Christopher Nolan loves IMAX. More so than 3D, 4DX, or any other modern cinematic innovation. He hasn’t held back in expressing his admiration for the format made no bones of the fact that it’s simply the best way to experience a movie out there. As is par for the course, marketing for his movies generally include an extensive featurette delving into the technicalities of the IMAX film format that apply to the movie at hand. To coincide with tickets going on sale, IMAX has released a featurette focusing on the technical details and challenges involved in shooting Oppenheimer in the large screen format. Have a look.
There’s lots to unpack here. While the cast sings praises of Nolan describing their experiences of working with him (many for the first time), Nolan and cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema offer two key pieces of insight through the featurette. The first of these is the use of the format for shooting something that’s essentially an intimate movie. IMAX is generally associated with landscapes and vistas and the duo had to figure out how to use it to tell an intimate story.
Nolan sees it as a window into another world, offering a sense of involvement that is unparalleled when compared to any other format.
Oppenheimer’s story is one of the biggest stories imaginable. Our film tries to take you into his experience. And IMAX, for me, is a portal into a level of immersion you cannot get from other formats.
Hoytema on his end, treated the face as a landscape of human emotions. In the featurette, he talks about using a lot of close-ups to (presumably) bring audiences closer to the characters. This would undoubtedly have placed a boulder of responsibility on the central cast as every move and muscle twitch they make will be scrutinized on the big screen.
IMAX is a format of spectacle and it’s made for vistas and for the grandeur of it. But I got very curious to discover this as an intimate format. The face is like a landscape. There is a huge complexity and a huge depth to it. How can we get this camera closer to people. How can we get this medium to work also as a very intimate medium.
The other challenge was filming in 70mm IMAX black-and-white, a format that didn’t exist. Executive producer Thomas Hayslip lays it out matter of factly: they were shooting on film that they themselves invented and engineered. The results appear to have pleased everyone, including Nolan.
We were able to test large format black and white, put it up on a giant IMAX screen and have a look at it, and the results were just magical and inspiring.
Seeing IMAX used in these ways is definitely exciting. It’ll be interesting to see just how Nolan and Hoytema play around with the dramatic aspects of Oppenheimer to bring a depth not just on the page, but also on the large screen. And this featurette just might mark the first time we’re hearing Ludwig Gorranson’s score for Oppenheimer. It’s buried in the background but with marketing heating up, an official release of a track or two from the score might just be around the corner.
Oppenheimer is set for release on July 21, 2023. Directed by Christoper Nolan for Universal Pictures, it features a star-studded cast that includes Cillian Murphy, Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Jack Quaid, Josh Hartnett, Rami Malek, Gary Oldman, Kenneth Branagh, Alden Ehrenreich, Dane DeHaan, and David Dastmalchian.
