Effects of the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki

This standalone documentary stands as the sole film produced in the immediate wake of the 1945 atomic bombings. Japanese filmmakers entered the two cities intent on appealing to the International Red Cross, but were arrested by newly arriving American troops. The Americans and the Japanese eventually collaborated to produce this film—a science-oriented, clinical portrayal that renders the effects of atomic particles, the blast, and fire on everything from concrete to human flesh. No other filmmakers were admitted into the cities, and when the project was finished, the Americans packed up the footage and shipped it to an unknown location. That material is now lost. However, an American and a Japanese filmmaker each stole and hid a copy of the film, fearing that the brutal reality would be erased from history. Eventually, these prints surfaced and became our only precious archive of the aftermath of nuclear warfare—a film that everyone knows in part, yet has rarely seen in its entirety.