Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer has officially earned an R-rating by the MPA, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed, marking a rare Nolan feature to get such a rating.
Nolan’s breakout feature Memento (2000) and his next outing, Insomnia (2002), were both rated R, but he has largely stayed in the PG-13 sphere. Actor David Dastmalchian once noted that The Dark Knight (2008) edited a moment involving his character to maintain a PG-13 rating. Dunkirk, his 2017 World War II feature that depicted multiple battle scenes, was also PG-13.
Oppenheimer, which opens July 21, is Nolan’s first feature since the pandemic-era Tenet (2020) and follows his departure from longtime home Warner Bros. for Universal after he expressed displeasure over Warners’ plan to send its 2021 slate day-and-date to HBO Max. Oppenheimer is also the longest film of his career at nearly three hours.
It stars Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer, considered to be the father of the atomic bomb as leader of the World War II-era Manhattan Project. Nolan showed off footage in April at CinemaCon, where he spoke about his reasoning for making a film about the theoretical physicist.
“Like it or not, J. Robert Oppenheimer is the most important person who ever lived. He made the world we live in — for better or for worse. And his story has to be seen to be believed, and I am certainly hopeful audiences will come to your theaters to see it on the biggest screens possible,” said Nolan.
Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon, Emily Blunt and Florence Pugh are among the film’s sprawling cast.