Hiroshima

Hiroshima may be a film of 1953 but exposure to it - good heavens, 'devastating', 'exposure' - has been contained for many decades, as if the film itself were radioactive. Apparently there were concerns that it was anti-American, or maybe a bit pro-communist? If it is anything it's anti-war, anti-catastrophy, anti-blind-allegiance, and of course anti-nuclear-weapons. If there's such a thing as an anti-war propaganda film then this is it.

The film's beginning is very powerful. A narrator describes the morning routine of the air crew destined to drop the bomb and obliterate Hiroshima, the sun rising, the pilot's thoughts and fears. Then we see children in a high school classroom. One cries out and the narration, which is actually playing on a record, is stopped by the teacher. Enough about the world changing event, it's time to think of the innocents on the ground. Several years have passed since the bombing but the children are succumbing to leukaemia, to the effects of radiation poisoning. Students in the class are desperate to talk about something that has scarred their world, over which a pall of silence has fallen. They visit a sick girl in hospital. They tell stories of kids who've fallen out of society. They talk about what it means to have the marks, to have witnessed the flash. Then we go back to 1945, to a city full of people living their lives, albeit under the cult of the emperor, military types making them drill and run around, and bow to his imperial majesty. And the minutes go by, and we wait...

Then it happens.

This movie is mostly a dramatisation, with some documentary footage used as well, and it was a community effort to make the movie work, on location, real artefacts from the bombing, and actual survivors acting in the movie. The movie is scored by Akira Ifukube with a dirge for orchestra and choir that is powerfully affecting, much like, for example, adagios by Shostakovich or the Memorial to Lidice by Martinu; the wordless choral part if anything makes Akira's music more emotionally intense.

I used the words devastating and exposure earlier, without intending irony, but what about the word trigger, or triggering. Someone had to pull a trigger of sorts, one presumes, or at least press a button or two, to drop the atom bomb. Makes you think how juvenile, no, how infantile people are in the 21st century who either claim victimhood for having been 'triggered', or who worry overtly about triggering someone's feelings. Watch what happens when somehwere, out of sight, the a trigger is pulled; the gawping Japanese school kids and adults look up at the sky, wondering why the alarm hasn't gone off to tell them to take shelter. Watch what it meant to be alive in the aftermath of the blast. Then see if you can use the word 'triggered' ever again and call yourself sane.

Needless to say, Hiroshima (1953) is a difficult watch. It is tough like watching The Passion of the Christ is tough. It makes you desperate. It makes you want to scream. It makes you want to cry for your own comfort. It is an audiovisual lament, a threnody for people compelled to live at a time when a few individuals had developed the power and the will to potentially destroy nations, in the blink of an eye.

But one has to decide if a movie is the best way to explore this subject. In isolation, I'd say no, one needs more. The movie is based upon the accounts given by the children of Hiroshima. The movie goes on to include the bloodymindedness of the Japanese military, attempts to suppress the truth about what had happened so as not to dent morale - and don't forget this film's circulation was viciously delimited to not upset the political class or anyone on the US side of the story - but I suppose if you want to know more about the military strategic context for dropping the bomb then you need to look elsewhere; to a documentary or two, or read a history of the war. Maybe you want to go see the new Christopher Nolan movie, Oppenheimer (2023), although given his tendency towards aggressive barrages of music and noise - there are already reports that the actors' dialogue can barely be heard - and a potentially confusing non-linear timeline, chances are you'll not come out of the movie exactly enlightened. This film, Hiroshima, is based upon lived experience, and it is terrifying.

A must-see, if you've got the stomach for it.

The film is a bleak depiction of life in Hiroshima in the days leading up to the dropping of the atomic bomb (on Aug 6, 1945) and the consequences of the attack, with a focus on the short- and long-term term effects of radiation exposure, especially on children. The production is outstanding, with realistic recreations of the ruined city blended with authentic footage, and the cast (many of whom were not actors) is excellent*. The scenes of homeless, parentless, children trying to survive are especially poignant, notably the two siblings finding their family's rice bowls as they pick through the rubble of their home or the group of boys trying to teach the youngest enough English to beg for food from American servicemen. The film is scored by Akira Ifukube, who a year later would write the iconic themes for the original 'Gojira'. His stirring music plays over the end, in which the people of Hiroshima congregate at the Genbaku Dome, the unbelievable scenes that feature the multitudes of extras for which the film is famous. Not surprisingly 'Hiroshima' is unabashedly 'anti-war' but is not simply a screed against the U.S. The contentious idea that the bomb would not have been used if the target population was 'white' is briefly mentioned but is counterbalanced by scenes of the Imperial forces deciding to lie to the Japanese public about the nature of the weapon and use the devastated city as a rallying cry to incite even more hatred of the Allied forces (in an attempt to reinforce the implacable resolve that defenders of the A-bombing maintain made use of the devastating weapons necessary). While Hiroshima did have some military value as a target, the casualties were overwhelmingly civilian, including many children. The film's message (IMO) is not an overly-simplified 'don't drop the bomb' but rather a more nuanced plea to consider the consequences beyond tactical or strategic objectives. The film also touches on one of the lesser known consequences of the bombing - the survivors sometimes faced anger and resentment from the rest of the population for their unique 'victim status' as "Hibakusha" ("people affected by the atomic-bombs"). Unfortunately, the visceral impact the scenes of stunned survivors limping through the streets, filthy, burned and bloody, may be blunted to some viewers because they almost look like a parody of modern 'zombie' movies. Excellent: sad, and memorable and perhaps, in some small part, a contributor to nuclear restraint - despite the proliferation of the weapons (and the powers that wield them), and despite the numerous wars that have been fought since 1945, they have never again been used. *Comments pertain to the English-subtitled version shown on TCM in 2020 (the 75th anniversary of the bombing).

This sad and strong movie, quite expressionist and reminding a documentary, was made just eigth years after USA atomic bombing of Hiroshima. It depicts the destruction of war in a so desperate and degrading way, with harsh images of tragedy and sounds of scream, that perhaps only Elem Klimov's Come and See overcane it in the history of cinema. Although pace is perhaps more sluggish than the ideal, Hideo Sekigawa has anyway an amazing sucess in using sound, working with broad spaces, and coordinating tens of thousands of extras, including many children, with remarkable and quite expressive performances of them. Hiroshima's hellscape with a multitude of dirty flabbergasted hobbling people on dispair and in tattered cloth surrounded by dead bodies reminded me not only of Come and See, but also of paintures such as Candido Portinari's Retirantes and Théodore Géricault's The Raft of the Medusa. The movie is able to cause deep emotions, by the combination of good soundtrack, striking cinenatography and very moving acring. It is one of the most important pacifist films ever made, not only for showing, without filters, the horror that is the reason for armed forces exist, but also for portraying their ridículous behavior and concerns.

There was minimal debate surrounding Oppenheimer's decision not to include any scenes set in Japan. I wouldn't call it a huge source of discourse, or a big controversy, but it popped up a little here and there, I noticed. Without going off on too much of a tangent, it was a damned if you do, damned if you don't kind of situation, because focusing on Oppenheimer, the man (as I think the film did quite effectively) does mean the victims of his weapons aren't directly given a voice... but if Christopher Nolan had set scenes in Japan, people might have taken issue with a white filmmaker overstepping a boundary (it's happened to a small extent with Scorsese making Killers of the Flower Moon, and that might blow up even more discourse-wise when that film gets a wide release).

But I think so long as people are aware that Japanese films also cover the effects of the atomic bomb while focusing on its victims, then that entirely negates the need for an American or English filmmaker to cover such a perspective. Unfortunately, not many people do seem to know about 1953's Hiroshima, as it only has about 1100 views on Letterboxd and about half of that on IMDb. It should be more well-known, though, because it's an impressively made and remarkably realistic depiction of the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima, including the aftermath and how the city grappled with the devastation following the end of World War II.

The film's commendable for how grounded and intensely real it all feels. The production value is, for the most part, incredible, with the scenes set right after the bombing feeling truly authentic and harrowing. It's a very tough film to sit through, but I think much of it will stick with me, and I don't feel like there are a ton of movies 70+ years old that feel quite this visceral.

I think the final act gets a little unfocused, if I was to have a complaint. I thought it all was losing me a bit towards the end, but then the final scene comes around and ties just about everything together in a haunting and effective way. It's not a film I think I'll ever rewatch, but I'm glad I've seen it now, because there's a ton to appreciate within this very hard-hitting historical drama.

Strategy and politics aside, civilians on both sides of WW2 paid a high price. That's a take away from this melodramatic take on the plight of many innocents.