Atomic Bomb Cinema The Apocalyptic Imagination on Film

Unfathomably merciless and powerful, the atomic bomb has left its indelible mark on film. In "Atomic Bomb Cinema," Jerome F. Shapiro unearths the unspoken legacy of the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima and its complex aftermath in American and Japanese cinema.

According to Shapiro, a "Bomb film" is never simply an exercise in ideology or paranoia. He examines hundreds of films like "Godzilla, Dr. Strangelove," and "The Terminator" as a body of work held together by ancient narrative and symbolic traditions that extol survival under devastating conditions. Drawing extensively on both English-language and Japanese-language sources, Shapiro argues that such films not only grapple with our nuclear anxieties, but also offer signs of hope that humanity is capable of repairing a damaged and divided world.

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Introduction: Vexing questions and atomic bomb cinema 1:1895 to 1945: Prototypical bomb films 2:1945 to 1949: The initial elation after Hiroshima and Nagasaki 3:1950 to 1963: Part I: A complex growth industry 4:1950 to 1963: Part II: Cold war fantasies 5:1964 to 1979: Losing faith in social institutions 6:1980 to 1989: The Reagan era 7:1990 to 2001: The post-cold war years 8:1945 to 2001: Japan's atomic bomb cinema Conclusion: Demonic cinema Notes Selected Bibliography Filmography Index

Jerome F. Shapiro