Press release:
The World Premiere of the documentary film The Beginning of the End of Nuclear Weapons will take place on the 6th of June at 7pm at the Village East Cinema, 181 2nd Avenue, New York, hosted by Pressenza International Press Agency. Tickets cost $10 each ($1 for students) and can be bought online here. View the trailer here.
The Beginning of the End of Nuclear Weapons tells the story of how the United Nations came to approve a new treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons, despite the fact that the majority of the world’s population neither know about the treaty nor understand the threat that nuclear weapons pose to the world today.
This 59 minute documentary film takes the viewer through a brief history of nuclear bombs and the anti-nuclear activism that has pushed to eliminate them ever since their invention, including moving testimony from Hiroshima bomb survivor, Setsuko Thurlow. It moves into a consideration of the humanitarian initiative that successfully challenged the dominant security discourse and the historic steps taken since 2010 to turn the treaty from a dream into a reality. The key roles of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, who won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts, and the International Committee of the Red Cross are highlighted. The story is told through interviews with 14 experts in their fields.
Finally, the film shows what can be done by anyone to help bring the treaty into force and to stigmatise nuclear weapons until they are finally eradicated.
Directed by Spanish filmmaker, Álvaro Orús, [“Beyond Revenge” and “Universal Basic Income: Our right to live”] and produced by British Pressenza co-director, Tony Robinson, the film will kick off the Symposium “Perspectives from Utopia: Wealth, Women and Weapons”.
Tim Wright, ICAN Treaty Coordinator, and one of the 14 people interviewed in the film said, “This is a great resource to educate the public about the ban treaty, and hopefully to inspire them to take action.”
Ward Wilson, historian and author of Five Myths about Nuclear Weapons and another of the film’s interviewees said, “Absolutely great. Clear, factual, undeniable, and incredibly powerful.”
From the interviewees, attending and speaking at the Premiere will be Alice Slater, an advisor to Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and a committee member of World Beyond War. The film’s director and producer will also be attending to take part in the question and answer session immediately following the film.
For more information, contact: David Andersson, david.andersson@pressenza.com, +1 (917) 378-8758
About Pressenza International Press Agency
Pressenza International Press Agency is an independent news agency, focusing on journalism for peace and nonviolence and it publishes articles every day in 8 languages. www.pressenza.com
About the UN Treaty to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons
On the 7th of July 2017, 122 countries voted in favour of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Despite the boycott of countries possessing nuclear weapons, the treaty was approved after 10 years of work which led to nuclear weapons being examined through the lens of their humanitarian impacts. The treaty will come into force when 50 countries have ratified it. 23 countries have done so since it was opened for ratification on the 20th of September 2017, making it the most rapidly ratified disarmament treaty in UN history. https://bit.ly/2HJ4WFg
About ICAN
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons is a global campaign supported by a network of over 500 organisations. For their work in promoting efforts to create a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons, they were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017. www.icanw.org
About Álvaro Orús
Álvaro Orús is a Spanish documentary film maker whose films have been translated to several languages and tackle issues of interest from a Universalist Humanist perspective. “Beyond Revenge” tackles the subject of revenge and how it has become institutionalised and ended up entwined in culture, art and religion. “Universal Basic Income: Our Right to Live” explores the concept of Universal Basic Income and how, not only, it could be implemented, but also how it must be implemented given the growth of technology being applied to more and more tasks, leaving increasing numbers of people unemployed.
About Tony Robinson
Tony Robinson is a life-long humanist, member of the organisation “World without Wars and Violence”, coordination committee member of the Abolition 2000 Global Network to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons, and co-director of Pressenza International Press Agency. He has been specialising in the field of anti-nuclear weapons activism since 2006.
