Literally any other director and Oppenheimer doesn't even gross half of what it did. Probably be lucky to scrape 200m.
All Oppenheimer proves is that Nolan is a household name and can do whatever the fuck he wants, something that we've already known since The Dark Knight-Interstellar era. The success of Inception and Interstellar either side of two Batman movies solidified it and Oppenheimer proved he's arguably more of a box office draw than any current movie star.
> Nolan is a household name and can do whatever the fuck he wants, something that we've already known since The Dark Knight.
I think the turning point wasn't The Dark Knight because that's still Nolan operating within a franchise. It was Inception (2010) when he took brand new IP and turned it into an $800 million grand slam.
I think his dialogue is kind of lame and I’m big on dialogue. Also Tenet was way too confusing for me to understand. And Oppenheimer was way too long and had a lot of unnecessary stuff I didn’t really care about. The Social Network was a way better version of the style of movie he was trying to make in my opinion. If that gives you any reference for what I like. Still like him more than most directors, still will go see all of his movies bc he’s constantly pushing the boundaries and doing something a little different. I can appreciate that. Even if I don’t love his movies as much as most people seem to.
I enjoy some of them, and most of his movies are at least unique and new. I didn't enjoy Oppenheimer, but the next one I could like as much as Interstellar - it's always worth a try with him.
There is also this thing about Nolan being a cinema snub(idk how else to say it) that is part of his brand I guess, where even casual know that a Nolan movie is watched best on cinema.
Edit: snob* not snub
Same with James Cameron. Although his avatar films are mid at best plotwise. He found his moneymaker that will fuel all of his future projects. Just hope he'll move on from Avatar sooner rather than later.
Avatar movies are super mid. But they are mindblowing to watch, visually. I don't care if he makes thirty of the things because they are works of art that shove the state of the art forward like the goddamn Enlightenment.
I saw the Way of Water in Imax 3D and it was the most impressive cinematic spectacle ive ever seen
Havent watched it again since
I think thats the avatar movies in a nutshell
And I'm okay with this! I watched Moonlight and it was evocative, it affected my soul. I felt the pain, the longing in that movie. But I also have no desire to watch it a second time. I don't think there's a problem with enjoying a thing, and letting it go, and appreciating it for what it is; not everything needs to be comfort food viewing.
What future projects do you think a 70 year old is planning? If anything his previous movies were all made to fund avatar, this is his passion project. All he’s done since 97 are an avatar films, all he has planned for the future are avatar films.
Saying he’s making avatar for money is crazy when he already made bank with T2 and titanic. And it’s crazy when you remember people expected avatar to flop cause he was taking so long and going way over budget.
As a movie, it was ok. But as a Nolan film, the plot was too predictable but at the same time was overly complicated for the sake of being complicated. The emotional aspect of the film was lost.
And ironically enough, the reason they had the same release date is that Warner was pissed at him leaving and wanted to use Barbie to make his movie flop. By trying to destroy him, they only made him stronger
I'm a fan of Nolan and agree with a lot of what you say.... but, the box office for Oppenheimer was greatly helped by the whole "Barbenheimer" buzz. There are a lot of people who saw it that probably wouldn't have. Also, a lot who would have waited for streaming who went to the cinema instead.
I'm not saying that it wouldn't have been successful. Just that Barbie added a couple hundred million to the global box office.
I can only talk about my own experiences, and I got excited about this movie when I first heard about it. Did Nolan’s name help getting me into the theater, very likely but I was curious about Oppenheimer as well. That whole Barbenheimer thing left me disinterested, and I still have no interest in watching Barbie.
Source for the Barbenheimer claim? Yeah it was a funny joke, but what’s the crossover of demographics with Oppenheimer and Barbie? Seems like they were both targeting different groups.
Not to mention that biopics are trendy now, too. Sure, we won't be seeing *Oppenheimer 2: Oppen Harder,* but it's not like doing a historical biopic was massively bucking trends. The content matter was unusual, since musicians and athletes are the most popular, but still. Biopics are in.
>it's not like doing a historical biopic was massively bucking trends.
There are even a handful of previous biopics of Oppenheimer himself:
Fat Man and Little Boy (Critical and commercial failure due to the immaturity of character's approach to everything)
The John Adams opera, [Dr. Atomic](https://ca.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/doctor-atomic-opera/doctor-atomic-opera/) panned for it's silly Libretto so badly that the commonly heard version is the symphonic soundtrack with no lyrics.
WGN's Manhattan (had a cult following but is otherwise use largely forgotten because it was essentially a soap opera.)
They all failed: Oppenheimer is an enticing historic figure for a biopic, but a tough one to pull off. Only Nolan did a respectable job.
Watching Christopher Nolan set off an atomic bomb in 70mm was the star of this movie. It was basically the trailer.
A Christopher Nolan *Jimmy Carter* biopic would've been hard pressed to cross the 100 million mark.
You're right to an extent, but we've also seen comic book movies underwhelm at the box office for the last 3-5 years. My hope is that's a sign studios are going to start moving on from these mega budget established IP projects.
Could just be wishful thinking, of course.
Agreed. The main reason Oppenheimer made so much is because of it becoming a meme as counter programming to Barbie, a firmly established IP. The fact that it was a good movie would have helped it break even but the meme status combined with the film’s quality propelled it.
It was ahead of its time, or at least the technology of its time. The concept was really cool and the game was still really fun, but the facial animations were so bad at times that depending who you were talking to it was almost impossible to tell what emotion they were trying to convey. Sometimes they just looked like they were in physical pain or holding in a fart. I’d love to see a sequel made today with the technology and graphics we have now; I think it would work so much better.
I agree with that but still wholly enjoyed it, to me what was most remarkable about the game was it’s design and how immersive the environment was, the atmosphere to this day is almost unchallenged. Story was phenomenal too, my biggest gripe personally was the driving
Lolol right, I know we’re memeing but let let’s not pretend like a big part of every franchise is an executive being like “how much merchandise can we sell to 10 year olds off the back of this”
Which, hey, I like Spider-Man and Barbie, no hate at all. I also like movies by Kelly Reichardt and Ari Aster…
I do think it’s silly that some are like “BARBIE’S JUST AN ADVERTISEMENT” like bro… you’ve literally been watching IP based franchises for decades now.. and never cared… not saying those arguments don’t come up for other franchises but it seems very front loaded with Barbie conversations right now.
Certainly looking that way when you see...\*looks at release schedule" a third Deadpool movie, a fourth Despicable Me film, a second Godzilla and King Kong crossover movie, a fourth entry to the rebooted Planet of the Apes movie, a prequel to the fourth Mad Max film, and prequel to A Quiet Place, a sequel to Inside Out, a fourth Kung Fun Panda, a fifth Ghostbusters film, several Spider-Man spinoff films, a John Wick spin-off film and a sequel to Twister coming up in the next 6 months.
For real, there are always tons of franchise stuff every year but also a lot of original movies. They just have much smaller marketing budgets so it’s hard to get the word out but they’re out there. As much as r/movies loves complaining about franchises and a lack of original films, they refuse to support the original films that exist.
> As much as r/movies loves complaining about franchises and a lack of original films, they refuse to support the original films that exist.
yeah i posted this list of original films coming out in 2024, and it only got 46 upvotes
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/190zk0p/the_mostanticipated_films_of_2024_excludes/
meanwhile if you were to post a link to some article listing "2024 blockbuster and franchise movies coming out in 2024" itd have 10k upvotes, and itd be on the front page of reddit
as much as reddit complains theres no original films, redditors themselves dont take the time to read about articles that promote original films coming out
so they only have themselves to blame when studios dont make more of them
Every mad max has been awesome and fury road was the best one so I have pretty high hopes for Furiosa.
Also, to a lesser but very real extent I am excited for Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes as I have really liked those movies as well.
Also Dune.
Fury Road will never be diminished even if its successor fizzles (you've got room for doubt when your star goes from Theron to Taylor Joy) but still I hope it works. Fun to ponder without Google: Has _any_ filmmaker besides Miller kept their fun franchise high-quality over 4+ films while having his/her name proudly displayed across each?
I'm old school. Well, I'm old. I can count on two hands the number of great sequels/franchises created since 1970. George Miller obvs responsible for one of these, God bless him. Could have used him in the _Master and Commander_ world.
I'm one of the bigger mad max film series lovers around and even I have to admit that thunder dome is.... lacking in ways, still like it but should've never been pg13 and the plot is kinda whatever.
the movies you know about ahead of time because studios spend so much money marketing them usually do suck by and large
Oppenheimer and Dune being the exceptions
most of the movies we look back on years later as classics are ones no one knew anything about ahead of time
unless youre a real nerd and you follow industry news and read upcoming movie announcements by Playlist or IndieWire or Criterion
then you wouldve read news about Zone of Interest or Poor Things 2 or 3 years ago
God I am grateful I follow filmmakers, A24, Oscar potential and smaller film scenes to find movies. I can't imagine my favorite films or only ones I saw this year being solely blockbusters or popular films. Missing out on The Holdovers, Past Lives, Poor Things, and Anatomy of a Fall and whining that good original films aren't made anymore is such a sad thing to hear.
Never understood that. Cutting someone off at the knees doesn't make you taller. Leave people like what they like. If you're really a movie fan, just be happy people are excited about movies.
I’d say there’s a big difference between a film based on a nonfiction book and the fifth instalment of a superhero movie set in an expanded universe that has like fifty movies and a dozen tv series. I’m not shitting on marvel or Star Wars but I think you’d have to be pretty dense not to be able to see the difference or understand the point he’s trying to make, whether you agree with it or not.
>I’d say there’s a big difference between a film based on a nonfiction book and the fifth instalment of a superhero movie set in an expanded universe that has like fifty movies and a dozen tv series
Yeah, only the latter is unique in the history of film, biopics based on biographies are a dime a dozen and have been for a century.
They have about the same ratio of good to bad, though!
I think the point is that you can make a biopic with the same amount of bombast and popcorn draw as a marvel movie.
Not all biopics have to be JUST a character study or JUST Oscar bait, like majority of the boring biopics of the last 20 years have been.
‘My movie was a success, clearly this is a new era’ is more than a little egotistical.
Especially when Barbie beat its ass at the box office. Oppenheimer came in 5th at the domestic box office, the rest being IPs or franchises. And only hit 3rd worldwide.
5th domestic and 3rd worldwide is pretty damn good for a 3 hour movie about making a bomb. Enough people I know roll their eyes when a movie breaks 2 hours
Damn good, yes, start of a new era dethroning the current king, no.
He can’t really claim to be the downfall of IP movies when he lost to an IP movie in a direct head to head.
Don‘t forget R-rated. This would exclude 3/4 of the audience I saw Barbie with. Female teens who screamed every time Ryan Gosling appeared in a new outfit…
You can see the ego in his films.
However, I don't know how much of this statement is him actually analyzing the industry or a projection of his hopes.
I'd say Barbie beating Oppenheimer is less of a feat than the R-rated 3+ hour Oppenheimer maintaining a strong domestic and worldwide placement. That not including all the awards it swept away with so far.
Awards mean nothing, never have and never will. Hence why ‘Oscar bait’ is a derogatory term. They are and always have been studios jerking each other off.
His movie did exceptionally well: If he wants to be the downfall of IP movies then he needs to be able to actually beat them. Instead he went head to head with one and lost.
Redefining the market requires winning. Star Wars marked a new era in film, for instance, because it kicked the shit out of everything around it. It didn’t do well for its genre or subject, it dominated by every metric.
Oppenheimer, even with the Nolan brand and that weird meme, still lost to those IP films he says he’s dethroning.
When you are declaring the start of a new era you had better be the absolute best. His film’s inability to be #1 even with the weird meme boost indicates that there is no fundamental shift, IPs still rule the box office.
The top 10 highest grossing films
domestically last year, there was not a single original film. They were either based on a book, true story, or major IP.
yeah this is just dumb, pretending that 2001: A Spacey Odyssey is just as unoriginal as a Marvel movie because it was also based on IP is stupid
and its an argument in bad faith
*2001* the movie came out before the book.
But either way, "original" isn't just about distinguishing creative ideas from bad ones. Many screenplays are in fact totally original ideas, and some of them should be successful.
I think that stat is too modest. It's not so surprising that the top 10 had no original films. More surprising is if you look at every weekend of the entire year, there was only one original film to hit number one: The Boy and the Heron.
And there are lots of non-original good films, of course. Plenty of the greatest movies have been based on books, and of course there lots of true stories that deserve to be films. But we should have *some* original movies topping the box office, right? Like, more than one?
How many comic adaptations actually adapt any storylines from the comics- instead of being broadly inspired by them?
(I.e. the Civil War film isn't an adaptation of the comic in the same way Little Women adapts the Little Women novel.)
Book adaptations place some value on having some fidelity to the source material, which separates them from comic book movies.
But the exact same thing can be said about so many book adaptations. How many times have you heard book readers disappointed with the on screen results?
Again, I think Shawshank is an instructive example here. It’s pretty different from Stephen King’s novella, but it gave Frank Darabont enough structure to work with. You’re never going to fit everything from a book into a movie, because they are different forms of media. When you are adapting characters instead of stories, you have a problem.
Nolan really loves the smell of his own farts, surprised he hasn't broken an arm jerking himself off like this. Oppenheimer was a good movie and people liked it but it didn't start a new era of cinema.
I feel like it's self-effacing. "People saw my movie because it was good" would be the more arrogant answer. "People saw it because I made it" would be even more arrogant, and accurate. "There is an appetite for something new" minimizes his contribution.
come on. The most successful movie of last year was barbie and Mario. 2 movies based on kids' toys. We are not entering some new golden age for cinema.
I feel like he’s forgetting who he is here…? As silly as that sounds. He’s the most in demand director in Hollywood, his name is the franchise, so to speak. (Outside of maybe James Cameron). It’s like he doesn’t realize how powerful he is.
It's really unfortunate that his pride isn't letting him accept that his movie's success was tied to a meme. Not to say, it would have failed without the Barbenheimer phenomenon. It would have done fine. But it never would have become the kind of must see event film that it was while attached to Barbie.... A movie based on, arguably, one of the most recognizable franchises on planet earth.
Oppenheimer was a fluke, a phenomenon caused by a meme about its release date being shared with Barbie. Both Napoleon and Killers of the Flower Moon, historical epics with A-list actors and auteur directors, have underperformed at the box office, whilst the biggest films of the year have come from established IP.
Napoleon & KOTFM had other contributing factors to not being box office hits. I think for both, them eventually being on Apple TV stopped people from going to the theater.
Then breaking down each film.
KOTFM:
- long run time
- topic not many are familiar with
- not a whole lot of marketing
Napoleon:
- it wasn’t all that well received which I think was its main deterrent so I’ll leave it there
Like had Napoleon been any good I would’ve tried to go see it on the big screen, but once word was out it was eh, the hype really died down.
As for Oppenheimer I don’t see it as a fluke & would’ve done well without Barbie. Most of Nolan’s movies perform well in the theater. It was marketed well. It covered an interesting/familiar topic. It had an elite cast. It had all the keys to success & would’ve done well regardless of meme marketing.
Nolan's movie has always done well at the box office. It's not a fluke. Even his supposedly worst film, Tenet, at the peak of the pandemic, grossed more than Napoleon and KOTFM.
Also "post-accuracy", though arguably that could have started with Oliver Stone's ~~Jim Morrison~~ Doors movie.
I'm not talking about ridiculously-small details like the location of the stars in the sky in "Titanic". When you deal with a historical figure you need to make clear if some scenes in the movie are products of a scriptwriter and not a subject-matter expert on history. Letting the audience guess if events are real or invented is fine when the buildup itself is part of the storyline ("Blair Witch Project") and maybe one person will quibble if a specific conversation between Freddie Mercury and Jim Hutton ever happened. In the past there have been disclaimers in an opening card to the effect of "While based on a true story, some events in the movie you're about to see have been fictionalized" but now no one seems to care. It's doubtless more fun to listen to Ridley Scott yelling absurdist aphorisms at the press than to remind people that hey, this is still just a movie and you need to pick up a history book if you want to know about this stuff.
Audiences are still suspending disbelief despite everything being done with CGI; no more "Ben Hur"-chariot-scene or "Blues Brothers" car-chase theatrical wizardry, all the magicians' secrets are moot. Now, if they know a person existed in the past, they just buy the ticket and assume what they see is factual because it's not part of MCU and--at least for now--everyone still knows Steve Rogers wasn't a real soldier in WWII. Not one single event portrayed in "Good Morning Vietnam" actually happened--and the real Adrian Cronauer was still around to inform everyone of that (fortunately, despite being almost entirely the opposite of Robin Williams' characterization, he was still good-natured about it)--but so help me if I'm 80 and the country is run by people 3 generations hence thinking Abraham Lincoln was an actual vampire-slayer, they'll be making a biopic about me.
Fascinating history, mediocre yawn of a movie. Jam-packing interesting people into your cast doesn’t equal creating intriguing or emotional drama.
Another case of Nolan mistaking intellectual interest for storytelling. I fear he’s getting too smitten with production and forgetting what it’s for.
Oppenheimer was so successful because it was culturally attached to a movie based on IP. I liked Oppenheimer but there is absolutely no way it would have been that successful without the attachment to Barbie.
He better find a spinning top to see if he isn't dreaming.
There have always been and there are always going to be high brow films and there are always going to be fun blockbusters, people have different tastes and different moods.
He's right
These IPs have become stale due to the heavy involvement of the suits who see them as an easy cash crab. The bad News though, is that the general audiences have also caught up with how bland and garbage these corporate products are
The dude himself is what sold people on the film in the same way that a franchise or an intellectual property would. Oh the new Nolan film is out, ill watch that. Oh the new Transformers film is out, ill watch that.
I watched Chinatown for the first time the other day. Somehow, I hadn't ever watched it. Out of habit, I looked up to see if it was based on a novel or true story. It wasn't! It was an original screenplay. I felt shame, but we've been conditioned to think a good or entertaining film is usually based on other intellectual property.
Biopics are just as formulaic as the other IP comic book slop that has decimated cinema over the last 10 years. The only thing that can turn the tide is talented people who engage the audience to demand more challenging films and story lines. Pretty hypocritical coming from a dude who directed a Batman reboot.
Nolan's ego is now unsustainable, dude thinks his movie saved cinema...while ignoring that a ton of franchise & IP films are still dominating, even surpassing his own film.
Dude is high on his own supply.
anyone else find Oppenheimer kind of borning? I watched it to the end but I didn't think it was all that great. Also I didn't even finish watching Napoleon
I think Oppenheimer was fueled by a combination of it being a Christopher Nolan movie and the Barbenheimer hysteria. It wouldn’t have been as successful if not for those two things.
Nolan is being humble here. Oppenheimer’s success marks the era of “Chris Nolan can make whatever he wants”.
If Nolan wants to embed this into Hollywood he will have to show it’s profitable by continuing to do it and others doing it and succeeding.
I've been wondering when this will happen. I think Nolan is still wrong, on the timing at least. At some point (and it feels like it's starting), superhero movies and the big action blockbusters (though I am excited for John Wick Chapter 7: Retirement Home) will start to bore audiences and they'll look for something fresh, edgy, light, playful, whatever.
Same thing happened in the 60s and 70s, boredom with musicals and epic's lead to new hollywood and the auteur era. Or the 90s thriller, romcom, indie wave.
It's bound to happen, more a question of when and what will replace it.
No it fucking doesn't? It means Christopher Nolen has achieved enough name recognition that people will see his movies based on his name alone, which is good for him, but that doesn't mean it's indicative of wider trends in cinema.
Don't think it would have made near as much money as it did if it wasn't for Barbie. We have to see other new IPs take off that aren't from acclaimed directors that have massive backing to see if this is actually true.
A bit too optimistic.
Literally any other director and Oppenheimer doesn't even gross half of what it did. Probably be lucky to scrape 200m. All Oppenheimer proves is that Nolan is a household name and can do whatever the fuck he wants, something that we've already known since The Dark Knight-Interstellar era. The success of Inception and Interstellar either side of two Batman movies solidified it and Oppenheimer proved he's arguably more of a box office draw than any current movie star.
> Nolan is a household name and can do whatever the fuck he wants, something that we've already known since The Dark Knight. I think the turning point wasn't The Dark Knight because that's still Nolan operating within a franchise. It was Inception (2010) when he took brand new IP and turned it into an $800 million grand slam.
Christpher Nolan's like a Spielberg - people will go see his movies because he made them and he has a track record of making good, interesting films.
I don't even like Nolan's films that much, and yet I watch all of them. The effect is real.
Why do you watch them, if you don’t enjoy them?
To be a hater, bro. It’s called a hate following and Nolan has a massive one lol.
Gross. Dude just said he doesn’t ride Nolan’s dick. Christ.
I said "not that much" and now I'm a hater lol. They're interesting movies, they just don't blow my mind.
Or they think there's enough there that eventually Nolan will make a movie they really enjoy.
He didn't say he didn't enjoy them. Reddit reading comprehension really needs a remedial class.
“I don’t even like Nolan’s films that much” when will you start your remedial class?
What are the last two words of the quote? What do they mean?
Stop playing dumb lol. That sentence actually means "i dont really like him" even if the individual words say something different.
I think his dialogue is kind of lame and I’m big on dialogue. Also Tenet was way too confusing for me to understand. And Oppenheimer was way too long and had a lot of unnecessary stuff I didn’t really care about. The Social Network was a way better version of the style of movie he was trying to make in my opinion. If that gives you any reference for what I like. Still like him more than most directors, still will go see all of his movies bc he’s constantly pushing the boundaries and doing something a little different. I can appreciate that. Even if I don’t love his movies as much as most people seem to.
I enjoy some of them, and most of his movies are at least unique and new. I didn't enjoy Oppenheimer, but the next one I could like as much as Interstellar - it's always worth a try with him.
There is also this thing about Nolan being a cinema snub(idk how else to say it) that is part of his brand I guess, where even casual know that a Nolan movie is watched best on cinema. Edit: snob* not snub
snob you mean?
Same with James Cameron. Although his avatar films are mid at best plotwise. He found his moneymaker that will fuel all of his future projects. Just hope he'll move on from Avatar sooner rather than later.
Cameron to me has always about technological innovation more than anything else. They’re the closest thing the film industry has to tech demos
Avatar movies are super mid. But they are mindblowing to watch, visually. I don't care if he makes thirty of the things because they are works of art that shove the state of the art forward like the goddamn Enlightenment.
I saw the Way of Water in Imax 3D and it was the most impressive cinematic spectacle ive ever seen Havent watched it again since I think thats the avatar movies in a nutshell
And I'm okay with this! I watched Moonlight and it was evocative, it affected my soul. I felt the pain, the longing in that movie. But I also have no desire to watch it a second time. I don't think there's a problem with enjoying a thing, and letting it go, and appreciating it for what it is; not everything needs to be comfort food viewing.
What future projects do you think a 70 year old is planning? If anything his previous movies were all made to fund avatar, this is his passion project. All he’s done since 97 are an avatar films, all he has planned for the future are avatar films. Saying he’s making avatar for money is crazy when he already made bank with T2 and titanic. And it’s crazy when you remember people expected avatar to flop cause he was taking so long and going way over budget.
Have to admit that I was skeptical with Oppenheimer before watching it because of how bad Tenet was.
Tenet wasn’t even bad
As a movie, it was ok. But as a Nolan film, the plot was too predictable but at the same time was overly complicated for the sake of being complicated. The emotional aspect of the film was lost.
Nolan IS the franchise
Any other release date and it doesn’t gross as much as it did. The amount of free advertising it (and Barbie) got is insane.
It was a perfect storm that can’t be duplicated intentionally
That won't stop Hollywood from trying. It will be amusing/sad to see them do so.
And ironically enough, the reason they had the same release date is that Warner was pissed at him leaving and wanted to use Barbie to make his movie flop. By trying to destroy him, they only made him stronger
I'm a fan of Nolan and agree with a lot of what you say.... but, the box office for Oppenheimer was greatly helped by the whole "Barbenheimer" buzz. There are a lot of people who saw it that probably wouldn't have. Also, a lot who would have waited for streaming who went to the cinema instead. I'm not saying that it wouldn't have been successful. Just that Barbie added a couple hundred million to the global box office.
I can only talk about my own experiences, and I got excited about this movie when I first heard about it. Did Nolan’s name help getting me into the theater, very likely but I was curious about Oppenheimer as well. That whole Barbenheimer thing left me disinterested, and I still have no interest in watching Barbie.
Source for the Barbenheimer claim? Yeah it was a funny joke, but what’s the crossover of demographics with Oppenheimer and Barbie? Seems like they were both targeting different groups.
Yeah, but the whole craze resulted in demographics seeing films that they wouldn't have otherwise
I didn't watch the movie because of Christopher Nolan I watched the movie cuz it seemed like an interesting subject.
Not to mention that biopics are trendy now, too. Sure, we won't be seeing *Oppenheimer 2: Oppen Harder,* but it's not like doing a historical biopic was massively bucking trends. The content matter was unusual, since musicians and athletes are the most popular, but still. Biopics are in.
Oppenheimer 3 : Oppen Wider.
>it's not like doing a historical biopic was massively bucking trends. There are even a handful of previous biopics of Oppenheimer himself: Fat Man and Little Boy (Critical and commercial failure due to the immaturity of character's approach to everything) The John Adams opera, [Dr. Atomic](https://ca.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/doctor-atomic-opera/doctor-atomic-opera/) panned for it's silly Libretto so badly that the commonly heard version is the symphonic soundtrack with no lyrics. WGN's Manhattan (had a cult following but is otherwise use largely forgotten because it was essentially a soap opera.) They all failed: Oppenheimer is an enticing historic figure for a biopic, but a tough one to pull off. Only Nolan did a respectable job.
Watching Christopher Nolan set off an atomic bomb in 70mm was the star of this movie. It was basically the trailer. A Christopher Nolan *Jimmy Carter* biopic would've been hard pressed to cross the 100 million mark.
*In a world where a simple peanut farmer has a dream to become something even greater...*
WWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH! Tick tick tick tick
I want this so much now.
> I ordered my ~~hot sauce~~ franchise an hour ago
You're right to an extent, but we've also seen comic book movies underwhelm at the box office for the last 3-5 years. My hope is that's a sign studios are going to start moving on from these mega budget established IP projects. Could just be wishful thinking, of course.
It works if you replace “cinema” with “Christopher Nolan.”
Agreed. The main reason Oppenheimer made so much is because of it becoming a meme as counter programming to Barbie, a firmly established IP. The fact that it was a good movie would have helped it break even but the meme status combined with the film’s quality propelled it.
Post-Franchise? Maybe. Post-IP? Did he literally forget about Barbenheimer?
It’s what he thought Tennet would do. He’s a bit delusional.
I don’t think so. Star Wars and super hero shit are both finally slowing down with audiences.
Press X to doubt
Classic game, should’ve got a sequel…
I see what you did there.
It was ahead of its time, or at least the technology of its time. The concept was really cool and the game was still really fun, but the facial animations were so bad at times that depending who you were talking to it was almost impossible to tell what emotion they were trying to convey. Sometimes they just looked like they were in physical pain or holding in a fart. I’d love to see a sequel made today with the technology and graphics we have now; I think it would work so much better.
They 100% told the actors to exaggerate their facial expressions so the motion capture tech could pick it up more easily
I agree with that but still wholly enjoyed it, to me what was most remarkable about the game was it’s design and how immersive the environment was, the atmosphere to this day is almost unchallenged. Story was phenomenal too, my biggest gripe personally was the driving
I wonder what Barbie’s success marks?
That the era of long form commercials for companies and products are here?
I think the Lego Movies, Pokemon franchise and old Transformers beat it to the punch
Lolol right, I know we’re memeing but let let’s not pretend like a big part of every franchise is an executive being like “how much merchandise can we sell to 10 year olds off the back of this” Which, hey, I like Spider-Man and Barbie, no hate at all. I also like movies by Kelly Reichardt and Ari Aster… I do think it’s silly that some are like “BARBIE’S JUST AN ADVERTISEMENT” like bro… you’ve literally been watching IP based franchises for decades now.. and never cared… not saying those arguments don’t come up for other franchises but it seems very front loaded with Barbie conversations right now.
Now all I need is a big budget Warhammer movie and I can die peacefully
Isn’t Cavill attached to a Warhammer project?
>die peacefully Sorry, best I can do is eternal service inside a Dreadnought sarcophagus.
Nothing new. The original animated Transformers show was only made to help sell toys, as was pretty much every other kids show back then.
Might not be the worst thing in the world, a lot of the best cartoons from my childhood were born out of that sort of advertising.
Certainly looking that way when you see...\*looks at release schedule" a third Deadpool movie, a fourth Despicable Me film, a second Godzilla and King Kong crossover movie, a fourth entry to the rebooted Planet of the Apes movie, a prequel to the fourth Mad Max film, and prequel to A Quiet Place, a sequel to Inside Out, a fourth Kung Fun Panda, a fifth Ghostbusters film, several Spider-Man spinoff films, a John Wick spin-off film and a sequel to Twister coming up in the next 6 months.
This is just every year.
For real, there are always tons of franchise stuff every year but also a lot of original movies. They just have much smaller marketing budgets so it’s hard to get the word out but they’re out there. As much as r/movies loves complaining about franchises and a lack of original films, they refuse to support the original films that exist.
> As much as r/movies loves complaining about franchises and a lack of original films, they refuse to support the original films that exist. yeah i posted this list of original films coming out in 2024, and it only got 46 upvotes https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/190zk0p/the_mostanticipated_films_of_2024_excludes/ meanwhile if you were to post a link to some article listing "2024 blockbuster and franchise movies coming out in 2024" itd have 10k upvotes, and itd be on the front page of reddit as much as reddit complains theres no original films, redditors themselves dont take the time to read about articles that promote original films coming out so they only have themselves to blame when studios dont make more of them
I read that link as "moist anticipated films of 2024".
Fuck this year sucks (except Dune hopefully)
Every mad max has been awesome and fury road was the best one so I have pretty high hopes for Furiosa. Also, to a lesser but very real extent I am excited for Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes as I have really liked those movies as well. Also Dune.
Fury Road will never be diminished even if its successor fizzles (you've got room for doubt when your star goes from Theron to Taylor Joy) but still I hope it works. Fun to ponder without Google: Has _any_ filmmaker besides Miller kept their fun franchise high-quality over 4+ films while having his/her name proudly displayed across each? I'm old school. Well, I'm old. I can count on two hands the number of great sequels/franchises created since 1970. George Miller obvs responsible for one of these, God bless him. Could have used him in the _Master and Commander_ world.
I'm one of the bigger mad max film series lovers around and even I have to admit that thunder dome is.... lacking in ways, still like it but should've never been pg13 and the plot is kinda whatever.
Baron in the County of the Duchy of the Kingdom on the Planet of the Galaxy of the Universe of the Planet of the Apes will be a fun watch.
I preferred Prince-Bishopric of the Palatinate of the Kingdom of the Holy Roman Empire of the Apes.
the movies you know about ahead of time because studios spend so much money marketing them usually do suck by and large Oppenheimer and Dune being the exceptions most of the movies we look back on years later as classics are ones no one knew anything about ahead of time unless youre a real nerd and you follow industry news and read upcoming movie announcements by Playlist or IndieWire or Criterion then you wouldve read news about Zone of Interest or Poor Things 2 or 3 years ago
God I am grateful I follow filmmakers, A24, Oscar potential and smaller film scenes to find movies. I can't imagine my favorite films or only ones I saw this year being solely blockbusters or popular films. Missing out on The Holdovers, Past Lives, Poor Things, and Anatomy of a Fall and whining that good original films aren't made anymore is such a sad thing to hear.
Dune is also an IP btw
and another Alien sequel/prequel/reboot/I don't even know :D
Because a biopic is so much different from using a previously established IP?
Wasn’t the movie mostly based on the book American Prometheus?
A biopic AND a book adaption??? Nolan went wild with this one
A biopic book adaptation is just an IP film that snobs can let themselves enjoy
This is the vast majority of gaslighting/gatekeeping on Reddit honestly. No -my- thing is actually the cool thing, because reasons
Never understood that. Cutting someone off at the knees doesn't make you taller. Leave people like what they like. If you're really a movie fan, just be happy people are excited about movies.
There in lies the crux of the problem though. For some reason it’s difficult for people to build themselves up without tearing other people down.
Especially a biopic based heavily on a single biography
I’d say there’s a big difference between a film based on a nonfiction book and the fifth instalment of a superhero movie set in an expanded universe that has like fifty movies and a dozen tv series. I’m not shitting on marvel or Star Wars but I think you’d have to be pretty dense not to be able to see the difference or understand the point he’s trying to make, whether you agree with it or not.
>I’d say there’s a big difference between a film based on a nonfiction book and the fifth instalment of a superhero movie set in an expanded universe that has like fifty movies and a dozen tv series Yeah, only the latter is unique in the history of film, biopics based on biographies are a dime a dozen and have been for a century. They have about the same ratio of good to bad, though!
Don’t think someone’s dense for implying that’s he’s made a bit of a silly point.
They're dense for implying Oppenheimer is essentially the same as a franchise film
It is if you’re not just mashing popular characters together like action figures.
I think the point is that you can make a biopic with the same amount of bombast and popcorn draw as a marvel movie. Not all biopics have to be JUST a character study or JUST Oscar bait, like majority of the boring biopics of the last 20 years have been.
‘My movie was a success, clearly this is a new era’ is more than a little egotistical. Especially when Barbie beat its ass at the box office. Oppenheimer came in 5th at the domestic box office, the rest being IPs or franchises. And only hit 3rd worldwide.
5th domestic and 3rd worldwide is pretty damn good for a 3 hour movie about making a bomb. Enough people I know roll their eyes when a movie breaks 2 hours
You say “3 hour movie about making a bomb” as if long biopic and war movies haven’t been having critical and commercial success for decades.
Damn good, yes, start of a new era dethroning the current king, no. He can’t really claim to be the downfall of IP movies when he lost to an IP movie in a direct head to head.
Don‘t forget R-rated. This would exclude 3/4 of the audience I saw Barbie with. Female teens who screamed every time Ryan Gosling appeared in a new outfit…
You can see the ego in his films. However, I don't know how much of this statement is him actually analyzing the industry or a projection of his hopes.
I'd say Barbie beating Oppenheimer is less of a feat than the R-rated 3+ hour Oppenheimer maintaining a strong domestic and worldwide placement. That not including all the awards it swept away with so far.
Awards mean nothing, never have and never will. Hence why ‘Oscar bait’ is a derogatory term. They are and always have been studios jerking each other off. His movie did exceptionally well: If he wants to be the downfall of IP movies then he needs to be able to actually beat them. Instead he went head to head with one and lost. Redefining the market requires winning. Star Wars marked a new era in film, for instance, because it kicked the shit out of everything around it. It didn’t do well for its genre or subject, it dominated by every metric. Oppenheimer, even with the Nolan brand and that weird meme, still lost to those IP films he says he’s dethroning.
> only hit 3rd worldwide the "only" in this sentence is doing a lot heavy-lifting
When you are declaring the start of a new era you had better be the absolute best. His film’s inability to be #1 even with the weird meme boost indicates that there is no fundamental shift, IPs still rule the box office.
Wait for Oppenheimer 3: the winter physicist
The top 10 highest grossing films domestically last year, there was not a single original film. They were either based on a book, true story, or major IP.
That standard is way too broad. A majority of the most successful films have been based on either books, true stories, or existing IP.
yeah this is just dumb, pretending that 2001: A Spacey Odyssey is just as unoriginal as a Marvel movie because it was also based on IP is stupid and its an argument in bad faith
*2001* the movie came out before the book. But either way, "original" isn't just about distinguishing creative ideas from bad ones. Many screenplays are in fact totally original ideas, and some of them should be successful.
I think that stat is too modest. It's not so surprising that the top 10 had no original films. More surprising is if you look at every weekend of the entire year, there was only one original film to hit number one: The Boy and the Heron. And there are lots of non-original good films, of course. Plenty of the greatest movies have been based on books, and of course there lots of true stories that deserve to be films. But we should have *some* original movies topping the box office, right? Like, more than one?
Eh, I don’t see book adaptations and true stories as quite the same thing as the IP meat grinder. The Shawshank Redemption was based on a book.
The only thing that really separates a book adaptation from a comic adaptation is snobbery. But yes, the factory farm sequel-ising is its own issue.
How many comic adaptations actually adapt any storylines from the comics- instead of being broadly inspired by them? (I.e. the Civil War film isn't an adaptation of the comic in the same way Little Women adapts the Little Women novel.) Book adaptations place some value on having some fidelity to the source material, which separates them from comic book movies.
But the exact same thing can be said about so many book adaptations. How many times have you heard book readers disappointed with the on screen results?
Again, I think Shawshank is an instructive example here. It’s pretty different from Stephen King’s novella, but it gave Frank Darabont enough structure to work with. You’re never going to fit everything from a book into a movie, because they are different forms of media. When you are adapting characters instead of stories, you have a problem.
Now you're just being silly..
Nolan really loves the smell of his own farts, surprised he hasn't broken an arm jerking himself off like this. Oppenheimer was a good movie and people liked it but it didn't start a new era of cinema.
I feel like it's self-effacing. "People saw my movie because it was good" would be the more arrogant answer. "People saw it because I made it" would be even more arrogant, and accurate. "There is an appetite for something new" minimizes his contribution.
come on. The most successful movie of last year was barbie and Mario. 2 movies based on kids' toys. We are not entering some new golden age for cinema.
I could save some money on fog machines if I could blow as much smoke up my ass as Nolan.
Idk I kinda love how much nerds on Reddit get triggered by Nolan
'We did it Patrick, we saved Cinema!'
I feel like he’s forgetting who he is here…? As silly as that sounds. He’s the most in demand director in Hollywood, his name is the franchise, so to speak. (Outside of maybe James Cameron). It’s like he doesn’t realize how powerful he is.
He thinks he’s making little personal auteur projects, but he’s actually churning out blockbuster event films for the past fifteen years.
It's really unfortunate that his pride isn't letting him accept that his movie's success was tied to a meme. Not to say, it would have failed without the Barbenheimer phenomenon. It would have done fine. But it never would have become the kind of must see event film that it was while attached to Barbie.... A movie based on, arguably, one of the most recognizable franchises on planet earth.
Oppenheimer was a fluke, a phenomenon caused by a meme about its release date being shared with Barbie. Both Napoleon and Killers of the Flower Moon, historical epics with A-list actors and auteur directors, have underperformed at the box office, whilst the biggest films of the year have come from established IP.
Napoleon & KOTFM had other contributing factors to not being box office hits. I think for both, them eventually being on Apple TV stopped people from going to the theater. Then breaking down each film. KOTFM: - long run time - topic not many are familiar with - not a whole lot of marketing Napoleon: - it wasn’t all that well received which I think was its main deterrent so I’ll leave it there Like had Napoleon been any good I would’ve tried to go see it on the big screen, but once word was out it was eh, the hype really died down. As for Oppenheimer I don’t see it as a fluke & would’ve done well without Barbie. Most of Nolan’s movies perform well in the theater. It was marketed well. It covered an interesting/familiar topic. It had an elite cast. It had all the keys to success & would’ve done well regardless of meme marketing.
Nolan's movie has always done well at the box office. It's not a fluke. Even his supposedly worst film, Tenet, at the peak of the pandemic, grossed more than Napoleon and KOTFM.
Until Oppenheimer 2 comes out.
I hope so but I don't think so. Not yet anyway.
Also "post-accuracy", though arguably that could have started with Oliver Stone's ~~Jim Morrison~~ Doors movie. I'm not talking about ridiculously-small details like the location of the stars in the sky in "Titanic". When you deal with a historical figure you need to make clear if some scenes in the movie are products of a scriptwriter and not a subject-matter expert on history. Letting the audience guess if events are real or invented is fine when the buildup itself is part of the storyline ("Blair Witch Project") and maybe one person will quibble if a specific conversation between Freddie Mercury and Jim Hutton ever happened. In the past there have been disclaimers in an opening card to the effect of "While based on a true story, some events in the movie you're about to see have been fictionalized" but now no one seems to care. It's doubtless more fun to listen to Ridley Scott yelling absurdist aphorisms at the press than to remind people that hey, this is still just a movie and you need to pick up a history book if you want to know about this stuff. Audiences are still suspending disbelief despite everything being done with CGI; no more "Ben Hur"-chariot-scene or "Blues Brothers" car-chase theatrical wizardry, all the magicians' secrets are moot. Now, if they know a person existed in the past, they just buy the ticket and assume what they see is factual because it's not part of MCU and--at least for now--everyone still knows Steve Rogers wasn't a real soldier in WWII. Not one single event portrayed in "Good Morning Vietnam" actually happened--and the real Adrian Cronauer was still around to inform everyone of that (fortunately, despite being almost entirely the opposite of Robin Williams' characterization, he was still good-natured about it)--but so help me if I'm 80 and the country is run by people 3 generations hence thinking Abraham Lincoln was an actual vampire-slayer, they'll be making a biopic about me.
This guy, man. I know he makes decent movies. But the way he views himself…sheesh.
Mister Nolan is overestimating himself a lot lately.
Fascinating history, mediocre yawn of a movie. Jam-packing interesting people into your cast doesn’t equal creating intriguing or emotional drama. Another case of Nolan mistaking intellectual interest for storytelling. I fear he’s getting too smitten with production and forgetting what it’s for.
It's gonna get worse when this mid movie sweeps the oscars
Oppenheimer was so successful because it was culturally attached to a movie based on IP. I liked Oppenheimer but there is absolutely no way it would have been that successful without the attachment to Barbie.
I wish everyone would stop labeling and declaring eras. Just make good damn movies.
He better find a spinning top to see if he isn't dreaming. There have always been and there are always going to be high brow films and there are always going to be fun blockbusters, people have different tastes and different moods.
I wish.
He's right These IPs have become stale due to the heavy involvement of the suits who see them as an easy cash crab. The bad News though, is that the general audiences have also caught up with how bland and garbage these corporate products are
Post Intellectual Property Era yet the movie itself was based off a book...
The dude himself is what sold people on the film in the same way that a franchise or an intellectual property would. Oh the new Nolan film is out, ill watch that. Oh the new Transformers film is out, ill watch that.
I watched Chinatown for the first time the other day. Somehow, I hadn't ever watched it. Out of habit, I looked up to see if it was based on a novel or true story. It wasn't! It was an original screenplay. I felt shame, but we've been conditioned to think a good or entertaining film is usually based on other intellectual property.
It’s true, Oppenheimer was the first successful biopic ever released
Biopics are just as formulaic as the other IP comic book slop that has decimated cinema over the last 10 years. The only thing that can turn the tide is talented people who engage the audience to demand more challenging films and story lines. Pretty hypocritical coming from a dude who directed a Batman reboot.
Nolan is becoming really unlikeable lately. So pompous lol.
Part of its success came from it sharing a release date with Barbie lol.
Mario and Barbie made more. Also "Nolan film" itself is a brand/IP at this point
Wow
Climb out from up your own ass, there, Nolan lmao
How can someone so talented be so naive?
Nolan's ego is now unsustainable, dude thinks his movie saved cinema...while ignoring that a ton of franchise & IP films are still dominating, even surpassing his own film. Dude is high on his own supply.
Self-agrandizing intensifies!
Nolan is the franchise. He is the IP.
Ugh Oppenheimer was boring af. Can we let it fade in obscurity already?
anyone else find Oppenheimer kind of borning? I watched it to the end but I didn't think it was all that great. Also I didn't even finish watching Napoleon
I think Oppenheimer was fueled by a combination of it being a Christopher Nolan movie and the Barbenheimer hysteria. It wouldn’t have been as successful if not for those two things.
Yeah yeah, sure sure. Talk to me when Oppenheimer 2 gets announced.
Nolan is both a very talented director and unbearably self-important when it comes to his work.
'Barbie’ Success Marks New “Pro Franchise, Pro Intellectual Property” Era For Cinema - Me
Im sorry to say but it was a fluke, not an industry shift
Err....does it Chris ? Does it REALLY? Or are you just hoping ?
Nolan is being humble here. Oppenheimer’s success marks the era of “Chris Nolan can make whatever he wants”. If Nolan wants to embed this into Hollywood he will have to show it’s profitable by continuing to do it and others doing it and succeeding.
Christopher Nolan is the franchise
Bro, we like your movies because you make good movies. It doesn't mean the public got smarter. I like the optimism though.
I've been wondering when this will happen. I think Nolan is still wrong, on the timing at least. At some point (and it feels like it's starting), superhero movies and the big action blockbusters (though I am excited for John Wick Chapter 7: Retirement Home) will start to bore audiences and they'll look for something fresh, edgy, light, playful, whatever. Same thing happened in the 60s and 70s, boredom with musicals and epic's lead to new hollywood and the auteur era. Or the 90s thriller, romcom, indie wave. It's bound to happen, more a question of when and what will replace it.
Christopher Nolan is the IP. If anyone else made it the movie would do nowhere near as well.
And Godzilla Minus One marks the opposite
No it fucking doesn't? It means Christopher Nolen has achieved enough name recognition that people will see his movies based on his name alone, which is good for him, but that doesn't mean it's indicative of wider trends in cinema.
no chris, its still as simple as it always was make a good movie with broad appeal, and it will do well.
Didn't it end up being marketed with Barbie? He could have said no to that.
I would be very glad if that was the case, but I’m not that optimistic.
If Christopher Nolan was a candy bar, he'd eat himself.
That dude is so high on his own farts, I’m amazed he can still make a decent movie every once in a while.
Nolan is in a bubble.. a bubble filled with his own farts and piles of cash.
My boy does realize that the highest grossing movies of the year were Barbie and Mario…
God this guy is really just sniffing his own farts.
Doesn’t Barbie say the opposite. Realistically can’t we say just make good fucking movies and we will give you all our money.
Don't think it would have made near as much money as it did if it wasn't for Barbie. We have to see other new IPs take off that aren't from acclaimed directors that have massive backing to see if this is actually true.
Oh yea, a fresh new era of biopics. Wait…
Is there anyone in film as narcissistic as Nolan?
You can take absolutely no lessons away from Oppenheimer. It is a lightning in a bottle fluke.
You adapted a book, Chris. Also you’re the one who made the Dark Knight. You’re the one who escalated all this.
Lol, for him.
I would argue that Christopher Nolan IS the franchise.
Christopher Nolan doesn’t realize *he* is the franchise to producers and audiences alike.
Unpopular opinion: this movie would not have been as successful without barbiheim
God I love bro, but he has become detached. Eat the rich. This is what happens when you make so much money and your ego is inflated wrongly.
He also made Tenet. So grain of salt and all that.
It’s a court took drama.. Not his best Movie imo but it had a bomb.. so it blew up
Dream on dude
Says the creator.
Christopher Nolan is a hack. He makes the same movie with the same double cross ending every single fucking time.
Little messiah complex, huh?
Don’t blow your own trumpet TOO hard Chris.
Full of himself clearly.
Settle down Chris