The Atomic Age on Film

The Atomic Age on Film showcases four iconic films about war and peace in the nuclear age. The program is a companion to the Never Again exhibition at the Holmes à Court Gallery (May-June 2025), and commemorates 80 years since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Program curated by Dr Mick Broderick.

On the Beach (USA, 1959)

Based on Neville Shute’s best-selling novel, Stanley Kramer's adaptation of On the Beach is set months after a thermonuclear war has killed all life in the northern hemisphere. An American nuclear submarine travels to Melbourne – which is the only metropolis yet to succumb to the pall of radioactive fallout inexorably working its way south across the globe. Entropic and stoic, On the Beach is a powerful warning of humanity’s seemingly suicidal trajectory in the nuclear age.

Special guest: Paul Grace, author of 'Operation Hurricane: The story of Britain’s first atomic test in Australia and the legacy that remains' (Hachette Australia, 2023)

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (USA, 1964)

Stanley Kubrick's sublime “nightmare comedy” deftly and hilariously confronts the existential paradox of mutual assured destruction (MAD). Sixty years on Dr Strangelove remains a potent critique of superpower nuclear brinkmanship by satirically deploying the very rhetoric and logic of nuclear deterrence to demonstrate the fallacies of relying on a posture of retaliatory Armageddon – an error-prone system perpetuating a global state of nuclear terror.

Special guest: Mick Broderick, writer, photographer and an internationally recognised researcher of nuclear culture

In the Corner of the World (Japan, 2016)

The award-winning Japanese anime In This Corner of the World depicts Suzu, a young woman living near Hiroshima prior to, during and after the Second World War. This animated drama is a gentle and heartfelt depiction of the privations of war and its impact on families and communities, especially those affected by the atom bombing. Despite these travails Suzu remains steadfast and resolute, surviving such tragedies with determination in post-war Japan.

Special guest: KA Garlick, peace activist and Nuclear Free campaigner

Twilight Time (Australia, 2024)

In Twilight Time, Dr Desmond Ball – lauded by US President Jimmy Carter as the “man who saved the world” – is revealed to be an Australian strategic thinker who challenged global defence policy and critiqued many of the underlying assumptions leading inexorably toward nuclear oblivion. As Australia becomes further embedded in American and allied military and intelligence networks, Des Ball’s influential career demonstrates how we can reorient our reliance upon strategic partnerships that may act against Australia’s national interest.

Special guest:  Twilight Time writer/director, John Hughes, in conversation with Jo Vallentine, peace activist and former WA Senator