4 real historical locations · Japan
Shohei Imamura's devastating Japanese film follows a young woman whose chance of marriage is destroyed by radiation sickness after the Hiroshima bombing. Based on Masuji Ibuse's novel, it chronicles the lingering horror that continued long after August 1945.
CinemaMapped has mapped 4 real historical locations where the story takes place, spanning Japan.
The 1989 Japanese film by Shohei Imamura depicts the lives of Hiroshima survivors years after the bomb — the lingering radiation sickness, social stigma and ...
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 killed approximately 80,000 people immediately; by the end of 1945 the death toll had risen to 90,000-166,000. Survivors (hibakusha) faced radiation illness, social dis...
View location →Yasuko and her aunt and uncle retreat to their village after the bombing. Black radioactive rain fell on them during their escape — a mark that will blight Y...
Black rain — dark, sticky, radioactive precipitation caused by the bombing — fell across northwest Hiroshima for hours after the explosion. Many who were not at the epicentre died of radiation exposure weeks later.
View location →Yasuko is in Hiroshima on 6 August 1945. Director Shohei Imamura recreates the immediate aftermath — the burned survivors stumbling through rubble, the silen...
Imamura's 1989 film is based on Masuji Ibuse's novel drawn from actual survivor diaries. It examines the bomb's legacy not as a political event but as a wound carried invisibly by those who survived.
View location →Five years after the bombing, Yasuko lives under the shadow of her hibakusha status. Potential husbands' families fear her exposure to radiation. The black r...
Hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors) faced severe discrimination in post-war Japan. Fears of genetic damage led to rejection in marriage and employment. The Japanese government denied hibakusha medical support for decades.
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