A documentary film featuring Americans involved in the dropping of the atomic bombs as well as survivors of the bombings was screened at the Peace Memorial Museum on June 29. After the screening of the film, its director, Steven Okazaki, 55, a third-generation Japanese-American, said he made the film in the hope of conveying the meaning of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
About 600 local residents saw the film, which was shown three times. Fourteen survivors of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki from both Japan and overseas appear in the film. In addition to these survivors, four others, crewmembers of the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and a scientist involved in the development of the bombs, quietly described their experiences on that day and in the days that followed, providing a perspective from both above and below the mushroom cloud.
With regard to the A-bomb survivors, who described their physical and mental suffering, a U.S. scientist said matter-of-factly, “I have no sympathy for them nor do I have any regrets. The bomb was used to hasten the end of the war.”
As for the gap in thinking between the two countries, Okazaki said, “If you are going to regret something for which you have such great responsibility, there is no end to it, so you have to put it in a positive light,” Okazaki said in analyzing the mentality of the side that dropped the bombs.
Okazaki’s film is titled “White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” After a showing at the International Conference Center Hiroshima on August 5, it will be screened at the Cine Twin theater starting August 18. Okazaki asked people to see his film, saying, “Whether or not the bombings were justified depends on whether it is seen from the U.S. side or the Japanese side. I would like people to stop debating and first listen to the stories of ordinary hibakusha.”