WWII: Saving the Reality

The Angel of Budapest(es)

El ángel de Budapest (Angel of Budapest) is a Spanish 2011 television World War II-Holocaust miniseries based on the book "Un español frente al Holocausto" (A Spanish against the Holocaust) written by journalist and radio executive director Diego Carcedo. The plot focuses on Ángel Sanz Briz, a Spanish ambassador in Hungary during World War II who helped to save the lives of thousands of jews from the Holocaust by lodging them in Spanish safe houses in Budapest.

A Yank on the Burma Road(en)

A celebrated New York cabbie is pressed into service for a perilous journey through World War II China.

1945: The Fall of the Reich(fr)

In June 1944, optimism reigned in the Allied camp. In the West, the Normandy landings were a success. In their advance, the troops soon threatened the German border. In the East, the Red Army launched an attack. With Operation Bagration, it swept into Belarus and forced the Wehrmacht into a terrible retreat. It was a time for confidence. There was no doubt: "The war would be over before Christmas." And yet... The war dragged on for almost another year. Eleven long months of fighting, punctuated by terrible battles and atrocious war crimes. Eleven months of fear and hope, which shook the certainties of the leaders and the daily lives of the men. Eleven murderous months, which left an eternal scar on hearts and in history.

Les SS de la Das Reich, un parcours de la désolation(fr)

Gasbags(en)

It's war time London and the Crazy Gang (Flanagan & Allen, Nervo & Knox, Naughton & Gold) are doing their bit for the war effort by running a fish and chip stall using their platoon's barrage balloon for advertising. Their Sgt Major is not happy about this and orders them to take the balloon down, but a freak heavy wind accidentally carries the gang away to Nazi Germany. They are captured and placed in a detention camp where they meet an elderly prisoner named Jerry, who possess a map for the location of a secret weapon which will win the war! Fortunately Teddy Knox's impersonation of Hitler lands him the spot of pretending to be the Fuhrer at a gala dinner and the gang are allowed out of the camp. However the Nazis have other ideas for their substitute leader.

The Oak and the Tree(sq)

The story follows the Kosovar partisan hero known as Lisi (Oak), from WWII days, subsequent liberation, until mid-1960s. Lisi was a brave warrior, yet he and his generation remains largely uneducated. However his nephew starts as a courier, and becomes doctor afterwards.

Kamikaze: An Untold History(ja)

On the Pacific front, towards the end of World War II, Japan's imperial armed forces launched 'kamikaze' attacks - suicide missions by aircraft laden with bombs. It was a mad operation with no hope of returning alive, but the nation went wild, and the attacks continued for ten months, literally until the very last day of the war. Close to 4,000 Japanese airmen died, and nearly 7,000 Allied military personnel were killed, and thousands more were injured by the attacks. How could this happen? Utilising 15 years' worth of extensive interviews with US and Japanese World War II veterans, Takayuki Oshima’s film delves into the mechanism of how a crazed madness swept through an entire nation.

Zarki(sh)

In Vojvodina during the war, a partisan commander Zarki fell into the hands of the local Germans. They bound him in chains and take him from one village to another, torturing him in public so he could tell the names from his movement. Bewildered by his resisting power, the Germans tend to break him down and destroy the pride which is his answer to their torture. Frenzied of powerlessness, they ultimately choose the most horrifying death - they buried him alive in the sand that will cover the last trait of him, but he died victorious: He died for his thing.

Old Man River(en)

Documentary film version of the stage show in which actress Cynthia Gates Fujikawa explores the story of her father, actor Jerry Fujikawa, who had a long career in films and television, most often as a stereotyped Asian. The daughter, in the course of searching out her late father's history, discovers many things that she had not known, among them that her father had spent time in Manzanar, the internment camp for Japanese-Americans during World War II, that he had had a family prior to hers, and that somewhere out there was a sister she had never known existed.

Valley of Peace(sl)

When the planes bombed a Slovene town, a Slovene boy and a German girl set on a journey towards the valley, in which there is no war. On their way a black American pilot, who jumped of a shoot-down plane, joins them. Although American planes have killed the boy's parents, he accepts the pilot with enthusiasm. The children communicate with him in German and the valley of peace seems like the last paradise place of refuge. The Slovene boy, the German girl, and the American pilot represent a symbolic triangle of peace in this adventure happening in the middle of the War of Liberation.

Here Is Germany(en)

A "know-your-enemy" propaganda film similar to "Know Your Enemy: Japan" and "My Japan", films about Japan with the same objective. It contains a history of the prelude to WW II, the death camps and other Nazi war crimes, and commentary on the character of the German people. Directed by Frank Capra, this film is in essentially the same format as his "Why We Fight" series. It was intended to be shown to American troops participating in the invasion and occupation of Germany. But by the time it was ready, events had overtaken it -- Germany was already well on its way to falling -- so the film was shelved. Although it is readily available for public-domain viewing on the Internet, it has never been widely distributed or shown.

Major Bauk(sh)

Partisans resist the terror of Italian fascists and Serbian Chetniks in the South-East of Bosnia and Herzegovina during WWII.

Cat Under a Helmet(sh)

A tragicomic tale of lumberjack who joined the partisans during WW2. As a corporal, he successfully and courageously fulfilled the combat tasks with his partisan battalion. The commander sends him on a special assignment.

Alt for Norge(en)

This is a humouristic viewpoint upon Norways history the last 100 years - Since the end of the union with Sweden in 1905. A Guide through Norways history the last 100 years.

1940: Taking over French Cinema(fr)

Paris, 1940. German occupation forces create a new film production company, Continental, and put Alfred Greven – producer, cinephile, and opportunistic businessman – in charge. During the occupation, under Joseph Goebbels’s orders, Greven hires the best artists and technicians of French cinema to produce successful, highly entertaining films, which are also strategically devoid of propaganda. Simultaneously, he takes advantage of the confiscation of Jewish property to purchase film theaters, studios and laboratories, in order to control the whole production line. His goal: to create a European Hollywood. Among the thirty feature films thus produced under the auspices of Continental, several are, to this day, considered classics of French cinema.

8000 Stolen Futures: The Children at the Center of the A-Bomb(en)

On August 6, 1945, the first-ever nuclear bomb deployed in war was dropped on the city of Hiroshima Prefecture, leaving an estimated 140,000 dead in its wake by the end of that year. Among the victims, one particular age group stands out for the sheer number of fatalities sustained: 12 and 13 year-olds, children of first year junior high school age. We investigate the tragedy of this lost generation, piecing together surviving records and speaking with survivors, for whom the memories of children robbed of their futures that day are still burned deep in their memories, nearly eight decades on.

Kirby at War: La Guerre De Kirby(en)

Black Panther, the Avengers, Hulk, Fantastic Four, The X-Men, Thor, Iron Man - to name only some of the best known super-heroes created in the 1960s by comic book artist Jack Kirby, the super heroes which today, dominate the world wide blockbuster box office cinema. This documentary mixed with CGI form his work examines Jack Kirby’s comics through his experience as a young American soldier in WWII France. How did this terrifying experience inspire him to create Captain America, and so many others characters as the war came to a close?

Mount of Lament(sh)

Lado Tajovic, a student, is charged by the communist party to go to his home in the Montenegrin Mountains, to illegally spread the liberation movement's propaganda. Alone, surrounded by enemies, always awake and ready to evade traps and ambushes, Lado fights on the verge of sleep, against people which are cowards ready to betrayal. He fights his own temptations, hallucinations that constantly besiege him. Although he perseveres in holding to party directives: no killing and no revenge, Lado at one moment of weakness falls to a primal human act vengeance.

In Four Rows(hr)

The story about the Bleiburg massacre, seen from a Croatian Home Defenders point of view.

Black Birds(sh)

WW2 story about group of prisoners who are trying to escape the death camp, run by local pro-Nazi militia.