Baltasar Kormákur’s latest film, Touch, was screened in Hiroshima this weekend. Among the attendees were survivors of the 1945 atomic bombing, reports RÚV.
The premiere took place at the Hiroshima International Film Festival. According to Baltasar, the audience was deeply interested in the film, particularly as the consequences of the atomic bombing during World War II are rarely discussed in Japan today. He added, “I also appreciated hearing how one viewer found it beautiful that the film is framed as a love story.”
Based on a novel by Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson, Touch is partially set in Hiroshima. The story follows Kristófer, a retired widower and restaurateur, as he travels to Hiroshima in search of Miko, his Japanese fiancée who disappeared without a trace 50 years earlier.
Some attendees, now elderly, vividly remembered the events. “A significant number of people who experienced these horrors were present,” Baltasar told the national broadcaster. “This is a very sensitive subject, especially for atomic bomb survivors. They faced severe discrimination, as the film illustrates, and they have rarely spoken about it publicly. Being among them was humbling — it’s such a monumental experience.”
Miko, Kristófer’s fiancée in the story, was a victim of Hiroshima’s bombing but in a way rarely depicted. Her fate mirrors the experiences of many Japanese women who survived that time.
“There was a woman in her nineties who told a TV station that Miko’s story was her own,” Baltasar shared.
The film is set to release internationally in January. Read our interview with the director here.
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