I was totally surprised at how great this film.You could feel your paranoia rise as the film went on and as you gradually learned the details of the real situation.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Riding on the coat tails of the highly successful "WarGames" (1983) Im surprised to see this movie flopped. It is told in the same style as WarGames as is its plot and relationships. But the lead character, Paul, is in a league of his own intellectually, which propels the "believability" of this film. Believability of course is the magic that many films lack. Christopher Collet and John Lithgow are highly likable and effective. This movie was cast well. The props are second to none as they were actually once used in a nuclear weapons lab. How do you get more realistic than that?If you are a fan of the esoteric world of nuclear weapons, then this is the holy grail of this genre. If you listen carefully or use subtitles you will here a lot of factual statements regarding the materials and processes that occur during the movie. This was a carefully crafted story line. Only the very ending raises some eye brows. Have watched it many times and never get tired of it.

In a word: annoying!For the first 45 minutes or so I kept asking myself, "Why? What does he get out of this?" A stupid science experiment and a "story" for the girl he likes. Thing is - neither of those things happen! The girl, sensibly, ends up saying "Uh, this is a bad idea." And he never even gets to do the science experiment thing, or whatever that was. Stupid movie. Another case of some douche being annoying in a typical 80s kind of way.John Lithgow is in it, he was OK. A young, cute, heterosexual Cynthia Nixon is in it. The dad from Frasier is in it, I don't even know his name or care what it is. A movie for an afternoon nap. Hopefully you fall asleep quickly so you don't have to see too much of it.4/10

First: I was 12 when I watched this movie on the ol' VCR. If I were to rate this film based on what I know today (December 2012) then it's a bit (sarcasm) far-fetched albeit still a good story with good actors. Find Robert Sean Leonard nearly two decades before House, MD! But I digress... Think about the film in a mid-80s mindset. No Google, no wikipedia...just Encyclopedia Britannica and this thing they called a library way back in the day. The general public didn't have a clue about radioactive isotopes or computers in 1986 and the information wasn't at our fingertips like it is today. So let that go and enjoy the film. Summary: The quirky whiz kid who is seemingly a rube in areas outside of all things science and tech is sheldonesque in nature. John Lithgow plays a great lead proving early on why he's been nominated for two Oscars. The caper used to extract the plutonium is pure genius and fun! The film falls into three categories according to IMDb: Comedy, Sci-Fi, Thriller. It's a blend of all three...oh and "Comedy" is first because it's in alphabetical order, not because the film is foremost a comedy.For those people who are 35 and up this is a great film to sit down with the family and watch for good clean fun, a great story, a little US history (perspective only as we were in a nuclear arms race in the 80s), and inexpensive entertainment.Who cares if the green stuff would be deadly outside the lab, forget the reality and enjoy the film. It's a good one!

I don't even wanna talk about it, I just wanna cut it down and leave it for dead. Or with other words, don't watch it unless you wanna make fun of it later! It's a half lame movie for little kids who haven't had a physics class yet and who's parents are willing to explain that something like that is never possible in real life. Here are some examples why (to get you started)The material being so highly concentrated I would imagine when he opens the hatch to get the jar out he'd immediately lose consciousness and die within minutes. No yellow rubber gloves are gonna protect him from the radiation.It looks like he's going for an implosion design with his bomb (like the Nagasaki bomb). That's really "smart". Especially since the gun design (Hiroshima bomb) is far easier to build, but maybe he is aware that the implosion design will have a far greater efficiency so he can incinerate far more people with it, if that's what he wants? (That's where another thought occurs: Why is he complaining about the morality of the lab when he builds a bomb of his own?) Then there is more unprotected working with the material. Even if the material was only slightly radioactive for some reason, his nice fluffy hair would have fallen out halfway through building his device. At the least we would have seen lots of vomiting! To sum it up, tired of writing this as I am, it's just all horrible anyway! I can't understand why a movie with that name couldn't have been a bit more interesting, realistic and possibly talk about the real Manhattan Project instead!