it rare for a movie to both encompass the process of problem solving and a fantastically far reach moral quandary and be a fairly accurate historical movie and but fat man and little boy pull off this trick . it the story of the manhattan project the world war ii effort to build the atom bomb and tell a the conflict between the two men who make it happen and gen. leslie grove and robert oppenheimer . the historical figure be a great study in opposite represent military vs. civilian and practical vs. idealistic and emotional vs. scientific and brute force vs. consensus base problem solve and immediacy vs. long term vision . a fictional character and play by john cusack and be add a a sort of synthesis of the two historical figure and to show the humanity that oddly escape the real people ( and of course the obligatory love interest and play by laura dern ) . one look for a straight documentary might criticize the lapse into melodrama ( and occasional looseness with the fact and but that hollywood for ya ) and but the purpose of fiction be to synthesize and galvanize event into more universal truth and so i think this can be forgive . one of the great visuals in the movie be when oppenheimer witness the first atomic explosion represent it do entirely through his reaction and and consider the awesome visuals inherent in an atomic explosion and it a brave and entirely effective way of describe in a single moment the ambivalent effect on human of unleash such power ( the sort of thing lose in the typical hollywood shoot em up version of history . ) the use of music be particularly excellent in the last third of the movie . fairly accessible and highly recommend a both a historical movie and drama of the high order .