Documentaries Go to War

From 1939 to 1941, while Britain and France were firmly engaged with Germany, the US sat on the sidelines.

There was a strong historical current of isolationism in the US--a reluctance to get dragged into war. Altho Britain and France were our allies...we weren't budging.

Then, on December 7th 1941...

PLAY FDR SOUND

The bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1941 and the declaration of war against the US by Germany four days later didn't change this sentiment overnight.

A Selective Service Act had been implemented in September 1940,

· but, there was growing concern about the motivation and morale of new conscripts.

· As a prominent newpaper noted at the time

· soldiers of a draft army "haven't the slightest enthusiasm for this war or this cause. They aren't grouchy, they are not mutinous, they just don't give a tinker's dam."

In 1941, Army Chief of Staff, General George Marshall, read an article published in The Atlantic Monthly, titled, “Wanted: A Faith to Fight For.”

The article expressed the worry that while German soldiers had a cause to die for, the American soldiers did not.

Marshall said,

“We’ve got to tell our young men why they’re in uniform. They’re going to fight seasoned soldiers who’ve got a thing going for them, a superman thing, and the soldiers believe it. And we haven’t got that.”

An Army Morale Branch had been established earlier to provide military indoctrination --

but it failed make any inroads due to what Marshall cited as

"the deadly effects of prepared lectures, indifferently read to troops."

Marshall claimed that "Troops found these lectures to be “baffling, bewildering, or just plain boring.”

Films had been used by some branches of the military in the past, but

between the outbreak of the war in Europe in 1939 and the attack on Pearl Habor,

the US govt made no real organized attempt to produce propaganda or counter-propaganda either for the military or the public in general.

The most it spooled off were sundry hygiene films, films on military protocol, and other general educational works geared to troop indoctrination.

In 1941, Frank Capra--a leading light Hollywood director and now a major in the army was assigned to the Morale Branch.

Capra was ordered by George Marsall to make a series for factual "orientation films"

to put the war into historical, moral, and political context.

The Morale Branch and Capra's film unit were later subsumed under a much more ambitious propaganda and education organization created by Roosevelt in 1942--The Office of War Information.

In the process of creating this Office,

Roosevelt told an aide privately in 1941 that,

“I am perfectly willing to mislead and tell untruths if it will help us win the war.”)

Capra was tapped for the job for a number of reasons:

· his stature in Hollywood (he'd had an amazing string of hits in the past decade);

· and the nature of his films:

· Capra was an unparalleled storyteller.

· Most of the stories he chose to tell are

· unabashed advertisements for populism and the American Dream

· filled with myths of small town America, and an unshakeable faith in democracy and the dignity and power of the "little man."

SHO MR. SMITH -- Democracy in Action

In other words, just the guy to inspire war time audiences for diverse backgrounds.

Capra produced a series of seven films collectively known as Why We Fight which was ultimately seen by over 9 million American in uniform

and eventually a tremendous number of individuals outside of the military also..

Capra--no shrinking violet when it came to self-promotion--was later to contend that the series not only "stated but, in many instances, actually created and nailed down American and world pre-war policy."

In undertaking this project Capra had no experience whatsoever with factual films… In fact, as a Hollywood stalwart, he contends in his memoirs that at the time he looked on documentaries as

"ash-can films made by kooks with long hair

To brief himself on documentary form he screened Leni Riefenstahl's paen to Nazism, Triumph of the Will

Capra was bowled over.

Capra would borrow a number of Riefenstahl's techniques in his own films.

In pulling off the work of his film unit, Capra begged borrowed and stole as much talents and as many resources as he could get his hands on…

He enlisted a group of seasoned Hollywood writers and production staff… and even obtained the services of Walt Disney studios for animation and effects.

The series is based almost exclusively on

· carefully-edited newreel footage,

· confiscated enemy war cinematography and propaganda film, and other stock footage

· very little original footage was produced by the Capra unit. Capra had neither the time, nor the funding (nor probably the inclination) to shoot his own film from scratch. (All seven Why We Fight films were made for about one-fifth the cost of his Hollywood film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington).

· Let editing and narration tell the tale…create the history.

SHOW CLIPS FROM WHY WE FIGHT: PRELUDE TO WAR

First three films (Prelude to War (1942), Nazi Strike(1942), and Divide and Conquer(1943), chronicle the rise of German, Italian, and Japanese aggression and explain our entry into war. The second three films in the series (The Battle of Britain (1943), The Battle of Russian (1943) and the Battle of China (1944) cover the war efforts of US allies. The last film in the series (War Comes to America (1945) recaps the information in the first six films and provides and overview of changing American attitudes toward war.

--What's the organizing principle behind this film? Highly emotional history lesson (How is it similar to films of the Depression: Plow that Broke the Plains, etc.)

--How does Capra go about attempting to persuade the audience? What evidence does he bring to bear in make his arguments? What's he trying to persuade the audience to do or think?

1. Destroy faith in isolation 2. Build up a sense of power, evil, and stupidity of the enemy 3. Emphasize the bravery of America's allies

--Use of dualities (Slave vs Free) Thirty-seven percent of American fighting men had less than a high school education and Capra believed that “this ‘free-world, slave-world’ [approach was] the only way you could reach that guy at that moment. You give him a lot of ‘but-on-the-other-hands’ and you confuse him completely.”

--What's the filmmakers "Voice" -- his tone: when discussing the allies; when discussing the Axis?

--What techniques did Capra learn from Newsreels and travelogs (faces of the common man--the essence or face of nations and individuals in them)

--How do image and narration function? Could the image stand alone? What would the images "mean" alone?

--What is the style of the narration: who is the narrator addressing and in what manner?

--What does Capra choose not to address in his film?

--I (the voice of god narrator) speak to you (the American people) about them (enemy) and about US

"Humanist" documentary form -- "as eclectic and romantic in its way as Riefenstahl --

Capra--would talk to his audience as peers in a democracy: Capra's vision of small-town America and small town heros -- the common man worked out in feature films -- same voice was used in WWF.

Rief - wanted to sweep her audience away with Nuremberg's grandeur --to create awe for hitler as a kind of divine embodiment

Glorification of war and the power and glory of the state

--Capra was firmly rooted in Hollywood ("To me documentaries were ash-can films bade by kooks with long hair").

Want to show you a clip from one of Capra's Hollywood films, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington -- How could you tell that this and WWF were made by the same filmmaker? What's the influence of Hollywood storytelling on WWF?

While WWF series was being shot, the Capra film unit also spooled out numerous other indoctrination films…including The Negro Soldier (Directed by Stuart Heisler 1944) intended to engender tolerance and appreciation of African American accomplishment; and promote wartime unity.

Capra's unit also turned out films attempting to explain (stereotype, actually) the national character and psychology of both enemy and allies, including Know Your Enemy Japan, . This is Germany, and Know Your Ally--Britain.