Kako Okuno watched “Oppenheimer,” the Oscar-winning biopic about the father of the atomic bomb, which opened in Japan on Friday.Scientists roared, stomped their feet and waved American flags as they watched the explosion in Hiroshima. I was shocked by the scene of the celebration.
Ms. Okuno (22), a childcare worker who grew up in Hiroshima and has been active as a peace and environmental activist, said she was “really shocked'' to see the joy on their faces.
Eight months after Christopher Nolan's film set box office records in the United States, Oppenheimer is now presenting Japanese audiences with an inside-out American perspective on one of the most painful events in Japan's history. Masu.
The film follows the breakthrough discoveries made by J. Robert Oppenheimer and his team before the United States attacked Japan in the first salvo of the nuclear age. Last month, it won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
Okuno, who saw the film in Tokyo on Saturday, lamented that it did not reflect the experiences of the hundreds of thousands of atomic bomb victims in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
“It's scary that this movie came out without a proper understanding of the effects of a nuclear bomb,” she said. Regarding her regrets that Oppenheimer expresses later in the film, she says, “If he had really thought he had created the technology that would destroy the world,” she said, “I wish he had done more about it.” said.
Bitter's End, the Japanese indie distributor that released the film, said in a December statement that it had decided to release “Oppenheimer” in theaters after “much discussion and consideration.” The reason: “The subject matter is very important and has special meaning for us Japanese people.''
Long before the film was released in Japan, online “Babenheimer” memes appeared to make light of the dropping of the atomic bomb by merging images from “Oppenheimer” and the movie “Barbie” to American fans. Future spectators were furious.
Given domestic sensitivities, some theaters in Japan have installed signs and posted trigger warnings warning audiences about scenes that “may be reminiscent of the damage caused by the atomic bomb.”
The film, which was released in 343 theaters nationwide, recorded box office revenue of 379.3 million yen ($2.5 million) in its first three days, making it the highest-grossing foreign film in Japan as of 2024.
Some commentators said they appreciated the film's release in Japan despite previous controversy. “We must not create a society in which it is impossible to see, think, and discuss,” wrote Yasuko Onda, editorial board member of the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's largest daily newspaper. “Don't squint at the movie.”
Some people, including atomic bomb survivors, have protested the exclusion of scenes from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but Hayato Yaguchi, a professor of American studies at the University of Tokyo, argues that “Oppenheimer” simply reflects the conventional perspective. He said that many other scenes are excluded from the world. It also includes stories of Native Americans whose land was used for nuclear testing.
The film “celebrates a small group of white male scientists who truly enjoyed their privilege and love of political power,” Yaguchi wrote in an email. “We wonder why such a one-sided white man's story continues to garner so much attention and acclaim in the United States, and how it relates to current politics and larger memory in the United States (and elsewhere). We need to focus more on what we are saying about politics.”
Some viewers who saw the film over the weekend said they realized it had a different story to tell.
Tae Tanno, 50, who watched the incident with her husband in Yokohama, Japan's second-largest city, was beginning to understand the devastating damage Oppenheimer and his fellow scientists had caused. He said he paid attention to.
“I truly believed that he certainly felt that way, that he felt remorse,” Tanno said.
Kazuhiro Maejima, a professor of American government and politics at Sophia University in Tokyo, said the portrayal of moral conscience may reflect changes in American public sentiment.
Decades ago, a movie depicting the guilt felt by the creators of the atomic bomb might have been unpopular in the United States. The accepted narrative in the United States was that the atomic bomb, at great cost, prevented an invasion of mainland Japan and saved the lives of thousands of American soldiers. says Mr. Maejima.
In 1995, for example, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington drastically reduced its exhibit showing part of the fuselage of the Enola Gay, the B-29 bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Veterans groups and some members of Congress objected to parts of the proposed document that questioned the rationale for America's use of the bomb.
“Thirty years ago, people thought it was a good thing that the atomic bomb had been dropped,” Maejima says. “I feel like there’s a much more ambivalent view now.”
Nearly 80 years since the end of World War II and eight years since Barack Obama became the first sitting U.S. president to visit Hiroshima, Japanese viewers are now more willing to watch films that don't focus on the victims. You may be able to watch it on .
Kana Miyoshi, 30, from Hiroshima, whose grandmother was seven years old at the time of the atomic bombing and who lost her father and younger brother in the atomic bombing, watched the film with her parents in Hiroshima on Saturday.
Like other viewers, Miyoshi said he was shocked by the scenes of celebrations that followed the bombing, but said he shouldn't condemn them. “This is reality and we can't change it,” said Miyoshi, whose grandmother passed away at age 83 almost three years ago.
Many Japanese support nuclear disarmament, and the country, which does not have its own nuclear weapons, relies on the United States' so-called “nuclear umbrella” for protection. 'Oppenheimer' builds nuclear deterrence as North Korea strengthens its nuclear arsenal, Russia threatens to use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine, and as the US approaches an election that could significantly change its commitment to global alliances Experts said this could stimulate debate.
Jennifer Lind, an associate professor of government at Dartmouth College who specializes in East Asian security, said, “There's a lot to be said about Japan's position on nuclear weapons here.'' “This film comes at a very interesting time when they're thinking, 'What is our national policy?'
Japanese peace activists also use “Oppenheimer'' as material for discussion.
Akira Kawasaki, a member of Peace Boat's executive committee, said, “Usually in Japan, the issue of nuclear weapons is taught as a story about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so this is a great opportunity to think about nuclear weapons from a very international perspective.'' A Japanese non-profit organization that operates cruises with an emphasis on social significance.
Kawasaki said “Oppenheimer” raises a potential warning as scientists develop artificial intelligence and other disruptive technologies that governments could exploit.
“Scientists are very vulnerable, very weak in the face of all forces,” Kawasaki said. “An individual cannot be strong enough to stand up to those things.”