Film
What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases
Bookmark this pageUnstable Elements – Atomic Stories 1939–85 (1985)
Director: Paul Morrison, Andy Metcalf
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Two-thirds documentary, one-third dramatic moral exemplar, this traces a new history of the bomb and its domestic spin-offs: the World War II race between the Allies and the Axis to get there first, the complicity of politicians and scientists, the international bullying antics of America (riding to world domination on the back of the bomb), and the fallacy of the 'Atoms for Peace' campaign, portrayed here as a whitewash over a deliberate policy of using nuclear power stations to produce plutonium for the bomb. Using documentary footage, interviews with Manhattan Project scientists and their UK counterparts, excellent montages from Peter Kennard, and interviews with the relatives of dead nuke industry workers, it's a powerful indictment. But the final part - a mystifyingly oblique drama about the human, emotional effect of the nuke industry, based around Sizewell B - presents such an abrupt change as to almost scupper what went before.Author: JG
Cast & crew
Director: Paul Morrison, Andy Metcalf
Producer: Gillian Slovo
Cast: Donald Sumpter, Caroline Hutchison, Susanna Kleeman, Sam Kolpe, David Henry full cast
Genre(s): Documentaries
Duration: 90 mins
Top Stories
Ridley Scott interview
Director Ridley Scott tells Cath Clarke why he's making a science fiction comeback
Cannes Film Festival 2012: half-time report
Dave Calhoun reports on the hits, misses and a shocking new masterpiece from Michael Haneke
What do you think?
Post your review now