One Hiroshima resident said he was a fan of the film's director Christopher Nolan, but wasn't sure the movie would be well received in Japan.
"The film also depicts the atomic bomb in a way that seems to praise it, and as a person with roots in Hiroshima I found it difficult to watch," said Mr. Kawai, who asked to be identified only by his last name.
College student Rishu Kanemoto was also in the audience.
"This film was telling the story from the American perspective, from the side that invented the atomic bomb," he said. "Hiroshima and Nagasaki where the atomic bombs were dropped are certainly the victims. But I think even though the inventor is one of the perpetrators, he's also a victim caught up in the war."
Japan is the only nation to have suffered atomic bombings, which claimed more than 200,000 lives in 1945 during World War Two. There were doubts over whether "Oppenheimer" would get shown in Japan when the film premiered globally last year.
