Warning: As Hadashi no Gen is extremely graphic, it is not to be viewed by the faint of heart.
First off :-
What tugged at my heartstrings the most:
The scene where Gen's mother lost control of her senses as she watched her husband, daughter and youngest son perish in the flames.
The madness brought about by this atomic bombing truly was horrifying, and through this movie, I was given a little insight of what life was like for the survivors.
Though the atomic bombing did end the war, what really stunned me was the fact that the dunces of war leaders involved took way too much time to finally hang up their 'pride' and admit their defeat. The movie producers depicted this shock perfectly through the doing up of a scene whereby Gen's mother learnt of Japan's surrender, and her subsequent reaction (of disbelief, and to some extent, grief and anger).
All in all, I gave this movie a rating of 8/10, where 2 points were docked off due to some of the exaggerated scenes (I understand that radiation does simply horrible things to the body, but does it actually reduce the person in question to something that is no different from the living dead?) and inappropriate fanfare used at regular intervals.
I would like to take the opportunity to once more reiterate my point that this movie is not for the faint of heart. It should only be watched by one who is prepared for the grisly chaos that nuclear disasters are capable of bringing about.