JAPAN: Japanese documentary takes a look at the life of a double A-bomb survivor as the U.S. looks to change its nuclear policy

Record ID: 356565

  • Title: JAPAN: Japanese documentary takes a look at the life of a double A-bomb survivor as the U.S. looks to change its nuclear policy
  • Date: 9th April 2010
  • Summary: TOKYO, JAPAN (APRIL 06, 2010) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) PRODUCER OF JAPANESE FILM "DOUBLE-HIBAKU - RACONTEUR TSUTOMU YAMAGUCHI HIS TESTAMENT TO THE WORLD ", HIDETAKA INAZUKA, SAYING: "Yamaguchi was able to meet James Cameron last December, but he passed away 10 days later. I feel the same way as Yamaguchi as I would like to see how a global director like James Cam
  • Embargoed: 24th April 2010 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Reuters ID: LVA55C9E0V963A8YZQT2W7JS7GSO
  • Story Text: A Japanese documentary on the life of a man officially recognised as the world's only survivor of both the Hiroshima and the Nagasaki nuclear bomb attacks is in the works as the world makes its way to Washington for an unprecedented meeting on nuclear security.
    The documentary produced by Japanese Hidetaka Inazuka tells the story of Tsutomu Yamaguchi who had the misfortune of being in both Hiroshima and Nagasaki each time the United States dropped an atom bomb onto the cities in the waning months of World War Two.
    While not the only person to be known to have survived both blasts, Tsutomu Yamaguchi is the only one to have asked and to have been officially recognised by the Japanese government as a double-hibakusha, as they are also called.
    He experienced the world's first atomic attack while he was just 3 kilometres (1.86 miles) away from the epicentre, in the western Japanese city of Hiroshima 64 years ago.
    The atomic bomb wiped out the city and killed over 140,000 of its then 350,000 population in a blinding flash.
    Yamaguchi, who was on a business trip to Hiroshima, was temporarily blinded, seriously burnt and his ear drums destroyed -- but the 28-year-old miraculously survived.
    He barely managed to return home in Nagasaki three days later only to, once again, barely escape death in Japan's second atomic bombing.
    Over 80,000 people were instantly blasted away or died within the year, due to radiation sickness in Nagasaki.
    Yamaguchi survived both bombings, but for over 61 years kept it all to himself while suffering from the long-term effects of nuclear radiation.
    This documentary film "Double-Hibaku, Raconteur Tsutomu Yamaguchi, His Testament To The World" was given a peak preview in New York in March 2010 at the New York Peace Film Festival but is expected to be completed and premiered in Nagasaki, Yamaguchi's hometown, in time for the 65th anniversary later this summer.
    "This year marks the 65th anniversary of the atomic bombings, but when you go around the world, people tend to know about the bombing of Hiroshima yet Nagasaki is rarely mentioned," Hidetaka Inazuka, producer of the documentary film, told Reuters in Tokyo on Tuesday (April 6).
    "There were two bombings in two big cities and many victims have been killed like a large massacre, but it hasn't been told," he added.
    Yamaguchi only decided to talk of his ordeal after the death of his second son - also an atom bomb survivor - to cancer.
    He became an ardent lobbyist for the end to all nuclear arms and a vocal anti-nuclear weapons activist.
    Yamaguchi spent his final years of his life giving speeches across Japan and the world with the hopes that his side of the story gets heard.
    "We must not allow a third atomic bombing. Please help me get the nuclear weapons in the world removed," Yamaguchi tells an audience in the United Nations Headquarters in the upcoming documentary.
    In Japan, people are raised on stories of the suffering in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and they regularly visit the museum and listen to the tales of the survivors.
    However, film producer Inazuka says that is changing with the rapid aging of those who survived.
    "The survivors are already in their sixties, seventies and eighties thinking they must tell their stories now or it will be left untold. The reality is that the memories of the bomb are fading gradually and that's when we met survivor Yamaguchi," said Inazuka.
    Yamaguchi's story, however, was heard by one individual in particular who has decided to do something about it.
    Responding to a letter Yamaguchi wrote to him, "Avatar" director James Cameron took heed and in December 2009 travelled to Nagasaki.
    "Yamaguchi was able to meet James Cameron last December, but he passed away 10 days later. I feel the same way as Yamaguchi as I would like to see how a global director like James Cameron would film the atomic bombing. If it's possible, I'd like him to shoot the film as soon as possible with an all-or-nothing attitude," Inazuka told Reuters.
    Cameron and Charles Pellegrino, author of "The Last Train From Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back," met with Yamaguchi as the man lay dying in his hospital bed.
    They shook hands with the 93-year-old promising that the survivors' story will be passed on to the world through Cameron's film.
    Yamaguchi passed away ten days later at the age of 93 of stomach cancer.
    Earlier next week, leaders from 47 countries will gather in Washington for an unprecedented meeting on nuclear security, with host U.S. President Barack Obama hoping they can agree on how to keep atomic bombs out of terrorists' hands.
    The Obama administration just unveiled a new policy on Tuesday (April 6) calling for reduced U.S. reliance on its nuclear deterrent, but sent a stern message to nuclear-defiant Iran and North Korea that they remain potential targets.
    Although the summit will not focus on individual nations, the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea -- and possible new U.N. sanctions against Tehran -- are expected to come up in Obama's bilateral meetings with Chinese President Hu Jintao and other leaders, as well as in the speeches of Israeli and other participants.
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