Blowing Up Paradise

Nuclear Nightmares

November 1979 •English

Peter Ustinov hosts this haunting 1980 documentary exploring the world's nuclear weaponry and the fragile system that deters either side from initiating the first nuclear strike. Although the world's political climate has mellowed since the Cold War era, Nuclear Nightmares takes the viewer back in time to gain a perspective of what it was like to live under a very real nuclear threat.

In My Lifetime: A Presentation of the Nuclear World Project

January 2011 •English

In one lifetime a nuclear-armed world emerged, and with it the potential for global destruction on a scale never before possible. Directed by a former ABC network news executive producer, In My Lifetime provides a comprehensive look at the full scope and impact of the nuclear age from its beginnings to the present day, including the international efforts by citizens, scientists and political leaders to reduce or eliminate the nuclear threat. Through archival footage and contemporary interviews, In My Lifetime portrays the history of the nuclear era and the complex search for "a way beyond". Filmed in Europe, Japan and the U.S., the movie features international voices from many perspectives and different parts of the history.

Half-Life in Fukushima

June 2016 •French

In the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, a Japanese farmer ekes out a solitary existence within the radiation red zone.

Radio Bikini

March 1988 •English

It starts with a live radio broadcast from the Bikini Atoll a few days before it is annihilated by a nuclear test. Shows great footage from these times and tells the story of the US Navy Sailors who were exposed to radioactive fallout. One interviewed sailor suffered grotesquely swollen limbs and he is shown being interviewed with enormous left arm and hand.

Deadly Deception: General Electric, Nuclear Weapons and Our Environment

October 1991 •English

This 1991 Academy Award®-winning documentary uncovers the disastrous health and environmental side effects caused by the production of nuclear materials by the General Electric Corporation.

Uncovering Fukushima

May 2022 •English

It follows a group of investigators as they return to the nuclear zone in Fukushima to uncover the secrets behind the wildlife that has claimed the toxic environment as its own.

The Phenomenon

October 2020 •English

This documentary examines unidentified aerial phenomenon. With testimony from high-ranking government officials, and NASA Astronauts, Senator Harry Reid says it "makes the incredible credible."

Le IIIe Reich n'aura pas la bombe

September 2019 •French

In the Nuclear Shadow: What Can the Children Tell Us?

October 1984 •English

Oscar nominated documentary short from 1984

Race for the World's First Atomic Bomb: A Thousand Days of Fear

August 2015 •English

The personalities behind the creation of the world's first atomic bomb were as extraordinary, and often as explosive, as the science they were working in. This is the inside-the-barbed-wire story of the men and women who worked on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos. Through first-hand accounts and never-before-seen interviews, this documentary looks inside the atomic insiders' hearts and minds, their triumphs and failures, their bravery in the face of paralyzing fear and, ultimately, their war-winning and world-changing accomplishments.

In Time's Shadow

August 1995 •English

Drawing upon eye-witness accounts from survivors and participants in the bombing of Hiroshima, this programme shows how both Japan and the United States are still facing enormous problems in coming to terms with the legacy of that fateful August day.

Rain of Ruin: The Bombing of Nagasaki

August 1995 •English

Scholars and eyewitnesses provide a picture of the 75 hours between the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and document the contradictions, interrelationships, and ambiguities of politics and military strategy in time of war.

Inside Chernobyl's Mega Tomb

December 2016 •English

Documentary which follows the construction of a trailblazing 36,000-tonne steel structure to entomb the ruins of the nuclear power plant destroyed in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes

February 2022 •English

Thirty-six years after the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded in Soviet Ukraine, newly uncovered archival footage and recorded interviews with those who were present paint an emotional and gripping portrait of the extent and gravity of the disaster and the lengths to which the Soviet government went to cover up the incident, including the soldiers sent in to “liquidate” the damage. Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes is the full, unvarnished true story of what happened in one of the least understood tragedies of the twentieth century.

Nuclear Savage: The Islands of Secret Project 4.1

November 2011 •English

A shocking political exposé, and an intimate ethnographic portrait of Pacific Islanders struggling for survival, dignity, and justice after decades of top-secret human radiation experiments conducted on them by the U.S. government.

Nuclear Rescue 911: Broken Arrows & Incidents

January 2001 •English

Since 1950, there have been 32 nuclear weapon accidents, known as "Broken Arrows." A Broken Arrow is defined as an unexpected event involving nuclear weapons that result in the accidental launching, firing, detonating, theft or loss of the weapon. To date, six nuclear weapons have been lost and never recovered.Now, recently declassified documents reveal the history and secrecy surrounding the events known as "Broken Arrows". There have been 32 nuclear weapon accidents since 1950. Six of these nuclear weapons have been lost and never recovered. What does this say about our defense system? What does this mean to our threatened environment? What do we do to rectify these monumental "mistakes"? Using spectacular special effects, newly uncovered and recently declassified footage, filmmaker Peter Kuran explores the accidents, incidents and exercises in the secret world of nuclear weapons.

The Day Called X

December 1957 •English

Portentously portrays the evacuation of Portland, Oregon, when threatened by a nuclear attack on its state-of-the-art civil defense system.

Vive La France

August 2014 •English

Kua and Teriki will soon get married. They live on the distant Tureia island in the French Polynesia, Pacific Ocean and have just been told that something is wrong with their son Maokis heart. It is a consequence of living only 100 km away from the island of Moruroa, where France has tested 193 atom bombs for 30 years. Several of their family members are sick and Moruroa can soon collapse, which can lead to a tsunami likely to drown all of them. Vive La France is a personal and intimate story about harvesting the consequences of the French atomic program.

The Journey

February 1987 •Swedish

Peter Watkins' global look at the impact of military use of nuclear technology and people's perception of it, as well as a meditation on the inherent bias of the media, and documentaries themselves.

A Compassionate Spy

August 2022 •English

Physicist Ted Hall is recruited to join the Manhattan Project as a teenager and goes to Los Alamos with no idea what he'll be working on. When he learns the true nature of the weapon being designed, he fears the post-war risk of a nuclear holocaust and begins to pass significant information to the Soviet Union.