What makes this film so interesting is that it shows many previously classified films of exploding atomic bombs during US testing in the 1940s and 1950s; as well as the test sites, equipment and key players. Also of interest are clips of military and public information films from the era.
Much of this information is here made accessible to the public for the first time, which makes it all the more pity that many of the films have been cleverly edited by the filmmaker to increase the "wow" factor. For example, the GRABLE test from 1953 has been edited to the point of being misleading; the time from the firing of the tactical shell from the gun, to the its detonation several miles away has been cut from the 19 seconds in the original footage, to just 9 seconds in this film, so that it times nicely with the music. It gives the impression that the shell explodes much sooner than it actually did in reality.
There are other similar artistic licenses taken, and the result for me, is that, though the documentary has some awesome shots, it's less interesting than it might have been.
Technical information about the bombs is kept to a bare minimum, and often we are left wondering how, why and what happened next; and having William Shatner do the narration doesn't help...
Much of this information is here made accessible to the public for the first time, which makes it all the more pity that many of the films have been cleverly edited by the filmmaker to increase the "wow" factor. For example, the GRABLE test from 1953 has been edited to the point of being misleading; the time from the firing of the tactical shell from the gun, to the its detonation several miles away has been cut from the 19 seconds in the original footage, to just 9 seconds in this film, so that it times nicely with the music. It gives the impression that the shell explodes much sooner than it actually did in reality.
There are other similar artistic licenses taken, and the result for me, is that, though the documentary has some awesome shots, it's less interesting than it might have been.
Technical information about the bombs is kept to a bare minimum, and often we are left wondering how, why and what happened next; and having William Shatner do the narration doesn't help...