In 1992 I was in my neighborhood Post Office in San Francisco. As I stood in line, I saw a poster that announced a series of US stamps that would mark the 50th commemoration of World War II. The stamps would be issued ten each year between 1992 and 1995 that depicted wartime events from 1941 to 1945. Only stamps for 1942 were shown on the poster.
Based on my experience co-directing and co-producing the film, Dark Circle, with Judy Irving and Ruth Landy, a film about the connection between nuclear power and nuclear weapons, I began to wonder how the end of World War II would be depicted.
According to many histories and opinions, World War II ended with the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Histories and opinions are divided as well among those who feel the bombs were necessary or not, among those who feel the United States had committed an immoral act and those who believed the bombings were a justified act of warfare that saved lives both Japanese and American.
My question was more simple. How would I depict the end of World War II?
