CRITICAL

‘Oppenheimer’ Sex Scene Ignites Hindu Nationalist Backlash

India’s Information Commissioner called on Christopher Nolan to remove the scene. (WARNING: Spoilers ahead.)

Warning: This post contains Oppenheimer spoilers.

A sex scene in Oppenheimer sparked an angry backlash from India’s Hindu nationalists, with calls for the scene to be removed altogether. Part of Christopher Nolan’s biopic of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, covers Oppenheimer’s relationship with his lover Jean Tatlock. The scene shows Oppenheimer, played by Cilian Murphy, having sex with Tatlock, portrayed by Florence Pugh, when Tatlock stops and goes to a bookshelf and picks up a copy of the Bhagavad Gita, one of the holiest texts in Hinduism. Tatlock asks Oppenheimer to translate a section from the Sanskrit scripture reading: “Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds,” as they resume having sex. In a message addressed to Nolan posted on Twitter, India’s information commissioner on Saturday called the scene “a scathing attack on Hinduism” which “amounts to waging a war on the Hindu community.” “We urge, on behalf of billion Hindus and timeless tradition of lives being transformed by revered Geeta, to do all that is needed to uphold dignity of their revered book and remove this scene from your film across world,” Uday Mahurkar added.