Spike Lee questions why ‘Oppenheimer’ didn’t show “what happened to the Japanese”

Director Spike Lee has commented on Oppenheimer, suggesting it should have shown “what happened to the Japanese people”.

The recent Christopher Nolan historical drama follows the story of the Manhattan Project during World War 2, which developed the first nuclear weapons. These were ultimately dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and are estimated to have killed up to 226,000 people.

The film focuses solely on the US side of the events, and in a recent interview Lee – who has directed films such as Do The Right Thing and BlacKkKlansman – praised Nolan, though suggested a “comment” regarding the historical depiction of events.

“Chris Nolan with Oppenheimer, you know, he’s a massive filmmaker. Great film. I showed [Dunkirk] in my class. And this is not a criticism. It’s a comment,” he told The Washington Post.

“If it’s three hours, I would like to add some more minutes about what happened to the Japanese people. People got vaporised. Many years later, people are radioactive. It’s not like he didn’t have power. He tells studios what to do.

“I would have loved to have the end of the film maybe show what it did, dropping those two nuclear bombs on Japan,” Lee continued, adding that “this is all love” towards Nolan.

“And I bet he could tell me some things he would change about Do the Right Thing and Malcolm X,” he added.

In August, there was some backlash in Japan over Barbie studio Warner Bros.’s use of the Barbenheimer trend for its marketing, which involved incorporating imagery from Oppenheimer including the flames of an atomic explosion.

Many people in Japan criticised the studio for trivialising the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and to illustrate their point many mocked-up their own images involving the 9/11 attacks on the US in 2001.

The Japanese brand of Warner Bros. also criticised the US account’s engagement with the trend, and Warner Bros. US said in response that it “regrets its recent insensitive social media engagement. The studio offers a sincere apology.”

Since its release in July, Oppenheimer has become a huge success at the box office, recently surpassing Bohemian Rhapsody to become the highest-grossing biopic of all time after taking $912.7million (£736million) globally. The movie currently stands at $939.1million (£771.3million) at the global box office.

In a five-star review of Oppenheimer, NME said: “Not just the definitive account of the man behind the atom bomb, Oppenheimer is a monumental achievement in grown-up filmmaking.

“For years, Nolan has been perfecting the art of the serious blockbuster – crafting smart, finely-tuned multiplex epics that demand attention; that can’t be watched anywhere other than in a cinema, uninterrupted, without distractions. But this, somehow, feels bigger.”