Overview
is a 1952 Japanese drama film directed by Kaneto Shindō.
Plot
Takako Ishikawa is a teacher on an island in the inland sea off the coast of post-war Hiroshima. During her summer holiday, she takes the ferry to her hometown Hiroshima to visit the graves of her parents and younger sister, who were killed in the Atomic bombing. She sees a beggar and recognises him as Iwakichi, a former servant of her parents, now burned on the face and partially blind. She follows him to his poor shack, where he is looked after by a woman living next door, and asks about his family. With his wife, his son and daughter-in-law dead, Iwakichi's only surviving relative is his grandson Tarō, who lives in an orphanage. Takako visits the orphanage and finds the children barely have enough to eat. She offers to take Iwakichi and his grandson back with her, but Iwakichi refuses, running away.
Takako goes on to visit Natsue Morikawa, a former colleague at the kindergarten where she used to teach, and now a midwife. Natsue has been rendered sterile as an aftereffect of the bomb, and is planning to adopt a child with her husband. Natsue and Takako visit the site of the kindergarten, which is now destroyed, and Takako decides to visit the students of the kindergarten.
The father of the first student she visits, Sanpei, has suddenly been taken ill from a radiation-related illness and dies just before she arrives. Another one of the students is terminally ill and dying in a church, where many people with bomb-related injuries are gathered.
From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).