39-40: The War Through a Lens

Overview

This well made documentary sees the outbreak of WW II (from the invasion of Poland 1939 till the fall of France 1940) as the contemporaries have perceived it in movie theaters. The news reels, made by the Germans, the French and the British, are presented in the historical context, in a chronological order. Sometimes, the narrator commentates on misleading, propagandistic images, such as pictures of German military exercises which are later presented as real combat footage.

Genres