Oppenheimer was made in less than two months

Oppenheimer may have an epic three-hour runtime, but the process of making the film was surprisingly quick, according to lead actor Cillian Murphy.

"We made the movie unbelievably quickly. We made it in 57 days," Murphy told Marc Maron's WTF podcast (via Variety). "The pace of that was insane." To compare to director Christopher Nolan's other recent movies, 2017's Dunkirk had a shoot that lasted 68 days, while 2020's Tenet shot for 96 days. 

"The sets are huge, but it feels like being on an independent movie," the actor continued. "There’s just Chris and the cameraman – one camera, always, unless there’s some huge, huge set piece – and the boom op and that’s it. There’s no video village, there’s no monitors, nothing. He’s a very analog filmmaker."

Murphy plays J. Robert Oppenheimer, an American theoretical physicist and head of the secret Los Alamos Laboratory during the war. He was heavily involved with the Manhattan Project, which is credited with developing the first nuclear weapons used to bomb the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. 

This is his sixth time working with Nolan (after The Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, and Dunkirk), but his first time leading a movie helmed by the filmmaker. Alongside Murphy, Oppenheimer features a stacked ensemble cast including Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon, Rami Malek, Kenneth Branagh, Benny Safdie, Casey Affleck, and Matthew Modine.

Oppenheimer hits the big screen on July 21. In the meantime, check out our guide to the rest of the most exciting upcoming movies in 2023 and beyond.