Lucky Dragon No. 5 (film)

Lucky Dragon No. 5 (第五福竜丸) is a 1959 Japanese drama film directed by Kaneto Shindō. It is based on events involving the fishing boat Daigo Fukuryū Maru and the Castle Bravo thermonuclear bomb test in 1954.

Plot
An ageing fishing boat, Dai-go Fukuryū Maru ("Lucky Dragon No. 5") sets out from the port of Yaizu in Shizuoka Prefecture. It travels around the Pacific, line fishing. While the ship is near Bikini Atoll, the ship's navigator sees a flash. All the crew come up to watch. They realize it is an atomic explosion, but take the time to clear their fishing gear. A short time later, grey ash starts to fall on the ship. By the time the ship returns to port, the sailors have been burned brown. They unload the fish, which are then transported away. They visit the local doctor and then go to Tokyo for an examination. It turns out they are all contaminated with radioactivity. Their symptoms become worse, and the contaminated fish causes a panic. The men are taken to hospitals in Tokyo, leaving their families behind. The radio operator, Kuboyama, dies from the radiation.

Cast

 * Jūkichi Uno as Manakichi Kuboyama
 * Nobuko Otowa as Shizu Kuboyama
 * Harold Conway
 * Masao Mishima
 * Kikue Mori
 * Yasushi Nagata
 * Taketoshi Naitō
 * Kei Taguchi
 * Eitarō Ozawa as Governor
 * Koreya Senda as Dr. Kinoshita
 * Ippei Sōda
 * Taiji Tonoyama
 * Kōji Mitsui (cameo appearance)

Legacy
Lucky Dragon No. 5 was screened at a 2012 retrospective on Shindō and Kōzaburō Yoshimura in London, organised by the British Film Institute and the Japan Foundation.