Movies Similar to Oppenheimer: Genius or Madman?

Einstein and the Bomb(2024)

What happened after Einstein fled Nazi Germany? Using archival footage and his own words, this docudrama dives into the mind of a tortured genius.

6.1

The Atomic Cafe(1982)

A disturbing collection of 1940s and 1950s United States government-issued propaganda films designed to reassure Americans that the atomic bomb was not a threat to their safety.

7.3

Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie(1995)

"Trinity and Beyond" is an unsettling yet visually fascinating documentary presenting the history of nuclear weapons development and testing between 1945-1963. Narrated by William Shatner and featuring an original score performed by the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, this award-winning documentary reveals previously unreleased and classified government footage from several countries.

7.2

Tokyo Phoenix(2017)

In 150 years, twice marked by total destruction —a terrible earthquake in 1923 and incendiary bombings in 1945— followed by a spectacular rebirth, Tokyo, the old city of Edo, has become the largest and most futuristic capital in the world in a transformation process fueled by the exceptional resilience of its inhabitants, and nourished by a unique phenomenon of cultural hybridization.

7.5

The Half-Life of Genius Physicist Raemer Schreiber(2018)

Our two-hour film highlights the life and career of Dr. Schreiber with respect and clarity. Raemer, his wife Marge, and young daughter Paula would move to the high-desert of New Mexico where he and other brilliant minds would change the world forever.

7.3

White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki(2007)

Steven Okazaki presents a deeply moving look at the painful legacy of the first -- and hopefully last -- uses of nuclear weapons in war. Featuring interviews with fourteen atomic bomb survivors - many who have never spoken publicly before - and four Americans intimately involved in the bombings, White Light/Black Rain provides a detailed exploration of the bombings and their aftermath.

7.5

Stephen Hawking and The Theory of Everything(2009)

Twenty years after A Brief History of Time flummoxed the world with its big numbers and black holes, its author, Stephen Hawking, concedes that the "ultimate theory" he'd believed to be imminent - which would conclusively explain the origins of life, the universe and everything - remains frustratingly elusive. Yet despite his failing health and the seeming impossibility of the task, Hawking is still devoted to his work; an extraordinary drive that's captured here in fleeting interview snippets and footage of the scientist sharing a microwave dinner with some fawning PhD students. Though the pop-science tutorials that dapple the first of this two-part biography are winningly perky, Hawking, alas, remains as tricky to fathom as his boggling quantum whatnots

7.6

Uncle Jack: Manhattan Project and Beyond(2016)

The Manhattan Project was an enormous undertaking that required the efforts of many of the world's most brilliant intellectuals. Hundreds of physicists, mathematicians, and engineers were needed to design, build, and test the world's first atomic weapon and the Unites States government did everything in its power to lure these individuals to the Manhattan Project. Documentary to include: Interviews with Scientists conducted by the World War II Foundation Interviews with World War II Historians Interviews with WWII veterans Interviews with those who worked with John Gray in the world of Atomic Energy Interviews with authors who have written extensively about the Manhattan Project Interviews with people from the world of academia. This film is personal: One of those assigned to the project was my uncle John Edmund Gray, a University of Rhode Island graduate with a brilliant mind. —Tim Gray

0.0

A Compassionate Spy(2022)

Physicist Ted Hall is recruited to join the Manhattan Project as a teenager and goes to Los Alamos with no idea what he'll be working on. When he learns the true nature of the weapon being designed, he fears the post-war risk of a nuclear holocaust and begins to pass significant information to the Soviet Union.

6.3

A Trip to Infinity(2022)

Does infinity exist? Can we experience the Infinite? In an animated film (created by artists from 10 countries) the world's most cutting-edge scientists and mathematicians go in search of the infinite and its mind-bending implications for the universe. Eminent mathematicians, particle physicists and cosmologists dive into infinity and its mind-bending implications for the universe.

7.2

The Day After Trinity(1981)

This essential, Academy Award–nominated documentary offers an urgent warning from history about the dangers of nuclear warfare via the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the enigmatic physicist and all-around Renaissance man who led the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb that America unleashed on Japan in the final days of World War II. Through extensive interviews and archival footage, THE DAY AFTER TRINITY traces Oppenheimer’s evolution, from architect of one of the most consequential endeavors of the twentieth century to an outspoken opponent of nuclear proliferation who came to deeply regret his role in ushering in the perils of the atomic age.

7.5

A Doctor's Sword(2015)

An Irish doctor survived the atomic bomb attack on Nagasaki and was given a Samurai sword for the lives he saved. 70 years later his family searches for the origin of their father's sword.

5.0

Lise Meitner: The Mother of the Atom Bomb(2013)

To historians, physicist Lise Meitner deserves to be placed on a par with Einstein, Heisenberg and Otto Hahn. In the 1930s on the verge of World War II, she led a small group of scientists who discovered that splitting the atomic nucleus of uranium releases enormous energy. This extraordinary film tells the story of a woman who was far ahead of her time as a scientist and a pioneer of feminism.

8.0

Hiroshima(2005)

The documentary recounts the world's first nuclear attack and examines the alarming repercussions. Covering a three-week period from the Trinity test to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the program chronicles America's political gamble and the planning for the momentous event. Archival film, dramatizations, and special effects feature what occurred aboard the Enola Gay (the aircraft that dropped the bomb) and inside the exploding bomb.

7.1

The Beginning or the End(1947)

The research, development, and deployment of the first atomic bomb, as well as the bombing of Hiroshima, are detailed in this docudrama.

6.5

The Bomb(2015)

Using masterfully restored footage from recently declassified images, The Bomb tells a powerful story of the most destructive invention in human history. From the earliest testing stages to its use as the ultimate chess piece in global politics, the program outlines how America developed the bomb, how it changed the world and how it continues to loom large in our lives. The show also includes interviews with prominent historians and government insiders, along with men and women who helped build the weapon piece by piece.

6.7

Inside Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer(2023)

A look behind the scenes of Christopher Nolan's film "Oppenheimer" about an American scientist and his role in the development of the atomic bomb.

6.5

Searching for the Standing Boy of Nagasaki(2020)

October 1945. A young Japanese boy in the devastated city of Nagasaki, two months after the atomic bomb, carries on his back the lifeless body of his younger brother. An American military photographer, Joe O'Donnell, took a picture of the boy standing stoically near a cremation pit. No one knows the subject's name, but the photo has become an iconic image of the human tragedy of nuclear war. This documentary follows the continuing efforts to deepen understanding of the photograph, while exploring the fate of thousands of atomic-bomb orphans and their struggles to survive the aftermath of World War II.

10.0

To End All War: Oppenheimer & the Atomic Bomb(2023)

Explore how one man's relentless drive and invention of the atomic bomb changed the nature of war forever, led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and unleashed mass hysteria.

7.7

Atomic: Living in Dread and Promise(2015)

Using only archive film and a new musical score by the band Mogwai, Mark Cousins presents an impressionistic kaleidoscope of our nuclear times – protest marches, Cold War sabre-rattling, Chernobyl and Fukishima – but also the sublime beauty of the atomic world, and how x-rays and MRI scans have improved human lives. The nuclear age has been a nightmare, but dreamlike too.

6.6