Picadon Explained

Pikadon
Native Name:ピカドン
Director:Renzo Kinoshita
Producer:Renzo Kinoshita
Daizaburo Hayashi
Toshihiro Komori
Screenplay:Sayoko Kinoshita
Music:Reijiro Koroku
Production Nova
Cinematography:Satoru Isobe
Studio:Studio Lotus
Runtime:8 minutes
Country:Japan

Pikadon (Japanese: ピカドン Hepburn: Pikadon, "atomic bomb"[1]) is a 1978 Japanese short animated documentary war film anime,[2] produced and directed[3] by Renzo Kinoshita.[4]

Plot

The movie starts with depiction a normal morning in Hiroshima.

Although there is no protagonist, most focus is centered around a child playing with a paper plane. At the same time he throws his paper plane from his balcony and it falls, the atom bomb detonates, unleashing an unprecedented amount of destruction over people.

People burn to death, survivors’ skin melts. This scene ends with the view a small burned figure near the dome, presumably the child.

Last sequence of the work shows the child throwing his plane again, the paper plane flying instead and passing over modern-day Hiroshima as a shadow.

Legacy

This work is reported to be shown at Japanese schools as a reminder of the nuclear bombings. It is considered an obscure short film.

Notes and References

  1. https://jisho.org/search/%E3%83%94%E3%82%AB%E3%83%89%E3%83%B3 jisho.org Japanese-English dictionary ピカドン
  2. Web site: Pica don - Court-métrage (1979) - SensCritique. www.senscritique.com. fr. 2018-03-10.
  3. Web site: Pica-don (ピカドン, 1978). nishikataeiga.blogspot.cl. en-GB. 2018-03-10.
  4. Web site: Pikadon (1979) - A short animated film showing the nuking of Hiroshima in terrifying detail. Still shown in Japanese schools today as a rememberance(sic) of the bombs being dropped. • r/ObscureMedia. reddit. 26 October 2017 . en. 2018-03-10.