On Saturday, I spent a little over 3 hours at the movie theater with a friend, finally watching the widely-acclaimed Oppenheimer. It did not disappoint.

Okay, well, it disappointed a little. The beginning was very much a mess, in my opinion. Flashbacks of flashbacks, changing from color to black-and-white, moving from young Oppenheimer to an old, and there was precious little thread holding these scenes together. The infamous apple scene, in which Oppenheimer attempts to poison a mean professor but eventually thwarts his own plan after guilt overwhelms him, felt forced. I believed the director was trying to demonstrate the depths of Oppenheimer’s chaotic personality (by using an even that those close to the man claim never happened), but it came just a few minutes into the movie, after just one interaction with the intended victim, so it didn’t carry any weight.

The plot twist toward the end was also a little messy. There were so many major characters involved with names barely used that when the antagonist mentioned a couple by name as conspirators, I couldn’t quite remember who he was even talking about.

But aside from those grips and a couple other petty ones, I really enjoyed the film. Cillian Murphy as Oppenheimer and Robert Downey Jr. as Lewis Straus were simply brilliant. Emily Blunt also gave a masterful performance of Oppenheimer’s wife. None of these characters are very sympathetic, as they are all deeply flawed and selfish individuals, but the actors still did a tremendous job bringing them to life.

The scene of the Trinity test was one of my favorites, as Christopher Nolan did a tremendous job building up the pressure, including the actual countdown for the atomic blast. A little later, following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there is a scene where a deeply conflicted Oppenheimer delivers a congratulatory speech for the scientists who worked in the Manhattan Project where Nolan’s artistic vision was once again on full display with the combination of sounds and lighting.

I highly recommend this one for anyone with a taste for history. It doesn’t feel like a full 3 hours, and the resulting performance is well worth the time and money anyway. It wasn’t quite the cinematic coup de grace I was hoping, but I still give it a solid 4.5 out of 5 stars. Easily the best movie I’ve seen all year.