1964
Civil defense
films were, primarily, a teaching tool. Films created in anticipation of a wide release among the general public were infused with
entertaining elements as well, to grab a viewer's attention while relaying a
message of preparedness. The same cannot be said for the often tedious, purely
instructional films meant to train civil defense officials and radiological
monitors. Nuclear Detonations: The First Sixty Seconds, falls into
this latter category, delivering just as the title promises, a summary of the
immediate effects of a nuclear explosion. As if to drive home its
strictly educational nature, the film is set entirely within a classroom while
the narrator teaches a civil defense workshop.
The narrator is portrayed by Chris Bohn, a television actor and veteran of several civil defense productions
throughout the 1960's. He
can also be seen hosting In Time of Emergency (1969) and Fallout
Shelter: What is It? (1963), portraying a concerned news anchor
in Individual and Family Reactions on Warning (1964), wearily examining bomb damage as an engineer in Manual Damage Assessment (1964), and perhaps most
interestingly, playing a shelter occupant in Information Programs Within a
Public Shelter (1963) who often wanders out of the dark shadows to address the
camera and offer management advice. Here he acts as a teacher, explaining to
his class the dangers of blast, heat, and initial radiation which pose the
greatest hazards in the period after a nuclear detonation. Given the short length
of the film and the focus of its content, the Office of Civil Defense likely
intended it to function as a visual aid or a segue into a longer lecture.
Some interesting artistic elements remain, however, demonstrated in the
opening scenes where a ticking clock counts down the seconds until the class
begins while students mill about the room. This animated timepiece,
accompanied by a musical score reminiscent of The Twilight Zone, plays into the
narrator's opening argument: in the time it takes for his class to settle
in their seats, the worst damage from a nuclear bomb would have already
occurred. This point is repeated a number of times through graphic photographs and chalk outlines meticulously drawn upon the blackboard. Does the danger of a nuclear detonation end after the first
sixty seconds? Certainly not, but as Bohn makes clear in his
closing remarks, "that's for another chapter!"