The result is a slick globe-trotting documentary that holds attention, yet doesn’t really leave the viewer more enlightened on the subject at hand than they were before.Īrchival footage under the opening credits provides a rapid-fire overview of relevant key events over the last 80 years, from bombing aircraft Enola Gay to climate activist Greta Thunberg. Irish filmmaker Frankie Fenton’s second feature, following the much more intimately focused “It’s Not Yet Dark,” chooses to focus primarily on pro-nuke advocates and their uphill public campaigns - as opposed to the pro-nuke arguments themselves, which are never rigorously addressed. It’s an intriguing if unpopular viewpoint that merits clear explanation and debate, things that “ Atomic Hope” ultimately does not provide. Yet in recent years, some voices have argued that nuclear power is in fact humanity’s best option to meet its energy requirements amid escalating environmental and resource crises.
Power plant accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl seemed to confirm fears that this energy source’s risks outweighed its benefits. Among the many social movements that arose in the 1960s and ’70s, one just about everyone on the liberal spectrum could agree on was anti-“nuke.” Hiroshima and Nagasaki left behind a lingering horror at the ways technological advancement might be turned to mass destruction.
