Based on the 2005 biography American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, the film dramatizes Oppenheimer's studies, his direction of the Los Alamos Laboratory and his 1954 security hearing.

The ensemble supporting cast includes Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett, Casey Affleck, Rami Malek, and Kenneth Branagh.

Oppenheimer assembles a team consisting of Rabi, Hans Bethe, and Edward Teller, and collaborates with the scientists Enrico Fermi, Leo Szilard, and David L. Hill at the University of Chicago.

As an advisor to the United States Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), Oppenheimer's stance generates controversy, while Teller's hydrogen bomb receives renewed interest amidst the burgeoning Cold War.

After Kitty vigorously defends herself and her husband, the board no longer suspects Oppenheimer of disloyalty but still revokes his clearance, thereby damaging his public image and limiting his influence on American nuclear policy.

[65][66] According to insiders, Paramount was ruled out early in the process due to the replacement of the CEO and chairman, Jim Gianopulos, with Brian Robbins, an advocate for increased streaming-service releases.

[66] Nolan signed with Universal because he had previously worked with Donna Langley, chairwoman and chief content officer of the NBCUniversal studio group, on an unsuccessful attempt to make a film version of the UK television series The Prisoner.

[76][70] Wanting to make the film as subjective as possible, the production team decided to include visions of Oppenheimer's conceptions of the quantum world and waves of energy.

[91] Pre-production had begun by January 2022 in New Mexico, where a two-day casting call took place in Santa Fe and Los Alamos for people to audition to play local residents, military personnel, and scientists.

[117] When this news first broke online, many fans (aware of Nolan's famous preference for in-camera practical effects) thought it meant he had set off a real atomic bomb.

[5][110] The production filmed the Trinity test scenes in Belen, New Mexico, with Murphy climbing a 100-foot steel tower, a replica of the original site used in the Manhattan Project, in rough weather.

[121] The last portion of principal photography was for Nolan and van Hoytema to travel to Europe to obtain establishing shots for the early European phase of Oppenheimer's life.

[132][133] Nolan had advised him to use a solo violin for Oppenheimer's central theme in the film, with Göransson remarking that he had felt that it could go from "the most romantic, beautiful tone in a split second to neurotic and heart wrenching, horror sounds".

[141] SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher later claimed the studios "duped" the guild into accepting a twelve-day-extension for negotiations to continue promoting summer films like Oppenheimer.

"[150] In March 2022, Universal Pictures halted the release of its titles in Russia, joining other major American film distributors in the boycott against the country following its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

[151] Oppenheimer had also been banned by Russia's Ministry of Culture, which had refused to license screenings of the film, stating that it did not meet their goals of "preserving and strengthening traditional Russian spiritual values".

[165] As NDTV reported, the Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur questioned how the CBFC certified the film with the verse heard during such circumstance in the first place, and asked the scene to be deleted.

[167] Among them was journalist Uday Mahurkar, who wrote an open letter to Nolan calling the scene a "direct assault on religious beliefs of a billion tolerant Hindus", and demanded its removal from all releases of Oppenheimer across the world.

[239] Empire's Dan Jolin labeled it a "masterfully constructed character study", taking particular note of Murphy's performance and van Hoytema's IMAX cinematography.

[243] Caryn James of BBC Culture similarly termed it "boldly imaginative and [Nolan's] most mature work yet", adding that it combined the "explosive, commercially-enticing action of The Dark Knight trilogy" with the "cerebral underpinnings" of Memento, Inception and Tenet.

[246] In August 2023, it ranked number three on Collider's list of "The 20 Best Drama Movies of the 2020s So Far," with the site writing that Nolan "explores the world's obsession with destructive nuclear weapons from the perspective of their creator; using the Greek myth of Dante [sic] as an inspiration, Oppenheimer makes it clear that once this type of power is unleashed, it is bound to be used again.

[248][249] Owen Gleiberman of Variety found the film's first half "mesmerizing" and "tick[ing] with cosmic suspense", but wrote that "a certain humming intensity leaks out of the movie" after the Trinity Test sequence, which was itself described as a "letdown".

However, she found some of the cameos by supporting actors such as Malek "distracting", and noted that the film's black-and-white scenes could feel "overlong" despite ultimately working in service of Nolan's narrative intentions.

Furthermore, Henderson negatively characterized the film's second half as "an interminable series of scenes set in courtrooms and at congressional hearings", and felt Pugh and Blunt were "wasted" in "severely underwritten" roles.

[254] Richard Brody of The New Yorker described the film as a "History Channel movie with fancy editing" and wrote, "I was tempted to call it a movie-length Wikipedia article.

The United States Senate approved amendments to accommodate additional services to people in New Mexico, but it has not passed through Congress as the House of Representatives had not yet debated its inclusion as part of the national defense bill for the 2024 fiscal year.

In this scene, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson is portrayed ordering the removal of Kyoto from the list of top atomic bomb targets, allegedly because it was a favored honeymoon destination for him and his wife.

According to Wellerstein, Stimson's diary from his 1926 travels with his wife does not mention Kyoto, and the only brief visit they made there was in 1929, during a single night stay while on a "fact-finding" mission related to his role as Governor-General of the Philippines.

Stimson wrote in his diary on July 24, 1945, "He [Truman] again reiterated with the utmost emphasis his own concurring belief on that subject, and he was particularly emphatic in agreeing with my suggestion that if elimination was not done, the bitterness which would be caused by such a wanton act might make it impossible during the long post-war period to reconcile the Japanese to us in that area rather than to the Russians.

[284] Besides composer Göransson, all recipients were first-time Oscar winners, including Nolan, Thomas, Roven, Downey Jr. and van Hoytema, who had each earned previous Academy Award nominations.