Goofs

Torrential rains last through the night, stopping right before the initial atomic bomb test. However, after sunrise, the ground is dirt dry and dusty.

When the Senate aide is presenting the new Time magazine article to Strauss, the aide closes the magazine in one shot of the dialogue. However, this does not happen in the reverse shot. As a result, the magazine alternates from being closed to being open several times during the dialogue sequence between the aide and Strauss.

There are a handful of scenes where Oppenheimer is using a blackboard and chalk to write or draw things. During these scenes, the appearance and size of the shapes/letters change during each camera shot (e.g., during the scene with FAECT written on the board, as well as when Oppenheimer draws the four overlapping circles, each with a letter inside them).

When Oppenheimer and Groves are riding the train, the table arrangement changes between shots, from the tablecloth being laid out and the folded tablecloth placed on the table.

When Kistiakowsky is testing the triggering device for the bomb, the camera follows Oppenheimer and Groves as they walk over the sand barrier and head over toward Kisty. In this shot, Lilli Hornig is coming over the barrier behind them, but when the camera flips to Kisty, Lilli is next to him examining the explosion site. Then, the camera returns to Oppenheimer and Groves, and she is behind the two men again.

Oppenheimer consults with Einstein for advice on the Los Alamos team's calculations that the Trinity test could be contained and would neither ignite the atmosphere nor blow up the world. However, in reality, J. Robert Oppenheimer consulted not Albert Einstein on this, but rather Arthur H. Compton, the Director of The University of Chicago's Manhattan Project team.

Oppenheimer snatches away the poisoned apple before Bohr can take a bite. In reality, J. Robert Oppenheimer was on vacation with friends when he poisoned the apple, and Niels Bohr never was near it. His Instructor, Blackett, never ate the apple, but the plot was disclosed. His wealthy parents had to intervene to prevent him from being punished.

Oppenheimer, in conversation with Jean Tatlock, claims to have read all three volumes of Karl Marx' "Das Kapital" (a.k.a "Capital"). He then summarizes the philosophy as "Ownership is theft", which Tatlock corrects as "Property is theft." This slogan was actually coined by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (a contemporary rival of Marx) and Marx disagreed with it at a fundamental philosophical level; something both J. Robert Oppenheimer and Tatlock would be aware of through reading Capital.

When Oppenheimer gives the lecture in Dutch (which he factually learned in eight weeks), impressing the American present, the speech barely makes any sense. This is mainly because Christopher Nolan took out random words to make the scene shorter, as he later admitted to a Dutch reporter. He also said he considered quantum physics to be too complicated to translate and remember in Dutch. J. Robert Oppenheimer probably spoke Dutch with a heavy German accent, further adding to native speakers' confusion.

In the official German dub, however, he is speaking Dutch fluently.

Dr. Teller is portrayed as walking normally. Edward Teller's right foot was almost entirely severed in a streetcar accident in Munich in 1928, and he walked with a pronounced limp.

The stop signs are yellow in the film, which is accurate. The United States used yellow stop signs until 1954.

The cost of the Manhattan Project is mentioned in the film as "two billion dollars." Although some may consider this to be an anachronism, the word 'billion' instead of 'one thousand million' started being used in the US as early as the 1920s even in technical contexts (see David E. Smith, "History of Mathematics," published in 1925) and became common terminology by the late 1940s/early 1950s, so its usage in the film is not necessarily out of place.

During Kitty Oppenheimer's testimony, Roger Robb says that Robert Oppenheimer "made contributions to the Spanish Civil War as late as 1942." The Spanish Civil War ended in 1939.

However Robb's point may well have been that Robert was making contributions after that war was over and that, therefore, he was simply giving money to Communists. Kitty clarifies that he had donated to Spanish refugees, which is something that might have extended years past the actual fighting.

At Los Alamos, the team is told that the war is nearly over, as "Hitler blew his brains out in the bunker." The exact circumstances of Adolf Hitler's death were only revealed some months after the war. But Hitler's death being due to him shooting himself rather than face defeat would have been a reasonable assumption to make.

The pilot shares that he had seen German V-2 rockets being shot towards London. The scene showed to take place at night. During the bombing of Germany during WWII, the British RAF operated at night and the US Army Air Forces bombed during the day.

William Borden took part in Operation Carpetbagger, though, and these flights supported saboteurs and resistance members with material drops at night time.

As Oppenheimer enters Jean Tatlock's hotel, a cable car passes behind him. However, the street lacks cable car tracks, revealing this is a motorized replica cable car rather than a real one.

When Einstein's hat blows off his head due to the wind, in closeup, the wire used to pull it off is briefly visible.

Before the test, Oppenheimer states that a fizzle would strew radioactive plutonium all over the test area. This mishap was anticipated, and a large steel containment vessel called "Jumbo" had been constructed. It was later decided that using it would impair measurements of the bomb's yield, so it was placed near the test tower instead. There is no such structure in shots of the test area. By the way- "Jumbo" survived the blast and still rests at the Trinity site.

The phrase "Paper on black holes, it's in!" is said in the movie in 1939, while the term "black hole" wasn't coined until the 1960s. Before this, physicists used the term "gravitationally collapsed object".

During Oppenheimer's speech, people are waving American flags with 50 stars; this flag was not adopted until 1960, after most of the events portrayed.

The countdown to the Trinity test is shown on a Nixie tube clock. Nixie displays weren't invented for another decade, and the ones depicted are Soviet IN-14s from the 1970s.

Oppenheimer is seen receiving his Q clearance before the explosion of the atomic bomb. However, the Q clearance was established after the war in 1946 by the Atomic Energy Commission.

At several times during scenes taking place in 1943-44, "President Truman" is referenced. However, Franklin D. Roosevelt was president at that time. Harry S. Truman did not become president until April 12, 1945.

When Oppenheimer is ending his relationship with Jean Tatlock, when he says, "We both know I'm not what you want, Jean." While this line is delivered, the camera is on Oppenheimer's face, showing his mouth moving but then the camera cuts to Jean's face and Oppenheimer's mouth is not moving though his words continue.

Near the end, a mic pack is visible under the sweater on Emily Blunt's back when Oppenheimer and his wife speak outside their house after the security clearance ruling.

While Oppenheimer and Ernest O. Lawrence (Josh Hartnett) are around a campfire at night talking about dark stars, a rectangular studio light is visible in Lawrence's glasses instead of a real campfire.

When a truck is being loaded at Los Alamos, it has a warning "LEFT HAND DRIVE" on its tail gate. That warning was stenciled on American trucks driven in the UK where cars have right-hand drive, and not in the US where vehicles have left-hand drive. The movie makers apparently worked with a military vehicle collector who acquired a truck used in the UK.

When Strauss sees Oppenheimer to his car, the boom mic and operator are briefly visible in the reflection of the car window when the car door is closed.

On the newspaper announcing "Hitler Invades Poland," the date above the headline is misspelled as STEPTEMBER.

Oppenheimer claims Secretary of War Stimson changed his mind on his belief the Japanese were ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped. Henry L. Stimson did not reverse his opinion, and in a 1947 Harper's article he wrote about his beliefs.

Truman uses an "intrusive r" when naming Hiroshima and Nagasaki, pronouncing the former as "Hiroshimer." This would be fitting for a British or even Mid-Atlantic accent, but is entirely out of character for someone raised in the American mid-west like Missouri, as Truman was.