Christopher Nolan Seems to Embrace Barbenheimer: ‘We’ve Been Waiting for a Crowded Marketplace’

The time is quickly coming upon us. What time, might you ask? The time of Barbenheimer, of course — and it looks as though the Oppenheimer cast and director Christopher Nolan are pretty excited about this head-to-head film event of the summer.

“Summer, in a healthy marketplace, is always crowded, and we’ve been doing this a long time,” the filmmaker told IGN when asked about sharing a release date with Barbie in a recent interview. “I think for those of us who care about movies, we’ve been really waiting to have a crowded marketplace again, and now it’s here and that’s terrific.”

As for the film’s leading man, Cillian Murphy, he’s in agreement that the Oppenheimer-Barbie double header can only be a positive thing. “I think it’s great. I mean, I’ll be going to see Barbie. I can’t wait to see it,” the actor gushed to IGN during the same interview. “I think it’s just great for the industry and for audiences that we have two amazing films by amazing filmmakers coming out the same day. Could spend a whole day in the cinema, what’s better than that?”

To be fair, Barbenheimer, when made into a mashed-up word like that, seems way more complicated than it is. But at the end of the day, it’s simply just the hybrid term given to the fact that Greta Gerwig’s highly-anticipated film Barbie and Nolan’s equally-as-anticipated atomic bomb drama Oppenheimer both release in theaters on July 21 in the United States. 

“I love the fact that people are talking about going to two movies in a weekend,” Matt Damon, who also stars in Oppenheimer, explained to IGN. “Ben [Affleck] and I used to go to two movies every weekend, and I think people should do that.”

“And also the interest in the variety of what’s available is so awesome,” Emily Blunt, another famous face who is part of the star-studded Oppenheimer cast, noted to IGN during the interview. “It’s awesome.”

Notably, the Barbenheimer concept has totally blown up in the zeitgeist, taking it from a quippy descriptor for a double feature at the cinema to a phenomenon spawning memes, merch, and an overall connection to the moviegoing experience that has been largely absent since the onset of COVID. 

That said, which goes first in the unmissable double feature? “Maybe Oppenheimer on the Saturday? Friday night? I don’t know,” Blunt mused before Damon asserted: “I’d knock out Oppenheimer.” But in Murphy’s opinion, fate is the best approach to setting up your Barbenheimer viewing plans. He smartly told IGN: “Just flip a coin.”

Lex Briscuso is film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.