Japan premieres 'Oppenheimer' amid mixed emotions, historical reflections

“Oppenheimer” has finally premiered in the nation where two cities were obliterated 79 years ago by the nuclear weapons invented by the American scientist who was the subject of the Oscar-winning film. Japanese filmgoers' reactions were mixed and highly emotional.

Toshiyuki Mimaki, who survived the bombing of Hiroshima when he was 3, said he had been fascinated by the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer, often called “the father of the atomic bomb”, for leading the Manhattan Project.

“What were the Japanese thinking, carrying out the attack on Pearl Harbor, starting a war they could never hope to win,” he said, sadness in his voice, in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.

He is now chairperson of a group of bomb victims called the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organisation and he saw “Oppenheimer” at a preview event. “During the whole movie, I was waiting and waiting for the Hiroshima bombing scene to come on, but it never did,” Mimaki said.

“Oppenheimer” does not directly depict what happened on the ground when the bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, turning some 100,000 people instantly into ashes, and killed thousands more in the days that followed, mostly civilians.

The film instead focuses on Oppenheimer as a person and his internal conflicts.

The film's release in Japan, more than eight months after it opened in the US, had been watched with trepidation because of the sensitivity of the subject matter.

Former Hiroshima Mayor Takashi Hiraoka was more critical of what was omitted, saying, "From Hiroshima’s standpoint, the horror of nuclear weapons was not sufficiently depicted," adding, “The film was made in a way to validate the conclusion that the atomic bomb was used to save the lives of Americans.”

Some moviegoers offered praise. One man emerging from a Tokyo theatre Friday said the movie was great, stressing that the topic was of great interest to Japanese, although emotionally volatile as well.

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Those who expect an anti-war movie may be disappointed. But telling Oppenheimer’s story in a Hollywood blockbuster would have been unthinkable several decades ago when justification of nuclear weapons dominated American sentiments, Kazuhiro Maeshima, a professor from Sophia University said.

“The work shows an America that has changed dramatically,” he added.

Takashi Yamazaki, director of “Godzilla Minus One,” which won the Oscar for visual effects and is a powerful statement on nuclear catastrophe in its own way, suggested he might be the man for that job.

“I feel there needs to be an answer from Japan to "Oppenheimer." Someday, I would like to make that movie,” he said in an online dialogue with “Oppenheimer” director Christopher Nolan.

Hiroyuki Shinju, a lawyer, noted Japan and Germany also carried out wartime atrocities, even as the nuclear threat grows around the world. Historians say Japan was also working on nuclear weapons during World War II and would have almost certainly used them against other nations, Shinju said.

“This movie can serve as the starting point for addressing the legitimacy of the use of nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as humanity’s, and Japan’s, reflections on nuclear weapons and war,” he wrote in his commentary on “Oppenheimer” published by the Tokyo Bar Association.