In 2017, filmmaker Toru Yamada visited the town of Namie, Fukushima Prefecture, shortly after evacuation orders for the town were lifted following the 2011 meltdowns at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. He was struck by the eerie silence that haunted the town at night.

“During the day, the town was filled with the noise of unoccupied houses being torn down and construction vehicles driving by,” says Yamada, 42. “But at night, there was absolute stillness, with traffic lights quietly flashing. Repatriation efforts had begun, but I wondered whether people would return to a place whose pre-disaster population of 21,000 had fallen to zero. That’s how I was inspired to turn this abnormal condition into a film.”

He later met a family of three — Tetsu Watanabe, the then-99-year-old matriarch and founder of a decades-old family-run printing business; her 75-year-old son, Takemasa; and his wife, Shigeko, also 75.…