Japanese Film Directors Want People to Remember Hiroshima Bombing

Film directors want to show in their films how a nuclear bomb devastates the planet's surface within several seconds
A new film about the nuclear catastrophe in Hiroshima was shot in Japan as based upon the novel If to Live With the Father by Hisashi Inoue. The film was made by Nikkatsu Studio (in Chofu, Tokyo's suburb).

The film is about a girl who survived after a bomb explosion. Famous actress Rie Miyazawa performs the role of the girl; the actress rejected numerous scenarios of other films for the sake of this very film. Rie Miyazawa's heroine cries "I must hate everyone!" standing amidst the ruins of a house destroyed with the nuclear explosion in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. At the same time, the girl constantly feels guilty and doubts that she can be happy at the time when many people died so tragically.

Suddenly the girl sees a ghost of her father who was killed by bombing. Then the film tells about the events in Hiroshima in 1948, three years after the nuclear explosion.

Last month Rie Miyazawa visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum; the actress carefully watched the photos of a ruined city and things that belonged to perished people. The popular actress says that it is for the first time in the career that she treats her roles with such respect as this role of the girl. In fact, this opinion is shared by the whole of the film crew.

Over the past two years Japanese got apprehensive over the possibility of a new world war several times: after the 9/11 acts of terrorism in the USA; after beginning of the Iraqi war and after North Korea unveiled its nuclear program. The events spurred film director Kazuo Kuroki, 72, to make a film to remind the people of the world about the tragedy caused by world wars.

Several films dedicated to the memory of the nuclear bombing were shown in Hiroshima this year. The commission for cinematography at the Hiroshima municipality founded in December 2002 reports that now three films about Hiroshima are being made. One of the films is shot by a US film crew. It is planned that one more film dedicated to the memory of the nuclear bombing will be made.
 
As non-Japanese film directors cannot reproduce the exact scene of Hiroshima after the bombing, US cinematographers engaged Masaaki Tanabe, 65, the man who remained alive after the nuclear explosion, as a consultant for the films. The man helped film makers to reproduce the scenery of Hiroshima in 1945 using computers. Tanabe's three relatives were killed with the bombing. In 1945 Masaaki Tanabe was 7 and he hardly remembers the day when the nuclear explosion sounded.
 
Several famous film directors were engaged for participation in the film project of the Hiroshima municipality. Kaneto Shindo, 91, who made his famous film Children of Hiroshima in 1954 and three more films about Hiroshima, started a new film in spring of 2003. The film will be supplied with the effects and the after-effects of a nuclear explosion. The film crew will try to show how people were raised with a blast wave, carried through the fire and then were dropped into a river.
 
All the films by Shindo concentrate upon the strongest suffering that victims of the nuclear bombing experienced. In his new film, the film director wants to show how a nuclear bomb devastates the planet's surface within several seconds.