Day One (1989 film)

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Day One
Anne Twomey
Music byMason Daring
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
Production
Executive producersAaron Spelling
E. Duke Vincent
ProducersJosette Perrotta
David W. Rintels
CinematographyKees Van Oostrum
EditorDebra Karen
Running time145 mins.
Production companiesAT&T
Spelling Television
World International Network
Original release
NetworkCBS
ReleaseMarch 5, 1989 (1989-03-05)

Day One is a

The movie received critical acclaim for its historical accuracy despite being a drama.

Plot

When

Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, where the bomb is built. As World War II
draws to a close, Szilard (whose idea was responsible for the progress made) has second thoughts about atomic weapons and debates how and when to use the bomb.

The film focuses on the organization and the politics of the whole affair, such as tensions between the scientists and the military, the

communist
affiliation of many scientists around that time, the risks of espionage and the decision whether to use the bomb after Germany is defeated. Concerning the actual scientific work on the bomb, some of it is shown, but not explained, so an understanding of the workings of the bomb is needed to understand what is going on in that respect.

The story starts with

Project Manhattan
is started.

As Germany is being defeated and its scientists interrogated, it is found out that they have not even come close to constructing a nuclear bomb (partly due to bad cooperation by scientists). Despite the fact that no one has the technology now, and the original reason for project Manhattan is gone, work continues. Szilard, who first used Einstein to get his ideas about building a bomb across to the US leaders, now convinces him to join him in writing a letter to the president to do the opposite, namely not to build the bomb, in order to avoid an arms race. 68 scientists sign a petition, but that is held back by the military.

U.S. President Truman is faced with four options: peace talks (which would require the Japanese to keep their emperor, as eventually happened), a blockade (which was thought to be cowardly), an invasion (estimated by some to cost up to a million lives, though such numbers have been widely disputed), or dropping the bomb. Another consideration is that the USSR had said they would enter the war against Japan three months after the surrender of Germany and there is a fear that they might not leave. So Truman decides that the best course of action is to drop the bomb on Hiroshima, against the advice of General Eisenhower.

Cast

Production

In order to depict a desert setting, certain scenes of the film were filmed in a town named

Notre Dame de Lourdes
, located in the province of Quebec. The town offered a wide expanse of sand quarry that was used for filming.

Rival project

The film premiered on television in the same year that another film about the subject, Fat Man and Little Boy, starring Paul Newman as General Groves and Dwight Schultz as J. Robert Oppenheimer, was released to theaters.

See also

  • The Manhattan Project
    .

References

External links