes your behavior a lot.
That was one of the things that was most interesting about it to me. You know, I as the movie's coming closer to coming out, all these little YouTube videos are popping up. Is like the life of Robert Oppenheimer. Here's why Oppenheimer's interesting, Here's what you need to know. And I literally knew practically nothing about him and wanted
to go into the movie with that. Yeah, it was like the movie I want to be totally surprised by everything that happens here, and I was, and maybe had hard time following some parts of it where I just had to double back on the conversations. But it was so interesting to see that paranoia and how it affected everyone, and the eggshells everybody's on all the time, and the challenges of not just you know, a they've got these
time limits, which I also didn't know either. We're it was like the space race, like Russia's actually further ahead. They've done things we haven't done yet, and we're going to watch that and copy it and try and leapfrog what their work that that's exactly what happened with the space race. Russia was in space first, yeah, and we leapfrog that to get to the moon. So that was
really fascinating to me. But then on top of that, just the fact that while you're under this immense pressure, you can't talk to anyone, you can't call your friends, you can't even you have to live in our fake little town we built. Just a nightmare I think to be living in that time.
Well, and like when we see this in the movie, a lot of complaints amongst the scientists who feel that knowledge is global and they shouldn't have to hide their discoveries from their Russian or German or Swiss.
Or whatever exactly.
Personally, respect this person I ranged from them. I used their equations in my shit or whatever, and so they felt very strongly that like you should be I should be able to share these things. And in addition to that, they're not sharing with me. So I'm behind maybe what they know, and that's putting me at a disadvantage of
my science, just pure science. I'm angry that I'm not able to get the resources that I'm out there and exchange these thoughts with these other brilliant people where I know in these discussions we're both gonna see things or come up with things that we wouldn't have come up with on our own.
Yeah, totally.
So it's like slowing me down. I feel really frustrated, you know. But it was also a bit of a hint when scientific community stopped sharing nuclear information. It was a hint to every security department worldwide that oh, they're working on a bomb. They're stopped sharing. Now I know they're working on that shit. Ye, Like it was a clue, so you had to be really careful.
Oh if we ever come back from that, I mean, international community, I don't know what it was like before, but it still feels like the same thing now, Like, no, you can't trust anybody or sharing anything with anyone else. I know, we're all just people trying to live on this stupid spinning marbled together. But that person slightly different than me, so you know that means they're gonna stab me in the back the first chance they get. Is wild that kind of distrust, and you see that in
the movie as well. Yeah, I was also really fascinated by that that there was people saying, like you said, we've got to share information with each other. In fact, a lot of people, of course, thought the whole point of the A bomb is once they know we've built it, they'll stop. There's no more war because who would get involved. Was I'm not even gonna build one once you have one, which is obviously a little arrogant to think, and of
course has time and again proven untrue. There's what doctor Seus's butter battle book, right, there is no weapon big enough to stop everyone from using weapons.
Right, or decide we don't want one of our own. Yeah, you shouldn't get to press that button that destroys everything. I get to press that button.
Yep, you know it's a pain in the ass. I would love to talk about performances in this movie because I think at the center of it all is the cast and and you know what, I'll say it also, I'll say this, I was a fan of Killian Murphy before it was cool. Oh look, I'm.
Just saying, taste maker Eli in.
The House twenty eight days later comes out, Right, there's gonna be people out there who like, yeah, he was in stuff before that, you lose her. But twenty of days later came out. I was obsessed with that movie. I was like, I'm not into zombie movies, even though twenty eight Days Later is not a zombie movie. Also, yeah, because they don't die. It's not about resor, it's not about the living dead. In twenty eight Days Later, it's
just a rage virus. Oh yeah, so technically if I push my glasses up on my nose here, it's not a zombie movie. But anyway, I was like, this guy is amazing and I want to watch everything that he's in. Yeah, And at the time, I was like, uh, have you guys heard of silly and Murphy because he's so cool, and then learned, like five years later, that's pronounced Killian but.
Silly old Murphy, silly old Murphy.
Here's a little facto weight for you. All that blew my damn mind. Even as a Killian Murphy fan, Robert Oppenheimer was tall. Yeah, I have always thought that Killian Murphy was tall and slim. That man is five foot seven, and there's nothing wrong with that. But he has a very towering presence and he's actually shorter than my short ass nine so short King Killian Murphy, kill Murphy. Yeah, incredible,
that's probably the most mind blowing. That's probably the most explosive piece of information that I got out of.
Oppenheimer, the most important thing I learned.
Because there's times where they shoot it. We talked about this. There's times where they shoot it and he looks like the tallest guy in the room, and there's times where they shoot it and he looks like everyone is like imposing on him and he's surrounded by giants.
Beautifully done, so good, because you it's again, it's so much. I think really he was really trying to put us in his brain, his perspective. It's not meant to be an overarching perspective of nuclear whatever, whatever. It's literally this guy and what he thought and felt during the time
and these various times in his life. And I thought that that camera work worked beautifully for that, because when he felt confident, he was the biggest guy in the room, and when he felt like he was getting piled on, he was the smallest. It was beautifully beautifully shown in that way. And I will say I thought Killian Murphy and Christopher Nolan did something that's very hard to do with a biopic in that they did not make him a hero or a villain. Yeah, I really, I think
that's so hard to do. If Usually with a biopick, you kind of pick a side and you're like, I've decided that this person's the protagonist, so anyway they're the hero and everything they did was right and fine and whatever, and like you might have feelings, but anyway, in this movie they were right to do it, and it's all great. But in this case, I really I think they left it.
I think they both felt ambivalent about it in a way, and they were like, this was just a human guy who was in the middle of history and happened to be the finger of destiny was placed on him. Like it didn't have to be him. It was weird that it was him. People were like General Groves chose probably the worst guy in the world for it because they had all these communist ties and he was a lefty and he you know, like he wasn't the most brilliant nuclear scientist there was.
Good at maths.
He's terrible at math, he was bad at lab. He's a theorist.
He's a theorist.
Yeah, and so a lot of people were like, that's a weird choice. But as you said, he was like this guy's magnetic. People are going to follow him, and that's what I need. And in the movie, Oppenheimer says, I think you chose me because of my lefty association, so you can control me. And I don't think he was wrong about that either. I'm sure he saw it
as leverage right times. But anyway, I thought they both did that really well in the writing and the performance of kind of being like, this is a complicated individual. He's not always right and he's not always wrong. He's not a villain and he's not a hero. He was a guy. You know, he's just a guy. And I think that's really hard to do.
That's so interesting by that, Yeah, that you say that. I'm thinking about actors often who play, you know, wicked characters in some way, shape or form. And the thing you say is, well, I can't think they're evil. I have to think that. I have to think like they do, that my behavior is justified and I take these actions because I think they're right. So I have to think of myself as the hero or the good guy or something. But this is Killian Murphy is playing a guy who
literally is questioning his own morals. Yes, am I a villain? Am I a horrible person? Or am I or did I do the right thing? I'm literally hearing it from all sides, and I don't know myself. So I think that's where that comes from in this movie, where it is able to balance that so well, is probably both of them not approaching this character as someone who thinks he's doing the right thing, but quite the opposite of a character who has absolutely no idea if he's done the right thing or not right.
And also beautifully shot was his congratulations everyone, it works and we dropped the bomb and it worked, and he had to give this speech and I thought that was really well done because he had such a and of course he had his own personal like, fuck, I didn't didn't know it was going to kill this many people. I didn't realize, you know, exactly the weight or the destruction, the destructive power it would have. I knew it would be big, but more people than I thought.
Whatever.
Also, he's looking at people who spent years with him building this bomb, and they're proud of their achievement and they should be proud of it, and he is proud of it, and he's like, I just wish we could have dropped it on the Nazis, because that's who the fuck I was working against. I didn't gonna give a shit about Japan, you know, so anyway, it was just really well done to show him kind of being like jovial and excited and his performance like great job. Everybody
did it, like ooh, patch yourself on the bag. We you know, it's not just about me, it's about you. Everybody's so great whatever. And in his mind he is freaking out like he is he is seeing the effects of this bomb and and like not knowing, am I proud of this?
Is this good?
I don't know anymore?
I don't know. I think that it's I want to get back to performances. But just you saying that makes me think about this element of the movie of we should I wish we'd dropped it on the Nazis. Yeah, right, I think very deliberately in this movie, the word Japan never comes up once until they say it's the target for the bomb. And I think that must have been so true of the mentality at the time, like, wait, Japan, what I thought the whole thing was the Nazis. That's
kind of what we've been thinking on. But I think that the scientists, Themselve Oppenheimer himself and all his team. At this point, they're so seduced by their own creation, right that they that they you get this to this point where you're like, I just have to see if
I did it. I just have to know if we succeeded and if it works, and I just have I built the toy, now I have to use it, right And so even they are in the moment excited about like, we'll just drop it somewhere, and so the US has And again there's a whole lot of history here to unpack in terms of would Japan. A lot of a lot of strategists say Japan never would have surrendered.
I also heard that they sued for peace before.
This dropped exactly obviously a big part of the movie too, But but they so badly wanted to use it because they could. And so this idea of Japan not even coming up until they're at target, I think really speaks to I sort of said this, but the mentality at the time of just oh crap, the Nazis are surrendering. Well, we got to do this somewhere, we got to show the world, we got to show Russia was a big part of it what we can do, And they said, the first bomb is to show them we can do it.
The second bomb is to show them that we can keep doing it. Horrible, horrible, And.
I guess they didn't really know the effects that the radiation would have, the extra deaths that happened from the radiation, or maybe they did.
Well, we had kitties studying the effects of radiation on the blood, and I know that there were there was an understanding that radiation was deadly afterwards too, but I don't know. And I mean what they were how many miles away from the test site.
Oppenheimer and the scientists were twenty.
Miles twenty miles away. They knew there was not just the blast to worry about, but fallow up other shit.
Yeah, yes, very true. And we'll throw out there that there are a lot of indigenous and people of Native of New Mexico who are called down windows downwind of the Trinity Test and have radiation poisoning from it, and they have not been recompensed by the government in any way. So they have still to this day within their community, birth defects, all kinds of crazy shit from Trinity test itself.
So there's not only in Japan was their fallout from Robert Oppenheimer's and his team's invention, but also right here in America and people are still trying to get justice for that.
Yeah, and again, the movie does not go into this thing, much like it doesn't go to the women of his life. And there's a degree to which I forgive the movie for that, because it is a singularly focused story. And I don't want Christopher Nolan to be the one who comes out and says, you know, let me tell you about what happened to the Native Americans out here, you know, like it's not necessarily he's not going to necessarily do a good job at that. True, he's telling the Oppenheimer's story.
I think the issue is that we're going to keep seeing movies like Oppenheimer. Who's gonna make one that shows us about the Downwinders or about these three women? You know that that just should also exist in tandem, and then we've got the full picture.
Right I Speaking of performances, I will say everyone everyone says, and everyone knows Christopher Nolan quote doesn't do women. He's not great at writing women, not he very rarely has them in his movies. If they're there, they're very they're very limited.
It's often like a very important character with very little screen time. They're like their significance to the heroes matters so much. They're the only ones with any sense who know what's going on, Like I'm thinking of Scarlett Johanson and The Prestige for example, right, But at the same time, the story is not revolve around them.
I think the criticism is that all his female characters only exist in relation to the men what they're doing. And in the same in Oppenheimer, Yah, Jean's whole character is that she was a I mean this and that was a problem for him. You know Kitty's whole characters. She's drunk and that's a problem for him. You know Rufe's whole characters. I was fucking her and that was it, Like, you know, there was there however they related to him, that was it. They had no life outside of it.
And again, this is a very focused movie, and it makes sense in a way to say, well, how did they what was their thing with him? Specifically because I don't have time to go follow Jean through her regular daily routine while I'm trying to tell you about the nuclear bomb. You know, I totally totally get that. It's just I think what's strange in this film is that
he's clearly trying to address it a little bit. He got two amazing actresses, Florence Pugh and Emily Blunt to play these women, and there's some scenes you know, he tried, like you tried, but it's still so lacking. And particularly Florence Pugh is such a phenomenal actress, and I felt like she didn't really have that much to do with Jean. Jean's scenes seemed to be the same thing each time. Yeah, and have a lot of levels and sort of the same with kitties. She's kind of the same every scene.
She was drunk and mad in every scene, and so it was just kind of where was the softness. I wanted to see what he fell in love with, but they liked to know him or you know, anything that made them more of a person instead of this is who he This is just the part they had to play in his life to make him who he was, Yeah, instead of this is a full person who affected him.
You know, we have long known that me and Emily Blunt have a very special thing. I know, you and I know this. I'm pretty sure John Krasinski knows about it. But Emily Blunt and I have a very special thing between us, not unlike Oppenheimer and maybe Gene Or it's like this, we're both married, we're both happily with our but you know, but we can't not be in each other's lives. So a big point being I'm a big Emily Blunt fan. I think she's very talented, and I
think she was very good in this movie. But at the same time, I did feel in the moment, and I do want to see it again and re examine this, but I felt in the moment like her shutting down the interview, her rob what's his name, the the Jason Clark's character, Yes, the security hearing, and her like absolutely
destroying him was so well delivered. She did such a good job in that scene, and yet it felt unearned because like he comes, what does Oppenheimer say is like or is said about her like she's always.
He says what Verna Hobson says, Basically, he's like, you don't know our relationship. She's my wife. We've been through fire together, been through fire, and she can pull herself together when you wouldn't think she could, but.
Specifically that part We've been through fire together. In the moment, I was like, oh, have you we haven't really seen that. There's that one scene where he was sad about Jeane's suicide and she walks up to him and says, play yourself together. And that's even what they flashed back to
as he's saying we've been through fire together. And I just felt like the movie lacked kind of, like you said, where is the passion in their relationship that led to this moment where she said, I'm gonna put my flask down and destroy all you guys for having the audacity to come after my man. He was one of the best people I know. Like we see a few scenes of her saying we need to fight harder, we need
to fight harder. But I was so taken aback by that sudden turn from her that I felt like it was kind of out of nowhere, as opposed to being suggested, suggested and then yes and then revealed.
I feel like it was she was so scornful and almost contemptuous of him in those moments where we need to fight, we need to fight. Yeah, that it was It didn't read as you know, we're just a different personality from each other, and I'm angry on your behalf. It was like, I'm angry at you. And a lot
of the movie was her being angry at him. She's mad, she has a kid, she's mad, she don't know about this, she's mad about even the thing about pull yourself together, Like I guess that was something he needed from her, was for her to be that kind of person. It's like, hey, I get it, you're sad, but you need to get it together. You're in the middle of something right now.
But it was presented as look at this shrew, like like every time you saw her, she was kind of a shrew, and she was just sort of yelling and I don't know, distracting and not a good presence. And I was like, I don't see what makes her such a great partner for him. I don't understand. And as you say, when she does end up being a bad ass, she's like, where did that even come from? So, you know, it was it was a little uneven in those ways.
I do wish that maybe even in the scene where they got together, there was a little more anything there. I don't know, And then they just show them like riding horses, and I guess that's supposed to be the good times. Though they're pretty, but they don't give you much character development. So yes, although as you say, I did love how she performed that security hearing scene was
really beautifully done. And I will say too, learning that Kitty did hold a grudge for the rest of her life against every single person who said a damn thing against him, including Edward Teller. When he gets his medal, he goes to shake his hand and Robert's like, sure, no hard feelings, but Emily was sitting there fucking glaring, no, no daggers, and that's clearly very true to life. She was straight up what to see Edward and like, why don't you make shit very dead?
Yeah? You said that. The robbers like, how dare you? What do you mean you shook his hand? Yes, the guy just sold you out right. Yeah. Yeah.
So that was very well done. And I think Emily Blunt said she had a she deeply felt for this woman who was very sad and lonely. Yeah, and she drank a lot to address those feelings and stuff like that.
So well, I think I think, you know, obviously we can say that Nolan, it's not his strongest storytelling element, right, romances and women and how they women and anything about.
Them, anything about that.
And on top of that, this is an incredibly complicated person who made for an incredibly complicated character. Yeah, so these things that we're not seeing, not getting, you know, might just be wrapped up in her complications. I do agree that there's probably some some things in the movie that could have established something that had a better payoff
in that moment. But but yeah, it's real hard to encapsulate somebody like Kitty without her own damn movie, which quite frankly, give me that Emily Blunt spin off, and I'm first, I'll watch, I'll do the seventy millimeters IMAX thing.
I would do that there was bigger.
Emily Blunt, the better.
I've always said, there is actually a fun story about Kitty on Los Alamos, where she fucking was like, why don't you eat shit with your security protocol, got in the car, drove away from Los Alamos and went to a hotel bar for the nice So there were times Juice was like, why don't you just eat my dirt?
So she actually might be kind of a fun movie actually, if you really really wanted to try to pull down this character who is vivacious and lively and sharp tongued, like a witty person can often be very sharp, as we've learned with like Oscar Wild example, he was kind of a bitch like but he was, but that's what was witty. He was a bitchy, witty guy. So when he said to me, like, oh, that shit was funny, but it was totally a roaster. She might have been
a roaster, you know, in that way. But you don't appreciate a female to roast the same way you appreciate a male to roast, you know what I'm saying, as little as you appreciate a male roast in you, you know you definitely, women are supposed to be nice and kind, right, so and and whatever. So at any rate, fantastic performances even with very little to work with, We'll say, because again, Florence Pew, I.
Mean, forget, she's doing incredible things, very magnetic. I want. I've I've there's been a I've had my foot on the break with Florence Pew like ready to tap it, you know, ever since she sort of popped up. But I've been like, oh, she's you know, the new hunt thing. Well, we'll see. I'm always skeptical of public opinion because I just think everyone's wrong. But me so I don't know
what I'm getting at here. Point is she has consistently amazed me and checked my hesitations numerous times because she's always good. She is. She's always very.
Good killer And as you said, Kelly and Murphy, amazing, just did a fantastic job.
I want to rush to our Barberie review so real quick, just let's just we've talked about the movie a lot. Let's just hammer down a couple performances real quick. Obviously we talked about the Big three, but let's talk Robert johniy Junior coming in and reminding us why he's one of the greats.
Just Healy crushed it fantastic.
Yeah.
There are so many moments where he just did something so subtle, Oh my god, just something so little, and I was like, you just gave me so much in that little moment, and I admire it so much, Like when he said, oh, you were just a lowly shoe salesman, and Lewis Draus goes just as two salesman and he's smiling but his eyes are fucking furious. He just does it. It's it's such a little moment, but it was so good, and there's few of those.
The way he pronounces his plosives in that movie, like his p's and b's were diff I know Robert Downey Junior's voice pretty well after twelve years of MCU and and he was speaking just this with this subtle difference. That was just like, you're embodying a different person right now. And I was so amazed by that.
Yes, he was really great.
And may I say, where the hell has Josh Hartnett been all this time?
I was so excited. And he looks different. He looks he looks great me, but he looks different than when he was pretty boy, young, younger or whatever. But he I thought he did a fantastic so.
Good, so good. I was just like, I never knew what to think about him. He's all over the place. I was like, Oh, he's bestie, he's he's right there with you. Wait a minute, no, this guy's a fascist. Wait a minute, no, he's got your back. But it was just all over the place in a really good way.
Yeah, he was his character was apparently he was really against union organizing. Yeah, so that's what was his big problem. Yeah. But and of course communa he was surely communist kind of guy. But but I didn't really get the impression from the movie that he had like a long list of grievances and would be spreading rumors about Oppenheimer and stuff. I was kind of a surprise to see about Ernest Lawrence in the research.
I did kind of get that impression a little bit. I did. Yeah, I felt like he not unlike Straws, was like he was a little more side by side with Oppenheimer so much that he sort of had to be had had a positive working relationship with him. But it felt like there was something in there that was like, God, but oh, I just can't wait to punch this guy in the face. Though too like he was. I think
he was a little jealous of Oppenheimer. I think he was resentful of his success, despite the fact that he was like, but you're the You're I'm meeting with government people about what a problem you are, and they gave you the Manhattan Project. Yeah, so I thought there was I picked up elements of that. Yeah, sure.
Well, anyway, Josh Hartnett, great.
Job, great job, Josh Hark.
I think at one point you leaned over and you're like, every white man with a SAG card is in this movie, and that is so true.
And the rest of SAG was next door working on Barbie. Which brings us to the other movie we saw this past weekend. And we will take our last break for this episode, and we'll come back right after this and talk all about Greta Gerwigg's incredibly pink movie.
Barbie, the pinkest movie ever.
Yeah, you know, And of course goes to that saying we're talking about the movie here is spoiler alerg rightpoilers. Yeah, we'll be right.
Hi. Barbie's welcome back to the show.
Perfect. Okay, So Barbie opening night, we went Thursday with a bunch of friends because they we thought we weren't going to get in because the whole weekend was sold out, and then they added a show time. Yay, we managed to squeeze in Thursday night.
All right, And I'm gonna tell y'all, I'm a fan of Barbie. I love Barbie's, loved plan with Barbie's had a billion Barbies, loved them. I still have them in my parents' house. They're always asked me to come get them. I'm not going to do it. Their house is bigger than mine and they have more storage sorry sorry, more storage space over there. I'll try one day, but y'all are gonna hold on. But anyway, so I was like already sold on the Barbie Movie. Like I was like,
I'm going to the Barbie Movie. So I'm very happy we got to see it opening night, and it was It's such an interesting double feature because, you know, one hand, you have this dark movie, historic movie with basically nothing but men in it doing man thing being men. And then you have this movie with so many women in it, and it's women being women and they're on top of them there in the center of the story and the center of the world, and they're the center of everything.
So it was very kind of interesting to see them both at the you know, so close to one another, right and for that, especially after leaving, you know, leaving Openhimer, Like, man, those ladies didn't get nothing. They should have been the Barbie movie. Yeah, they would have gotten more story. Anyway, I very much enjoyed the Barbie Movie.
Oh yeah, I loved it. Super fun. And I'll say my relationship with Barbie is limited, but not non existent. I remember as a as very young. I was I don't know, six years, seven years old something like that, and my older sisters were playing with Barbie's and I was younger and had my own Kendall except his name was George.
Oh, I don't know, why did you named him George?
Yeah? I think I named it. It was no like I named him George. It was like this guy's name. They were like, here's here's a ken and I was like, cool, what's his name? Uh, George. And so when I wanted to play with my sisters, whom I my own respect very much, they were like, Okay, you're the neighbor and we're going to invite you over later. So you sit in your house, which is in your room, and then
we'll invite you over later. And cut two little six year old sitting in my room with my little George doll, just waiting waiting for that invitation. And maybe I don't know in my mind, it was weeks went by. It was probably ten minutes before I was like, I don't think they're gonna invite me and getting really upset. So that's that's my Barbie memory. That's how it went for me, I was I was more enamored with my thrift store, my Little Ponies, what I had with their Neon colors
and stuff like that. So and of course I had some like cool Ninja turtles. So I had a real mishmash of toys and dolls and action figures and stuff that I played with, but a little bit of Barbie. And I will say I was skeptical from the trailer, not because I thought it looked bad or I didn't like the colors or anything like that. I was thinking, I'm not sure if Greta Gerwig and No Bombback No Comedy skillfully enough to pull off you know that what I feel like is looking like it's supposed to be
a very funny movie. And I don't know them to have a big history with comedy, and I'll say I'm not that familiar with either of them, but just looking at their IMDb and watching the trailer, I was like, I'm nervous that a lot of these jokes are gonna fall flat despite the very cool world it looks like it takes place. And I'll say I laughed my ass off that whole movie hilarious. It was very funny and I was wrong to question that, and.
A lot of that to do with the performances, I think too, because Ryan Gosling was so funny, like he really brought a lot to the role. I thought Margot Robbie was amazing. Oh my god, everyone's talk about Ryan Gosling and they should again. He did an amazing job and he was really really funny. But Margot Robbie brought such a humanity. Yeah, she was so real and I just loved it. I just thought she did an amazing job. I really thought she was incredible.
I feel a little badly for her right now because and she she'll be fine, but but I feel, like so many people, it's so much easier to be impressed by what Ryan Gosling was doing because his was big and comedic and like he has all these very stylized performance deliveries and stuff where it's quotable and stand out and noticeable, and what Margaret Robbie doing is so much more subtle and like you said, real and human, and
you don't notice that as much. By definition, she's doing a good job because it's not sticking out right, And so now I'm like, it's the Barbie movie, which is kind of about this, and everybody's talking about Ryan Gosling, right, that's upsetting to me for on her behalf because I'm like she, I think honestly did a more impressive job at doing something that doesn't stick out at you.
Yeah, yeah, I think.
And America Ferrara too, I thought was also yes, awesome, But I also have a little bit of America Frere and I also kind of have a deep passionate history together.
El has a real dog, y'all. He's got a lot of girls. I'll say, Margaret Robbie's.
In my on your list, on my list.
I love Margaret Robbie.
And I would be jealous of you, not for you, like you know what I mean, Like, I wouldn't be like, how dare you? I'd be like, how dare you? Why not me? I'm well.
No, but yeah, I just thought, yeah, I thought everybody and it was for first of all, everyone in it was having a blast, which is really fun to watch. I mean, it just makes it so much more fun to watch. I really enjoyed the idea of a land, Barbie Land, you know, you know, completely run by Barbie. The cans are not important, They're They're just there, you know,
to be Kens. There's even like some Barbie show on I don't even know what network, but it's some Barbie show anyway, and they show they show this little clip of Ken being like, well, Barbie has so many jobs and I just don't have any job, Like what am I?
What do I even do?
And he goes, I'm Barbie's boyfriend. That's my job, you know. So it's like very common for Ken to be given this kind of ideal of like, that's my job, beach I do peach or what I and that's what I do, and I just I think that's really fun and it was fun to sort of lp it on its head. Of course, that's the point, right, is that they come to the real world and they find that women don't run the world and all the men are not himbos running around trying to make the women happy with them.
It's very much the opposite. And so then Ken learns about patriarchy, brings it to Barbieland and changes everything in barbie Land, and all the Barbies are now skimpily clad, you know, serve and drinks and yeah, subservient, and the Kens are all very excited about patriarchy because they get to be in charge of things and have their Instead of a dream house, they get to have a mojo dojo kasa house or whatever. So then they have to write the Barbie land, right, that's the movie to write
barbieland get it back to Barbie's in charge. And we did you know, we're feminists ourselves, and we have a lot of feminist friends that are very deep in the theory and they have been studying feminism for many, many, many many years. Right, So we have some friends that are kind of like in the Barbie movie, not that great, right, feminist wise, it's very simplict like Baby's First feminism. Yeah, yeah,
and it is. There's definitely if you read any theory, a lot of the things that are said in the film you've heard a thousand times yea, like America Frere's big speech for example, in the film, I have heard a variation of since college. Right, So I was like, yeah, yeah, obviously, So that can be a little off putting, I guess if you're watching it for feminist reasons, I guess.
Or if you're really first disappointing that it's like so basic you were hoping for something more little dechallenging for yourself.
Yeah, profound or something like that, And I totally understand that, and it's completely valid. I thought it worked though, because the whole conceit throughout is that Barbie and Barbie Land they're being played with, right, So for example, she doesn't walk down the stairs, she floats because you just take your Barbie and you pick her up and you put her wherever you want her to be when you play with her. So they're very much leaning into that people
are being played with. This is the playing this is the playing situation. So it kind of worked for me because it was like it was simplistic and straightforward in the way that oh, no, Barbie Lands, Barbie's been taken over by the patriarchy. I know, we'll speak truth to power, and then by the time your playtime is over, everything is fixed and everything is fine. And it took very little and it wasn't hard. Yeah, that's playtime, right, So
it kind of worked for me on that level. And I was like, there's a lot of people who don't read feminist theory since college that haven't heard all this shits, and it was probably still very revelatory for a lot of watchers. So I'm okay, if you need to welcome Matt to feminism, make it hot pink, I'm fine with that.
That's what I'm thinking too about America Ferrera's character. This is not a woman who necessarily has read a bunch of feminist theory and has heard all these arguments before. She's literally discovering and saying that. It's not that she's discovering her for the first time. She's known it and never had someone to express it too. Yes, and now she's in this place she's like, hang on, let me tell you what I think and lays out something that
may sound very foundational to someone. She's not a scholar. She's a mom with a job like she's She's someone who would just let me articulate this any way I can, so that these brainwashed people can also hear it and be woken up a little bit. So I think by its nature it should be kind of simple in its ideology, like a foundational understanding of it.
It made sense to me, Yeah, I didn't, It didn't. It didn't. I mean at the time when I was watching it, I was like, all right, Greta Gerwig, I know you know more than this this is like Twitter twitter stuff. But again then having seen it still really enjoyed it. I was like, fine, whatever, And then I was reading a lot of reactions and there were a lot of women older than me, younger than me, who were like when they said that, I cried When America
Ferrera had that speech, I cried. It was so amazing to hear finally, for the first time someone say that, and it was like, oh wow, I never really thought about my life that way, or I never really you know, literally it was working in in real time for some people that didn't don't don't aren't familiar with that thinking. So, uh, that was fine with me. That was fine with me. But I do get the criticism, of course, Oh for sure, that was fine with me.
Sure it's not a flawless movie, and it's not gonna fix all the world's problems, but hopefully it will, you know, give people something to think about. Yeah, I mean, I'll say my my biggest challenge was probably actually in the real world. The executives and we talked about this a little bit, the Will Ferrell's character and all them like they were so I think Ryan George said it on pitch meeting. He's like all the Mattel executives who want
to eat their cake but also have their cake. Yeah, you know, it was like they were point in one in one aspect, they're the problem, right, Like there's all these men running this company for girls dolls don't know no better, and they're reinforcing all these negative stereotypes, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. So they're kind of the bad guys, but they're presented as so dopey and silly.
And and well.
Intentioned and unrealistic. We moved from Barbie's fantasyland into the real world, and most of the men they meet in the real world are some exaggerated version of and are not not so much exaggerated of. You know, the worst kind of man you meet on the street, cat callers and ass slappers and you know, all these like kind of gross dudes. And then they show up at Mattel and we're back in a fantasy like these aren't realistic characters anymore. Ken they're basically.
Kenny Himbo's Yeah, they're they're kind of Ken life.
Yeah, and then they when they go to Barbie Land and it's funny, but it's feels unnecessary. It feels wedged in, Yeah, and I don't feel like they got the right lesson out of it, or or at least not an effective version of whatever they were trying to do with those guys.
I agree. I feel like the Metel executives were completely pointless. Really, they they really had nothing ye to do with anything. I think if you took them out, it wouldn't really change the mood very much.
It wouldn't.
But you know, well, also keeping in mind that this isn't a Tel person exactly. Uh maybe Baby's Furst feminism and goofy fun well intentioned and Metel execs where we do point out there's not enough women in here, not as far as they were letting her go, you know what I mean, So I do. I do keep that in mind. It's not like it was gretit Ger who was like, I'm coming after me till you know, like, but they were definitely, I thought, pretty pretty useless.
I also felt, I'll give my my male perspective.
Here for thank God, finally thanks.
Someone's giving it. But no, really, I think from my perspective, I really enjoyed the what I felt like they were saying with this patriarchy takeover of Barbie Land, where it wasn't exclusively like men are awful and you give them a chance and they'll just all turn into the worst
douchebags in the world. Theirs was and this was I think highlighted in Barbie and Ken's conversation near the end, largely a reaction to how they'd been treated in their world up to that point, Like the reason the Kens went so far in the wrong direction was because they had not been allowed to have any agency of their own for so long, right, so they are, you know, treated as objects for Barbie totally at the at their mercy, and they don't really have their own full identities or
anything like that. They're basically just dolls, these hymbos, and so when presented with like, well you could have power, they go a little overboard with it. They go very
overboard with it. And I to me that felt like the lesson in there is not just like these men that act like this are monsters, obviously, and the cruelty they did towards Barbie's is unacceptable, but also how we treat each other informs our reactions to that, right, and so there was something for Barbie to learn too, And I think that parallels back into the real world when men get all angry about how reactive feminists are or how like you know that that ideology is so extreme,
It's like, well, what do you want? How look at the lives these people have had to live for so long. Of course they want to move quickly and rapidly in the other direction. And maybe you might feel like that's overshooting, But what do you expect from someone who hasn't had any agency their whole lives?
Right?
You know? Yeah?
And I like too that it was patriarchy was as much of a brainwash for them, yes, as it was for the Barbiees, Like they they were fully taken in and Ken's like, as soon as I found out was about I didn't really care. I thought that was so funny, Like that was so funny. And I think that's good because it shows like patriarchy was hurting them too, even
when they were in charge of everything. They were like I just missed my friend Barbie, and I don't know what to do, And you know, like they didn't like it really, I mean, you know, they were pretty uncomfortable after a while, I think, and it was just not how they wanted to live. They wanted to be with Barbie and have a good time with Barbie, Like that was, you know, why do I need her to be over here underneath me in order to feel like a full Ken?
I am kanough or But you know, I thought that was that was well done, or at least I thought that was a big point. Part of that point, I think was to show like this is harming them as much as it's harming the Barbie is either way, you're caught up in a way of thinking that isn't serving you, you know, stuff like that. So I thought that was that.
Worked really well.
I had issues with some of the Ruth Handler stuff at the end. So when Barbie is saying, I'm you know, not done, like my story is not and Mattell's like, well, you're in love with Ken, that's your story, and she's like, well, I'm not in love with Ken, So I was my story right? And so so then she meets Ruth Handler, and Ruth Handler's like she says the line mothers stand still so our daughters can look back and see how far they've come, or something paraphrasing something like that.
I think that's pretty much it.
And I disliked that line I'm not a mother, so feel free to write to me and tell me why I'm wrong about this. But I did not like the idea that moms once they have a kid, stand still and don't do anything, or don't achieve anything right, or don't continue to work on themselves or their lives because it's all about their daughter now or something. I just didn't really think that sentiment worked for me. It didn't land it. Sort of that idea is why I don't
want kids. Why I think a lot of people don't want kids is because of that idea. And I saw a lot of women say they loved that line and they thought it was amazing and it brought to you to their eyes. So maybe I'm missing something.
But well, I'm sure it depends on your perspective too. I'm sure a lot of mothers feel like I put some shit down, yeah, so that you know, my daughter could get further than I did, and you know I set my career aside to raise her. Whatever. I mean. The women have such a more complicated, uh life to lead as a parent in a lot of ways, in a lot of the traditional sense, like, well, I guess my it's default assumption that if someone's career has got to go. It's mine, right, So you know that's where
I'm seeing. I guess where you could find something relatable in that line, but I do think it's such a I agree with you that it's so bluntly stated as a rule, right that it's it's a little disheartening.
Well, and to tie it back to Oppenheimer, is that not why Kitty was the way she was. Yeah, because she had to stand still for other people and did not get to become a botanist like she wanted, and not get her PhD. And I know she chose her She made her choices too. She said, I'm not going to go after this PhD. She did her thing. Sure, I'm not trying to take that away, but that is part of what made her so mad, I think, and feel so constrained in her life. Was once you're a
wife and mother, that's what you are. You don't get to have something else. So that line kind of frustrated me on that level. Again, maybe I'm missing something because I'm not a parent myself, but I had trouble with that line. And I also kind of hated the part where she's like, I want to be a real human and she's like, well, take my hands and you'll see what it's really like to be human, so you know what, you know what you're getting yourself into here. And then
they showed nothing but good times. Yeah, show a lot of home videos of like happy birthdays and like fun Christmases and like people in a field with flowers and like babies and lovely imagery about how great it is to be a human being. And I remember even thinking in the movie, I wish they were showing the nuclear bomb, because I mean, first of all, I've been an amazing
tie in. It's just like Kelly and Murphy somehow, but that you know, good times is not the only thing there is to be in human And I think it would have made her yes, a lot more definitive and powerful if she had seen a lot of bad shit too and said even so with all that shit, I still want it, right, I think I think it would have been more powerful, And so it kind of undercut it to me to only show good things.
I was thinking the exact same thing during that montage. I was like, this is a little too nice for the idea of what it is to be human. It sucks sometimes and and also, that's what makes good things good is bad things. If everything was just happy all the time, then where's your comparison point? What is happy?
It's just normal, right, right? So I agree that I think that montage would have been a lot better with some some some shots from openham They if both movies had found a way to include in their montages elements of the other. Truly the greatest we had to get movies like.
A drunken dream of kitties. So she's going, Hi, Barbie, Hi, Barbie, Hi, Barbie, I'm a bus fitness and then she wakes up. You know, I don't know, right. I also loved the point where she said all these things about how contradictory it is to be a woman, and now we want we're putting all that on a doll as well, because we want Barbe to see everything too. She has to be both beautiful, slim and gorgeous so that people want to play with her.
But also she has to be every job and smart and have all the capabilities of whatever whatever, right, Like, we need her to do everything and be everything. So weird and now everyone's kind of feeling that way. But the movie too, they're sort of like it's too feminist, it's not feminist enough.
Oh my god.
You know, it's getting all the same. All the exact same contradictions that she talks about in the movie are given to the movie now. And that's very interesting to me to see that kind of being extrapolated in the real world.
You know, I've said it before many times, and I'm glad that Greta Gerwig and the Barbie cast picked up on what I was saying, which is that it's it's I think it's challenging for women sometimes in this world it's complicated. Maybe even you know, I don't know, may maybe a little more complicated than men. I'm not sure. I don't want to walk into that, but but you know, I'm just glad that other that that women have finally caught.
Up to what I thought, Oh my god, you were gonna challenging me today. Uh No, But I just I think that's really interesting. And that's not to say that like movies that women do or you know, people put a lot more on it. I think they are putting a lot on this movie. It was offering a lot, so of course, what will people will put their weight of their expectations on it. And that's going to make a difference. But and people are saying the same about Oppenheimer.
They want Oppenheimer to do everything. I wanted it to have more with the women. You know, people were like, why didn't you include the down Winders. There's lots of criticism of that movie too, not even enough or whatever, right, and so we should probably examine how much we're expecting from our entertainment and our dolls and shit.
I mean, like, imagine, five years ago someone said Mattel is gonna produce a Barbie movie and they didn't tell you who's directing it or anything like that. We all know what trash that movie is gonna be. It's gonna they're gonna get the director of snow Dogs to come in and do the dopiest, schlockiest, like the jokes are gonna be awful, it's gonna be. It's gonna be the most stereotypical, just like Minions, but they're Barbies now garbage. What we got is kind of unbelievable.
I agree.
I'm sort of shocked that it was just on a surface level as thoughtful as it was, because A didn't have to be and B probably struggled just to be that. Yeah, so I'm impressed. Yeah.
Also shout out to Michael Sarah. Alan was is a really fun character. Very much enjoyed Alan. I love you go to beat some ass. Yeah, I'm Ken's friend and we can share clothes.
Or whatever. That is perfect part for him.
Delightful.
Yeah, just really good. Similu was really funny too. Yes, it was great, and uh yeah, it's just overall. Oh it's a ray.
It's a ray for president.
We're fans. She was hilarious.
I did love the kid too.
I don't know the great Kate McKinnon's I mean Kate McKinnon and Greta Gerwig just found out that they were roommates in college.
I know, yeah, I didn't know that. Oh the kid right America.
For first daughter, she was great.
We'll also say a little funny Easter egg. The daughter and her three friends are apparently based on the original Brats dolls. Oh so sort of like the next generation or whatever. So I thought that was kind of funny, and it's true when you look at the four bratstalls there at least very similar Like ethnicity is there's one one black Brats, one blonde one, you know. Yeah, yeah, oh shit, those really are her fore friends.
That's cute.
So that was really cute. A lot of little shit like that. That's fun to find out about the movie too, Yeah, for sure. It just makes it more fun.
So, folks, I want to know, I want to know. We've been talking about Oppenheimer, we've been talking about Barbie, and I'm just curious. I want you all to to email us. I want you to message us. I want you to let us know if you like listen to us talk about movies, because we like doing it. And I've always been curious if we put that on the air, you know what kind of interest, Yeah, Garner from that,
So I'm s curious. I mean, you know, it's just kind of circumstantial that we went into Oppenheimer and Diana dove deep into all this research, and now we get to talk about the movie as well. So I hope you'll enjoyed it.
Yeah, I hope so too. And all this stuff about Oppenheimer's ladies, Oh my god, I was just and as kids, you know, they were all of them a little bit left to the dust of history, so it was cool to dust them off and kind of see what was going on.
Right, right. Careful that dust, don't breathe.
In because that's radioactive.
Yeah, thank you so much for sticking with us through this. I think I think was really fascinated by by everything we've been doing for the last couple hours. So thank you for tuning in. Do please reach out give us your thoughts. I'm now more than ever. Maybe I just want to know what you thought of Oppenheimer the movie of the Man of These Women.
Nuclear nuclear weapons?
Yeah, sure, disarmament.
Would you have dropped the bomb on Japan?
God? But and then let us know? Yeah, if you want to join us for more movie conversations, we'd love to. We'd love to wrap you into that, so please shoot us an email ridict Romance at gmail dot com.
We're also on Instagram. I'm at Dianamite.
Boone and I'm at over Rate.
It's Eli and the show is atridict Romance.
Thanks again everybody for tuning in and spending your time with us, and we can't wait to hear from you. We can't wait to give you another episode next time.
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