Film about ‘father of the atomic bomb’ finally opens in Japan after being delayed by outrage at ‘Barbenheimer’ memes
Archived version: archive.ph/8vjF7
Article is a bit click-baity. Many of the survivors who saw the film were okay with its depiction and understood why the film presented the atomic bombings the way that it did. The film is ultimately about J. Robert Oppenheimer, and showing the physical outcome of the bombings would have itself been a potentially crass and shocking inclusion in a relatively subdued character study of a complex and tortured individual. Everyone knows that the physical outcome of the bombings on Hiroshima are shocking and terrible and left a lasting scar on the nation, coming to define the national identity of the Japanese, and especially Hiroshima natives that survived the blast, throughout the 20th century and into the 21st. But it’s sort of like The Wind Rises. Oppenheimer was a physicist, and a very talented one. That his work contributed to the horrors of war is part of the tragedy of the individual and their story, just like it was for Jiro Horikoshi, the designer of the Zero.
DigitalTraveler42@lemmy.world 7 months ago
That’s probably why the movie was titled Oppenheimer and not Hiroshima & Nagasaki, because the movie was focused on the man and his work and the regrets that came from that work, while nations celebrated the end of a second World War.
This movie was the type of movie that was always going to upset someone, and while it sucks that Japanese citizens were killed, their emperor’s military might was a brutally murderous raping scourge set loose on that section of the world, while also working with some of the other worst regimes of the world. Overall Japan fucked around and attacked first, did a lot of horrible shit to many different peoples, made some truly horrible friends, and then found out in one of the most devastating ways possible, I feel bad for the innocent civilians, but it was always ever going to end the way it did, if not a lot worse.
I’m just glad Japan grew to be what it is now and that it chose better ways to engage with the world than more attempts at domination, even though Anime, Manga, and more have dominated the world’s hearts.
madcaesar@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Few people know about the barbaric shit the Japanese did during WW2. Some really… Really fucked up shit.
fishos@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Bruh, Unit 731 is a meme at this point.
LowtierComputer@lemmy.world 7 months ago
NPR played an interview with a survivor.
He said that he hoped people in Japan would watch Oppenheimer and see the excitement when the nuclear bomb testing succeeded. He felt that it showed the American point of view and that a bomb was their ticket out of a terrible war with Japan.
He also said we should discuss these things now because by the time the century anniversary comes there will be none of “us” left.
Jax@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
It’s interesting how differently survivors of an event feel when compared to people who only ever learned about the event through history.
BrianTheeBiscuiteer@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I heard there was a plot to stop the emperor from surrendering, despite the massive devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It would’ve taken 10x as many losses from air raids and ground battles for them to concede.
Sunforged@lemmy.ml 7 months ago
This takeaway is mythologization of America’s most reprehensible act.
We murdered 210,000 civilians because of a perceived threat to capitalism.
sheepy@lemm.ee 7 months ago
While I’m not defending the use of the bombs as bargaining chips, Japan would have suffered the same fate as Germany under Soviet rule. North Japan and South Japan, alongside a Tokyo Wall, would have not been just a “threat to capitalism”.
I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Every Purple Heart that has been given out since WW2 all come from a surplus we made in preparation for a land invasion of Japan. Think about that. Had the bombs not worked, our own estimates put the casualties at hundreds of thousands of soldiers. Just US soldiers. Not even counting Japanese soldiers or civilian lives. I don’t think the Soviets would have had a magical method to invade without similar casualties.
Were the bombs the right move? I don’t know. It was almost 80 years ago in a complicated time that none of us discussing it now can fully understand. I think it’s telling that Japan surrendered shortly after. I also think it’s telling that no nuclear weapon has been used in combat since then. Based solely on our estimates of what a land invasion, either by the US or the Soviets, would cost in terms of lives lost, I do think it’s a fair argument to say the bombs wound up costing less.
pennomi@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Switched strats to focus on a culture victory.
Dasus@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Yeah.
And the whole horror of the bombs devastation wasn’t truly realised until much later, and acknowledged, in the US? Quite a lot later, probably.
We’re watching it from Oppenheimer’s pov essentially, it’s not a documentary.