Cultural impact of the Chernobyl disaster

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The Chernobyl disaster is the world's worst nuclear accident to date.

Overview

The name "Chernobyl" has become synonymous with the concept of a nuclear energy disaster.[1][2] Referencing the political damage from the inept initial response to the disaster, pundits sometimes use the phrase "Chernobyl moment" to describe alleged analogous damaging failures, such as responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.[3] Ukraine has announced an intention to open the disaster area to tourism.[4] Numerous cultural works have referenced the disaster, some of which are listed in this article.

Documentary films

  • The Bell of Chernobyl (1987), a documentary film directed by Russian filmmaker, Rollan Sergienko.
  • Black Wind White Land
     (1993), a documentary film exploring the disaster and its consequences for the people of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine.
  • Ljudmila's Voice [sv] (2001) tells the story of Ljudmila Ignatenko and her husband Vasilij who was a firefighter responding to Chernobyl.[5]
  • Chernobyl Heart (2003), a documentary film observing the effects of the disaster on the health of children in the area.
  • Surviving Disaster: Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster (2006),[6] a BBC docudrama about the events at the Chernobyl plant during the accident and its immediate aftermath, focusing on the role of Valery Legasov.
  • The Battle of Chernobyl (2006), a documentary with live footage at the time of the situation in Pripyat and the powerplant.
  • Heavy Water: A Film for Chernobyl (2006), released by Seventh Art Productions to commemorate the disaster through poetry and first-hand accounts.
    Cinequest Film Festival and the Rhode Island “best score” award, with a screening at Tate Modern.[8]
  • The Unnamed Zone (2006), a Spanish documentary film about three young Ukrainian children directly affected by the disaster.
  • White Horse (2008), a short documentary about a man returning to his Ukraine home for the first time in 20 years.
  • Klitschko (2011), a documentary about the World Heavyweight Champions Vitali Klitschko and Wladimir Klitschko, which makes reference to their late father Wladimir Rodanovich Klitschko, a senior ranking Red Air Force officer was involved in the cleanup operation following the disaster who died in 2011.[9]
  • The Russian Woodpecker (2015), a documentary film that investigates the events leading to the Chernobyl disaster.
  • Babushkas Of Chernobyl (2017), a documentary directed by Holly Morris exploring the daily lives of elderly women who live and farm in the Exclusion Zone.[10]
  • Back to Chernobyl (2020), a documentary by Roman Shumunov[11]
  • Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes (2022), directed by James Jones, contains interviews with people who were there and newly discovered footage filmed at the plant by cameramen who worked alongside those who cleaned up the disaster.[12]

Fiction films

  • Decay (1990 film) [ru] (1990), a Soviet feature film about the accident and its consequences, the title referring to its main theme of disintegration of human relationships—personal and public.
  • Chernobyl: The Final Warning (1991), explores the disaster.
  • Klingon Empire, itself an analog of the Soviet Union since Star Trek: The Original Series
    .
  • In the film Naked (1993), starring David Thewlis, the eccentric protagonist Johnny quotes the Book of Revelation and remarks that the Russian translation of Chernobyl is "wormwood". This quote is also used as a sample in the album Orblivion (1997).
  • The Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki wrote and directed On Your Mark (1995), a music video for Japanese pop duo Chage and Aska. This was essentially an animated music video lasting almost seven minutes. The opening scene shows a clean, old-fashioned, and apparently deserted small village which is dominated by a huge, asymmetrical version of the Chernobyl "sarcophagus". In a 1995 interview in Animage magazine, Miyazaki compared the sarcophagus in the video to Chernobyl, noting the survival of plant life.[13]
  • In the comedy film Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo (2005), the character Deuce Bigalow meets Svetlana, a woman who was born in Chernobyl, and, as a result of the disaster, has a penis instead of a nose.
  • The action film Universal Soldier: Regeneration (2009) revolves around terrorists seizing control of Chernobyl and threatening to expose the reactor.
  • In the time travel comedy film Hot Tub Time Machine (2010), the hot tub is converted to a time machine when an illegal Russian energy drink, "Chernobly", is spilled on its controls. The protagonists are transported to 1986, only a few weeks before the real-life Chernobyl disaster.
  • The Russian-Ukrainian-German co-produced film В субботу (2011; international title Innocent Saturday) dramatizes the events in the town of Pripyat during the hours and days after the disaster, before the Soviet authorities decided to evacuate. The film was entered into the 61st Berlin International Film Festival.
  • In the film Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011), the Autobots and NEST travel to Chernobyl to retrieve ancient Cybertronian technology (initially, they were supposed to discover the source of a radiation leak). However, once it is retrieved Shockwave suddenly appears and ravages the plant, along with a worm-like Decepticon named Driller.
  • The horror film Chernobyl Diaries (2012) revolves around a group of college students who take an extreme tour into Pripyat, only to find themselves being stalked and hunted by a group of mysterious creatures.
  • The final 20 minutes in the fifth film of the Die Hard series, A Good Day to Die Hard (2013), are set in Chernobyl.
  • In the film
    Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw
     (2019), the main antagonistic faction Eteon's biotech and weapons facility is located inside the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, and soon after Luke Hobbs, Deckard Shaw, and Hattie Shaw drive a damaged truck into Pripyat.
  • Chernobyl: Abyss (2021), a Russian film directed by and starring Danila Kozlovsky, centers on a fictionalized firefighter who becomes a liquidator.

Literature

Music

  • Polish singer Jacek Kaczmarski wrote a song titled "Dzień Gniewu II (Czarnobyl)" (Day of Wrath II (Chernobyl), written in May 1986 and released a year later), about the day of the disaster in Pripyat, its citizens unaware of the unfolding tragedy. The song juxtaposes calm, ballada-like music with the perspective of imminent death (such as "Around the well in the backyard / wet, smiley faces / a child chases wheel / it is being killed as well"), serving as a protest song against the Soviet handling of the disaster and the secrecy that surrounded it.
  • The 1986 song "Jijiji" by Argentinian rock band Patricio Rey y sus Redonditos de Ricota was inspired by this incident
  • David Bowie's 1987 song "Time Will Crawl" was inspired by the disaster.
  • The incident also inspired the song "Burli" from the 1987 album Liebe, Tod & Teufel by Austrian pop group Erste Allgemeine Verunsicherung. It tells the story of a "Burli" (Austrian German for "boy") born with multiple physical deformities following a nuclear accident, concluding with his marriage to a girl with similar deformities as a result of the Chernobyl disaster. ("Auch sie hat einiges zuviel / als Andenken an Tschernobyl" "She also has a bit too much / As a souvenir of Chernobyl".) The single was denied airplay on West German radio due to being considered insensitive to victims of the disaster and people with disabilities generally.
  • English heavy metal band Saxon describe their personal experiences of the disaster in the track "Red Alert" on their 1988 album, Destiny.
  • The Japanese punk band The Blue Hearts' song "Chernobyl", on their 1988 single "Blue Hearts Theme", was written in protest of nuclear power. The band's record label at the time had ties to the nuclear industry, thus the group left the label to release the song.
  • "Mayday in Kiev", a song by
    mayday
    .
  • Paul Simon's 1990 song "Can't Run But", found on The Rhythm of the Saints contains references to the disaster.
  • The German electronic band Kraftwerk mentions Chernobyl at the beginning of their 1991 remix of their song "Radioactivity", released on the album The Mix. Chernobyl is mentioned along with other places of nuclear incidents and accidents, such as Harrisburg, Sellafield and Hiroshima. The names were included in the remix of the song because some critics had found the original version of the song to be too optimistic towards nuclear energy.
  • American rap group Outkast makes a reference to the disaster in the song "Millenium" on their second album ATLiens released in 1996. André 3000s lyrics start the song off with the line "Me and everything around me, is unstable like Chernobyl".
  • The 1997 song "Spam" by the band Save Ferris claims that the product is made in Chernobyl, to rhyme with the line, "It's pink and it's oval."
  • Swedish black metal band Craft has a song referring to the disaster called "Reaktor 4" on their second album, Terror Propaganda, released in 2002.
  • The music video for the 2007 song "
    Pripyat
    , focusing on some parts of the city that has been greatly affected by the disaster.
  • Crossover thrash band Municipal Waste wrote a song entitled "Wolves of Chernobyl", which was about the effects of the fallout, on their 2009 album Massive Aggressive.
  • The music video for "Sweet People", performed by Ukraine's Eurovision Song Contest 2010 entry Alyosha, was filmed in Pripyat.
  • "Colony Collapse" from the 2014 album Lost Forever // Lost Together by British band Architects makes reference to the disaster.
  • Brazilian musician Fredi Endres (of the band Comunidade Nin-Jitsu) calls himself "DJ Chernobyl" in a solo project. The nickname comes from the MTV Brasil Rockgol football championship, where the comedian hosts likened his haircut to the nuclear accident.[20]
  • Russian band Amatory dedicated a song titled "Cherno" (Russian: "Черно)" from the album DOOM (2019) to the Chernobyl disaster.
  • Ukrainian band Go_A used an aerial shot of the Chernobyl power plant for their music video for the piece Shum for the Eurovision Song Contest 2021.
  • South African band
    Kalahari Surfers
    released a mini-album in 2019 titled "Chernobyl" which contains the song "Human Wrongs- Chernobyl 25th Anniversary" written by W.Sony'.
  • Thrash metal band Megadeth wrote a song entitled "Dogs of Chernobyl" from their 2022 album, The Sick, the Dying... and the Dead!.
  • New Zealand musician Shona Laing's song "Soviet Snow", released in 1987, was inspired by the Chernobyl disaster. [21]

Television

  • Nova television series season 16 episode 4 "Back To Chernobyl" (1989) was filmed on-location three years after the disaster.
  • Chernobyl miniseries, produced by HBO and Sky Atlantic, aired on May 6, 2019.
  • Motylki, Ukrainian miniseries, aired on April 27, 2013.
  • The September 30, 2009, episode of
    paranormal investigation
    located at the site.
  • In the
    anti christ
    figure who caused the Chernobyl disaster.
  • In Scorpion season 2 episode 23 ("Chernobyl Intentions", airdate April 18, 2016), the team works on an issue with the Chernobyl sarcophagus.
  • In the television series
    The Event
    , the character Thomas is said to have been responsible for the disaster at Chernobyl after attempting to transport the fuel rods from the site using alien technology.
  • In The Simpsons season 5 episode 9 ("The Last Temptation of Homer"), Homer and his new colleague Mindy Simmons represent the Nuclear Power Plant at The National Energy convention in Capital City. Many passers-by are shouting at the nuclear power stand, culminating in one shouting, "No more Chernobyls!", prompting Homer to throw a brick at him.
  • In The Simpsons season 7 episode 7 ("King-Size Homer"), Homer receives a medal and the promise to be thinner again from his boss Mr. Burns, when Homer saves the town by "turning a potential Chernobyl into a mere Three Mile Island."
  • In The X-Files season 2 episode "The Host", the main antagonist, a mutant creature dubbed "Fluke-Man", is traced to a Russian freighter that was carrying radioactive sewage away from Chernobyl.
  • In the British TV series
    season 21 episode 3, originally aired on February 16, 2014, presenters Jeremy Clarkson and James May
    had to drive past the reactor as a part of a challenge. Clarkson ran out of fuel and was made to stop not far from the reactor.

Video games

References

  1. ^ "Travel to the Haunting Ruins of Chernobyl". The Daily Beast. April 30, 2019.
  2. ^ "HBO's 'Chernobyl' Isn't Just a Historical Drama—It's a Warning". Time. May 2, 2019. Retrieved April 14, 2020.
  3. ^ Huang, Yanzhong (April 13, 2020). "Xi Jinping Won the Coronavirus Crisis". Retrieved April 14, 2020.
  4. ^ "Dark tourism explained: why we're fascinated by suffering". South China Morning Post. November 17, 2019. Retrieved April 14, 2020.
  5. ^ Bergdahl, Gunnar (October 12, 2001), Ljudmilas röst (Documentary), Fantomfilm, Göteborg Film Festival, Triangelfilm, retrieved August 1, 2022
  6. ^ Surviving Disaster: Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster Archived May 13, 2016, at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ https://web.archive.org/web/20110813131910/http:/www.moviemail-online.co.uk/scripts/article.pl?articleID=308 Movie Mail UK. Retrieved 31 July 2020.
  8. ^ "Heavy Water: A film for Chernobyl". www.atomictv.com. Retrieved May 19, 2021.
  9. ^ "Klitschko". IMDb.
  10. ^ "Home". thebabushkasofchernobyl.com. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  11. ^ "Back to Chernobyl". Roman Shumunov. 2020. Retrieved November 10, 2022.
  12. ^ "Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes". Jones Films. Retrieved August 1, 2022.
  13. ^ "Interview: Miyazaki on On Your Mark // Hayao Miyazaki Web". Animage. Nausicaa.net. 1995. Retrieved July 31, 2010.
  14. ^ Gunkel, Christoph (October 31, 2011). "Ein Jahr, ein (Un-)Wort!". Der Spiegel (in German). Retrieved April 29, 2019.
  15. ^ Arata Takeda (2015), "Towards global awareness of nuclear threat: Literary responses to nuclear disasters in Christa Wolf's Accident: A Day's News (1987) and Daniel de Roulet's You Didn't See Anything at Fukushima (2011)", in The Impact of Disaster: Social and Cultural Approaches to Fukushima and Chernobyl, eds. Thomas M. Bohn, Thomas Feldhoff, Lisette Gebhardt, and Arndt Graf (Berlin: EB-Publishers), pp. 195–214, here pp. 199–205.
  16. ProQuest 331269418
    .
  17. ^ Mycio, Mary (July 6, 2004). "The World; Account of Chernobyl Trip Takes Web Surfers for a Ride". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved September 5, 2008.
  18. ^ Marra, Anthony (August 7, 2014). "Red Alert". The New York Times. Retrieved April 29, 2019.
  19. ^ "Stalking the Atomic City by Markiyan Kamysh". Penguin Random House Canada. Retrieved August 19, 2021.
  20. ^ "Comunidade Nin-Jitsu no Beco: Concorra a ingressos". Archived from the original on October 27, 2016.
  21. ^ https://www.audioculture.co.nz/articles/southern-comfort-shona-laing-in-the-nuclear-age
  22. ISBN 4-87233-670-4
    .

Further reading

External links

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