James Cameron Meets Atomic Bomb Survivor To Research Film
Update:Sad news. Tsutomi Yamaguchi has died. A tragic reminder of how important Cameron’s promise to honour the victims of this tragic moment in history actually is. Here’sthe Guardian’s report.
After years and years of slaving away overAvatar– though most definitely, I think we’re agreed, not in vain – what isJames Camerondoing now? It would seem he’s already plunged straight back into hard work.
According to reports, Cameron paid a visit to Nagasaki, Japan, on the 22nd of December. He was there to visit Tsutomu Yamaguchi, one of the few survivors of the American Atomic bomb attacks on Japan in the second World War. Cameron made the visit to a hospital, where Yamaguchi is staying, being treated for cancer. He was accompanied byCharles Pellegrino, who has written a new book about the attrocities calledThe Last Train from Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back.
Where this becomes relevent to/Filmis in Cameron’s pledge to Yamaguchi, his stated intent to “pass on his rare and harrowing experience to future generations”.A story atMonsters and Criticsclaims outright that Cameron was there researching an upcoming movie project, calling it “a film about nuclear weapons.” They also quote Yamaguchi as saying it is “Cameron’s and Pellegrino’s destiny” to make such a film, possibly a rather hyperbolic translation that might instead have read that they are going to make such a film, or plan to.So it would seem that Cameron may be working on a film that echoes the material in Pellegrino’s book, very possibly adapted directly from said book. We don’t know for sure that this would be a fiction film as opposed to a documentary – which, we should not forget, Cameron directed three of in the break betweenTitanicandAvatar– but that’s how the quotes and circumstances read to me. Time will tell.Cameron is said, in the article, to have developed his interest in nuclear weapons after living through the Cuban missile crisis as an eight year old. I can barely imagine how terrifying that might have been, but I definitely see the influence of these fears on his films, perhaps most obviously the second Terminator picture.The most enthusing detail offered byMonsters and Criticsis Cameron’s promise that his take on the material would be “uncompromising”. Perhaps something more definitively ‘adult’ will turn around some of his critics a little, if only for that one film, though I can’t help but fear some pointless controversy will be kicked up when Cameron starts to make his “serious” movie in 3D.
