User Reviews

Fascinating documentary on the women--local mothers, a waitress, a young lawyer--who fought efforts to downplay the accident by the nuclear industry and the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Their efforts led to hearings that cast doubt on officials' statements--for example, it turns out no one knows how much radiation was released because the sensors atop the towers were pushed past their maximum limits--and led to the federal prosecution and conviction of the utility company for falsifying records.

The film notes that more such doubt is cast by recent peer-reviewed, journal-published research. One paper shows that cancer rates are higher where the radioactive plume fell. Another paper explains the disparity between official expectations of illness and the observed higher rate--in part because the expectations accounted for short-lasting gamma radiation and not fat-soluble beta radiation.

The film notes that the efforts of these women did not stop the reopening of TMI after six years--but did help scuttle more than 100 planned nuclear plants.

Well worth seeing.

This enlightening documentary exposes the political, emotional and physical effects on those living in the vicinity of the 1979 Three Mile Island Nuclear Disaster. The caring, concern of producer, Professor Heidi Hutner, explains how these four empowered mothers grappled with mis and the lack of information and so become politicized in order protect and preserve the welfare of their families. The facts and legal entanglements of these issues are sincerely recounted by the reporter and lawyers who attempted to uncover the truth. The women in this film speak loud and clear and still the physical effects remain obscured by the nuclear industry. These women's legacy to us, as women, and in fact as humans, is our own mission for today to seek truth about nuclear power, before we too have to deal with the fallout.

This movie tells the story of the women who fought back against the official response to the disaster at Three Mile Island. Focusing primarily on the efforts of four women who led the local community's protest, and a fresh-out-of-law-school lawyer who took a lawsuit all the way to the Supreme Court, it is both an indictment of the nuclear industry and its regulators and a personal story about real people.

I saw this at a local film festival and was expecting an amateur production or agitprop. But it's anything but. Rather, it is expertly filmed and carefully edited, splicing slice-of-life portraits, interviews with experts, and historical footage. It makes a compelling case that not only was the leak at Three Mile Island a cover-up that led to drastic spikes in cancer rates upwind of the site, but also that the official response to the leak was a travesty of justice against, and a personal tragedy for, the victims of the accident.

But what makes this film so compelling is how human it is. I found myself pulled into the lives of the people in this community, saddened at their tragedy, rooting for them as underdogs, and uplifted by their dogged spirit. The audience around me was rapt, sometimes in tears, and standing in applause at the end.

Brilliant documentary by Heidi Hutner and her cast. Loved the story of the four women and how determined they were to be seen and heard. From the flashbacks and the old footage it takes you back to a time when a tragic event hit thousands of happy family's in Pennsylvania. This film is not to be missed. The focus of strong female leads like Joanne Doroshow is highlighted beautifully in this piece. I, also, enjoyed that Ms. Hutner takes this film to a whole new level by asking the women to do testing to see the effects of the radioactive material and what it has done to their bodies and how it has effects on our future. Beautiful cinematography and wonderfully executed!

The heartfelt story of four housewives, two young attorneys and a journalist who have battled since 1979 for accountability by those responsible for the meltdown and coverup of the Three Mile Island reactor. They fought all the way to the Supreme Court after their families and neighborhood was decimated by cancers and other illnesses brought on by the poisonous cloud which resulted from the meltdown. The everywoman housewives personalize what could have been a dry scientific tale but I promise this documentary will grab your heart as well as your mind. If you think justice was served I'm sorry to say that, as of now, that is not the case. And if you think you don't live anywhere near a nuclear plant you might be surprised to learn that you do. I certainly was!

This film fills a critical void in the coverage of Three Mile Island. While it is tempting to let TMI fade into the past, the impact it had on nearby residents continues to this day. Hutner has done a masterful job of telling the stories of these women and integrating it with the science that suggests that harms to health might have been greater than understood at the time. That combination, the stories of the victims together with cutting edge science is not so easy to get right and she has done it masterfully. While current research continues and the full answers are not yet known, it is appropriate to take stock and consider the risks of nulcear power even as some are promoting it as an alternative to fossil fuel combustion.

I watched this at an environmental film fest. Knowing very little about Three Mile Island, I was disturbed to learn the extent of the failings of the local and federal government and big business. The residents of the community and our entire nation were misled. Telling this story through the eyes and of mothers in the community was effective and sincere. The women brought tears to my eyes but also laughs. You see their stories play out over decades and they are truly heroes and dedicated advocates. There are fascinating science and health concerns raised (I won't spoil them here), but you will walk away from the film with a healthy skepticism of nuclear energy and the protections in place in the United States of America.

I learned so much from "Radioactive" about the Three Mile Island disaster. I left the movie with a new perspective on the disaster itself. The film presents information I'd never heard before about the radiation exposure that people experienced. It also sheds light on the government and industry response to the disaster. The film mentions ongoing scientific research into the lasting effects of the exposures, and I am curious to learn more as that research develops. It's a must-see for anyone who remembers Three Mile Island, who lives near a nuclear power plant, or who is interested in nuclear policy.

This film has been shown at two festivals so far, one in NYC, one in DC. I attended both, and in both it received standing ovations from the audience. Meticulous in reporting the science and the facts, it does an even better job capturing the emotional tension of four mothers taking on the federal government and corrupt corporations that were pushing the fake narrative that there was "nothing to see here" at Three Mile Island.

Calling the corporation "corrupt" is no exagerration, since court cases the women brought proved a pattern of falsifying documents, cheating on licensing exams, and lying to regulators.

Those government regulators also continue to lie to the public about the radiation released at TMI and the health effects on the downwinders, again as documented in the movie.

Anyone who is thinking about drinking the radioactive kool-aid the Biden administration is offering in the form of tax payer support for the nuclear industry needs to watch this movie and learn about its decades of lying and cover ups and cheer at the bravery of the women who exposed it.

😢 What a sad joke.

Yes, radiation was briefly released, roughly the equivalent of a single Xray - if you were exactly downwind & on a 30 foot ladder during the hour it was released.

If the paranoia of this film were correct, the hundreds of workers at both reactors & their nearby families would have been greatly affected. Instead, the other reactor continued normal operations until 2019 - 40 years later!

I've no doubt rumors & empty innuendo have left some residents with fears, but those are groundless. It is a shame that this misinformation has terrified these persons for so long. Perhaps watching a lecture by Dr Geri Thomas would help, or the new Oliver Stone film, Nuclear Now.

This brilliant movie tells the moving story of three women and their communities that were greatly impacted by a horrible nuclear accident. It is masterfully told thru interviews and scenes where the lying and deceit of the industry and politicians attempting to minimize and deny any of the risk can be seen. It unfolds beautifully under the direction of its superb writer and director and it's cinematographer. The three women and the various people in the documentary bring credibility and a humanity to the story. The reality of the horror is brought to life and is frightening

Shouldn't be missed!

My name is Maria Frisby. I am a former Ms. Pennsylvania 2004, and was a citizen of Middletown, PA when we had the partial meltdown at Three Mile Island 44 years ago on March 28, 1979. I and so many citizens had a metallic taste in our mouths after controlled and uncontrolled amounts of radioactive gases were released into our atmosphere. It caused mutations/deformities in plants, animals and insects. It also affected people. We have a big latent cancer cluster in Middletown, PA and the surrounding towns since the partial meltdown at TMI. Many people, who lived near TMI during the partial meltdown, are getting diagnosed and succumbing to latent cancers at a young age and in their fifties and sixties. A lot of my brother's classmates and my classmates have died at a young age and in their fifties and sixties due to latent cancers since the partial meltdown at TMI. My brother knew a lot of the steel workers who worked at TMI. They would come to the bar in Middletown, PA on their lunch break and tell my brother that the TMI nuclear accident was much worse. All of them have succumbed and died to a latent cancer at a young age. There are a lot of latent cancer clusters as well in families who lived in Middletown, PA or the surrounding towns during the partial meltdown at TMI. Many family members in multiple families are getting diagnosed with latent cancers at the same time since the partial meltdown at TMI. It is so obvious that the partial meltdown at TMI was much worse. When the controlled and uncontrolled amounts of radioactive gases were released into the towns around TMI, it affected the molecular and cellular structures of plants, animals and insects found after the partial meltdown at TMI. It is now causing a lot of latent cancers in people who lived in towns surrounding TMI during the partial meltdown at TMI that occurred on March 28, 1979. The Fukushima, Chernobyl and TMI nuclear accidents have a lot in common, such as people reported having metallic tastes in their mouths after radioactive gases were released into their atmosphere and mutations/deformities in plants, animals, and insects found after the nuclear accidents at Fukushima, Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.

Excellent documentary! There was a lot that I learned about the Three Mile Island Nuclear disaster that I'd never known before, from the timing of events to the legal aspects to the medical concerns, but my favorite part was hearing from the four women who lived nearby. They worked tirelessly for years to get answers about what actually happened on March 28, 1979.

Clearly the company that ran the plant didn't know what to do in the case of an accident, and the local communities paid the price. The four women that were raising their families in the area are a delight to get to know through this film. Hats off to them and to the filmmakers who did a great job. Go see it!

This extraordinary documentary film puts a human face on the tragedy of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant disaster in 1979. Ordinary people lived in the community in Western Pennsylvania, and they had been told by regulators and the company managing the plant that everything was safe, and the company's staff had protocols in place to avoid anything untoward. In point of fact, the events of 1979 gave the lie to the fiction that nuclear power companies are anything but corrupt, and the so-called regulatory apparatus was working hand in hand with the industry to whitewash worst practices (and, once the disaster was underway, went out of its way to obscure the true facts of the disaster and its very real impacts on the community). Four brave women were undeterred in the face of official stonewalling, and this documentary puts them front and center: their response to the initial reports, their ongoing search for answers in the months and years that followed, and their present-day effort to come to emotional terms with the results among their community. The documentarians rely on testimony from whistleblowers, scientists, and public interest lawyers to lay out the case that the disaster at Three Mile Island was far worse than the public was given to believe. Ultimately, the film is very inspiring: ordinary people were thrust, no thanks to their governmental leaders, into a situation where they had to try on uncomfortable roles and challenge authority in ways that they had never imagined. This experience changed these four women in drastic ways. This film has the potential to change its viewers, and the nation, if we take seriously its implications.

This movie provided insights that i have never seen before. Not just the long term impact of radiation exposure (I had seen that before) but the power of committed action of a few people to navigate the intricacies of the legal and government systems. Its a salute to the people who say "we are not giving up or giving in".

The film also shed light on how Truth is a complicated word filled with many aspects and opinions.

The best thing about the film was that they didn't play the blame game which has no winners,ever.

See it for yourself and you will learn that this is the best kind of documentary.

Odella Woodson.

Given the blatantly self-serving attempts at spin, unrepentant obfuscation and outright lying that we see so much of these days coming from officialdom, big business and the media, it's no wonder that so many of us have become fed up with such brazenly untruthful tactics. And that's not just activists and advocates saying this - it's a growing sentiment from everyday citizens who've tired of the practice of unbridled deliberate deception. Such actions may have been harder to spot years ago, but, when life-threatening circumstances are on the line, it's inspiring to see how quickly and fervently riled-up individuals can get. That was the case with what happened in the wake of the 1979 Three Mile Island nuclear accident, when it became obvious that falsely reassuring messages about the allegedly trivial nature of the incident began to become apparent to the Pennsylvania locals who resided in the danger zone and suffered the consequences that came from it. A groundswell of protests spearheaded by four courageous women and their ardent attorneys emerged, even if those efforts did not receive much attention at the time. However, this debut documentary feature from writer-director Heidi Hutner, a professor of sustainability studies at Stony Brook University, seeks to change all that by bringing the stories of these determined advocates to light - as well as making known just how serious this downplayed incident really was. Through a series of interviews with the movement's principals, as well as a wealth of archive footage from the time, audiences witness what these individuals went through personally and as leaders of a campaign where they met pervasive resistance, condescending gender discrimination and ongoing intimidation from corporate and government sources. This offering also features first-time interviews with an insider/whistleblower who worked at the plant and with actress/social activist Jane Fonda, whose film "The China Syndrome" (1979), a fictional depiction of a nuclear power plant disaster, ironically premiered only two weeks before this real world event unfolded. Hutner's release, which has now become available for streaming, on home media and at special screenings, presents a powerful, damning indictment of how ineptly this incident was handled and a heroic profile of the outspoken champions who were willing to go all-out, despite the obstacles, to make their case known. Even if they didn't garner the attention they deserved at the time, this film helps to make up for that, shining a bright light on the reckless carelessness of those willing to place their own interests ahead of the welfare of innocent victims - and how those victims fought back to make their voices heard.

A never-before-told story about the women who fought the Nuclear Industry and their BIG LIE. They could have been warned but instead were kept in the dark, even after the Three Mile Island disaster occurred - putting their lives and their children's lives at risk. But they didn't slink away into darkness. They took on Goliath.

The film's director clearly built close relationship with the women who opened their homes to her, and she then interviews experts in the field to fill out the story. Cancer rates in that area are through the roof, and the suffering is horrific. And all of that could have been avoided if our government and big business believed in transparency.