John Carpenter Says ‘Oppenheimer’ Is ‘OK’ and ‘Alright’ — Not the ‘Movie of the Century’
Samantha Bergeson
John Carpenter wasn’t that impressed with Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.”
The “Thing” director called Nolan’s Best Picture-winning historical drama just “OK” in an interview for journalist Larry Fitzmaurice’s “Last Donut of the Night” newsletter.
“‘Oppenheimer’ was OK. It was alright,” Carpenter said. “Everyone’s praising it as the movie of the century — I don’t know about that.”
But is Carpenter a fan of Nolan’s films in general?
“Yeah, I guess, sure,” he added.
The director instead pivoted and pointed to another 2024 Academy Award contender, saying, “I don’t want to talk about things that I haven’t enjoyed. I liked ‘Maestro’ a great deal. I thought that was terrific.”
And it turns out that Carpenter wasn’t crazy about the “Barbenheimer” craze as a whole. The filmmaker told the “Last Donut of the Night” newsletter his thoughts on “Barbie,” simply stating, “Did I like it? No comment.”
Well, Carpenter had more than a few comments about “Barbie” in 2023 during an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
“I can’t believe I watched ‘Barbie.’ It’s just not my generation,” Carpenter said. “I had nothing to do with Barbie dolls. I didn’t know who (the Ken doll’s sidekick) Allan was. I mean, I can sum it up. She says, ‘I don’t have a vagina,’ and then at the end, ‘I’m going to go to a gynecologist!’ That’s the movie to me.”
He added, “I mean, there’s a patriarchy business in there, but I missed that whole thing. Right over my head. But I think she’s fabulous, Margot Robbie.”
Carpenter isn’t the only Hollywood staple to take a stance against the much-touted cultural impact of “Barbie.” Producer Shonda Rhimes told Variety that audiences tried to make “Barbie” something that it should never have been.
“If you’re expecting a ‘Barbie’ movie, then I thought it was great,” Rhimes said. “But I think a lot of people were expecting so much more, and then tried to make it so much more. There was nothing wrong with the movie; I thought it was totally delightful. But the weight people put on a movie about Barbie was very interesting to me. […] But, yeah, I think that people wanted it to be sort of this feminist manifesto that it doesn’t need to be.”
Additionally, director Oliver Stone initially called the movie an “infantilization” of filmmaking before watching it. Stone later apologized after seeing “Barbie,” adding that he “appreciated the film for its originality and its themes” and “found the filmmakers’ approach certainly different than what I expected.”
