About

Adapted from the classic manga series by Keiji Nakazawa, Barefoot Gen is a heartbreaking, beautifully rendered story of one boy's experience of the Hiroshima bombing on 1945.

The film opens only days before the fateful attack, as the local citizenry attempt to deal with the hunger and fatigue brought about by the dearth of resources in wartime Japan. Gen is a young boy, working hard for his family and eager to help his pregnant mother. Then, on August 6, an atomic bomb is dropped from a plane overhead and mass destruction is wrought upon the city.

Barefoot Gen is perhaps most famous for its shocking depiction of the physical effects of the bomb blast itself. That grisly sequence, showing the fate of various people caught within the blast radius, is followed by Gen's trek through the horrific aftermath of the bombing as he searches for his family.

The director Mori Masaki captures the spirit of Nakazawa's words and drawings, imbuing them with life and realising the trauma of a ruined city. Nakazawa himself was a 6-year-old boy in Hiroshima in 1945 and based many of the series' events on his own personal experiences. The film itself is wrenching, humane, and visually compelling – an underseen masterwork of anime cinema and an important depiction of a momentous day.