Netflix's new number-one movie is perfect for Oppenheimer fans

Oppenheimer was the box-office standout movie of 2023, thanks to Chris Nolan's powerful film showcasing the true story of those behind the making the US' first atomic bomb.

While the action revolved around the titular Robert Oppenheimer, the theoretical physicist who was the director of the Manhattan Project, another very famous face pops up in the movie, that of Albert Einstein.

Played by Tom Conti, he may only be a cameo in the film but his views on the bomb, as complicated as they were, had massive repercussions for the Manhattan Project.

And that is what a new Netflix docu-drama focuses on - a film which is currently topping the Netflix charts.

Einstein And The Bomb uses real footage and dramatised scenes to explain how Einstein, a pacifist, agreed to the making of a bomb in a signed letter - his thinking was the if the US didn't do it first, the Germans would - helped spur the project into action, something he would live to regret.

In Einstein And The Bomb, the physicist is played by Aidan McArdle and the script for the docudrama uses Einstein's own words, whether he said them or wrote them, to paint a picture of the man through key moments in his life.

Before the release of Oppenheimer, it would have seemed unlikely that this sort of drama would have reached the top of the Netflix charts - FlixPatrol has it at number one globally, right now - but it shows the power of the movie, and this doc goes some way in explaining key things the movie left out about Einstein.

Rolling Stone notes that the drama "packs a wallop in detailing how the man widely considered the father of atomic energy came to influence the innovations of the Manhattan Project, and how he lived to regret it."

The Wall Street Journal reckons the film is "a moving and even poetic mixed-media meditation on Albert Einstein."

Ready Steady Cut isn't quite as enthusiastic, noting: "Einstein and the Bomb fails to deliver on a premise that many will no doubt be keen to explore. While the physicist is more than his views on atomic weapons, there’s a balance that needed to be found, and unfortunately, Netflix was unable to find it."

Einstein And The Bomb is streaming now on Netlfix. Head to our best Netflix true-crime documentaries list for more real-life tales.