When your camera becomes a weapon and your directors are refugees turned propagandists.
For the USA, World War 2 was an all-out war - to mobilize the masses, the US government launched a huge propaganda campaign and cinema, the medium of the masses, was quite simply their most important weapon. Government authorities monitored the production of feature films and the military itself produced documentaries aimed at rallying the American people to support the troops. This film tells the story of four Hollywood directors of European origin, who returned to the "Old World" during the Second World War to make propaganda documentaries for the US Army at the front: William Wyler from Alsace, Frank Capra from Italy, Anatole Litvak from Ukraine and - in post-war Germany - Billy Wilder from Austria.
Direction
Hannover weaves archival mastery with intimate family testimony.
Editing
Propaganda footage recontextualized becomes devastating evidence.
Director
Jascha Hannover
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Wyler lost most of his hearing filming 'The Memphis Belle' in unpressurized bombers—the damage was permanent.
Wilder's postwar German films were so brutal the US shelved them; he basically invented the confrontational documentary.
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