This video was absolutely brilliant. I loved every aspect of what the creators did here. The crafting of dark ominous, shadowy images of a hamburger, the use of a rather moving overhead shot of a sesame bun, the quasi-comical display of lettuce and tomato slices dangling in mid-air as part of a series of images revealing the construction of this lethal culinary product, the subtly eerie dramatic background music, the use of stock images of explosions and sparks of light were so perfectly blended with clips from the latest Hollywood blockbuster bio-epic that it effortlessly attained an air of excessive pretension to the point of being absurdly satirical. The editing was so good that one could associate Cillian Murphy’s overbearing, hyperbolic acting with the burger in question. Did Murphy not raise his eyes at the thought of a sizzling hamburger patty? When Murphy questioned whether or not man can be trusted with a such a weapon, was he not referring to Burger King’s signature Whopper, which when combined with a special ingredient would get transformed into the Whoppenheimer?
Even if such notions are too far beyond the standard application of disbelief, I can’t remember the last time I saw a satire of our modern world that was so efficiently complex and multi-faceted. The phrase ‘Whoppenheimer’ itself appears to mimic the lazy, thoughtless marketing tactic of combining two completely unrelated concepts solely due to the similarity in their names. Of course this particular juxtaposition just so happens to bring together the two areas of American dominance on the global stage; one being their military might, and the other the accessibility and economic success of their wealthiest corporations. If that wasn’t enough, the standard fast-food burger itself could be seen as a toxic byproduct of death. The hilarious tagline at the end of the video “Now I have become death, the eater of burger.” could be interpreted as a sly, vegan sentiment.
But before getting that far, one would first consider the line as a comical take on an old quote from Oppenheimer himself. In this frame of mind, does not this false advert and its cinematic tether (a corporate synergy that perhaps gets ridiculed as well) steal from Oppenheimer all the complexity and nuance in his identity that he achieved in life, only to be recast as a theatrical caricature existing solely for our entertainment. Such a commodification is hard to ignore when seeing the visage of Murphy’s Oppenheimer adorning a container of french fries. This aspect though was emblematic of how much attention was paid to the small details of the satire, which can also be imparted from the date of the Hiroshima bombing being placed on a fountain cup, and the “Rice Cooker” keychain giveaway. On one hand it’s an hilarious video and yet it’s also impressive to consider how much subtext they were able to pack into a short 75 second clip.