The Day After Trinity

The Day After Trinity (a.k.a. The Day After Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb) is a 1980 documentary film directed and produced by Jon H. Else in association with KTEH public television in San Jose, California. The film tells the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967), the theoretical physicist who led the effort to build the first atomic bomb, tested in July 1945 at Trinity site in New Mexico. Featuring candid interviews with several Manhattan Project scientists, as well as newly declassified archival footage, The Day After Trinity was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature of 1980,[1] and received a Peabody Award in 1981.

The Day After Trinity
Photograph by Philippe Halsman (1958)
Directed byJon H. Else
Produced byJon H. Else
Peter Baker
(executive producer)
Written byDavid Peoples
Janet Peoples
Jon Else
StarringHans Bethe
Robert Serber
Robert Wilson
Frank Oppenheimer
I.I. Rabi
Freeman Dyson
Stanislaw Ulam
J. Robert Oppenheimer (archive footage)
Narrated byPaul Frees
Music byMartin Bresnick
CinematographyTom McDonough
David Espar
Stephen Lighthill
Edited byDavid Peoples
Ralph Wikke
Production
company
Distributed byPyramid Films
PBS (television)
Release date
  • January 20, 1981 (1981-01-20)
Running time
88 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

The film's title comes from an interview seen near the conclusion of the documentary. Robert Oppenheimer is asked for his thoughts on Sen. Robert F. Kennedy's efforts to urge President Lyndon Johnson to initiate talks to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. "It's 20 years too late," Oppenheimer replies. After a pause he states, "It should have been done the day after Trinity."

Cast
in order of first appearance[2]
  • Haakon Chevalier — writer, friend of J. Robert Oppenheimer
  • Hans Bethe — Los Alamos physicist, Nobel laureate in physics
  • Francis Fergusson — writer, friend of J. Robert Oppenheimer
  • Robert Serber — physicist, Los Alamos
  • Robert Wilson — physicist, Los Alamos
  • Frank Oppenheimer — physicist, Los Alamos, brother of Robert Oppenheimer
  • I.I. Rabi — Manhattan Project physicist, Nobel laureate
  • Freeman Dyson — physicist, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton University
  • Stirling Colgate — physicist, Los Alamos
  • Stan Ulam — mathematician, Los Alamos
  • Robert Porton — G.I., at Los Alamos during World War II
  • Françoise Ulam — writer, wife of Stanislaw Ulam
  • Dorothy McKibben — former head, Manhattan Project office, Santa Fe, New Mexico
  • Robert Krohn — physicist, Los Alamos
  • Jane Wilson — writer, wife of Robert Wilson
  • Jon Else — filmmaker, interviewer
  • Holm Bursom — rancher, Socorro, New Mexico
  • Dave MacDonald — rancher, Socorro, New Mexico
  • Susan Evans — resident, New Mexico
  • Elizabeth Ingram — merchant, San Antonio, New Mexico

Appearing on archive film
Trinity test, the first nuclear explosion (July 16, 1945)

Home media

The Day After Trinity was released on VHS cassette by Pyramid Home Video, and on Region 1 DVD by Image Entertainment. A CD-ROM that was released in 1995 included interviews, transcripts, annotations, biographies and other information.[3]

Reviews

That this is tacitly recognized is the most valuable aspect of The Day after Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb, Jon Else's documentary feature that opens today Jan. 20, 1980 at the Public Theater. The film serves as a kind of introduction to a period of history that is very easily ignored in favor of subjects of far less immediate concern. Mr. Else, and the movie, share with Oppenheimer an awful suspicion that when the first bomb was successfully detonated on the New Mexico desert in July 1945, it signaled the beginning of the end.

— Vincent Canby, The New York Times[4]

References
  1. "The 53rd Academy Awards (1981) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved October 7, 2011.
  2. Annotations from transcript of The Day After Trinity produced by PTV Publications, associated with the documentary's national broadcast on PBS April 29, 1981
  3. Nichols, Peter M. Home Video, The New York Times, August 18, 1995
  4. "The Day After Trinity: Oppenheimer & the Atomic Bomb (1980)", The New York Times, Vincent Canby, January 20, 1981
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