The Holocaust film that was too shocking to show (The Guardian) Caution: Graphic

[inanna]

Friday 9 January 2015 18.00 GMT

In 1945, overseen by Alfred Hitchcock, a crack team of British film-makers went to Germany to document the horror of the concentration camps. Despite being hailed as a masterpiece, the film was never shown. Now, in a documentary called Night Will Fall, the full story of its creation and suppression is being told

“In the spring of 1945,” says the narrator, over bucolic springtime shots of the German countryside, “the allies advancing into the heart of Germany came to Bergen-Belsen. Neat and tidy orchards, well-stocked farms lined the wayside, and the British soldier did not fail to admire the place and its inhabitants. At least, until he began to feel a smell …”

So begins a British film about the Holocaust that was abandoned and shelved for 70 years because it was deemed too politically sensitive. The smell came from the dead, their bodies burned or rotting; or from malnourished, often disease-ridden prisoners in the concentration camp of Bergen-Belsen, near all those thriving German farms.

As allied troops liberated such camps across what had been German-occupied Europe, the British Ministry of Information’s Sidney Bernstein (who later founded Granada Television) was commissioned to make a documentary that would provide incontrovertible evidence of the Nazis’ crimes.

cont'd...

Link: http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jan/09/holocaust-film-too-shocking-to-show-night-will-fall-alfred-hitchcock

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Thank you for this post. I will make sure I see the documentary. n/t

[progressoid]

2. Rec

[2naSalit]

3. K&R...

Don't know if will be able to watch the whole thing myself but thank you for posting this...

Lest we forget.

[SheilaT]

4. I could be wrong, but it seems to me that

one of the first times, if not the very first time, that film footage of the concentration camps was shown in public was in the movie "Judgement at Nuremberg", which came out in 1961. I can recall how incredibly shocking those clips were. I was just 13, and saw that movie in the theater when it came out. I seem to recall a general feeling that it wasn't really necessary to show those clips, that people didn't need to see them. But (even if my recollection is correct) those things need to be shown, because as everyone who survived the camps or who helped liberate them are soon to be gone completely, we must never forget how awful it was.

[villager]

11. I think that's right. The French documentary "Night and Fog" had preceded it by a few years

... but only Americans who ventured into the few theaters showing foreign films (back in the 50's) would have seen it...

For most of the American public, that Stanley Kramer was probably the first time they'd seen "actual" footage of what had occurred...

[yuiyoshida]

5. K&R and

bookmarking for later.. Thanks.

[appalachiablue]

6. A college friend's parents survived Auchwitz, another's mother was a Greek war refugee, one's

father was in the German Army. My father was in the 7th Army, Rhineland Campaign, Liberation of Dachau, treated for battle fatigue. My friends never talked about their family's experience, and I know little about Dad's wartime years.~ I read the Guardian article last night and look forward to seeing the film. It should have been aired long ago, worldwide.

[joanbarnes]

7. Dad was in the liberating force.......forever scarred.

[inanna]

8. But also a hero.

I thank your Dad and all other allied veterans.

[Fred Sanders]

9. Recommend. The true horor of war and genocide, face to face, is something Americans have been

protected from for too long.

Europeans understand the horrors of the Holocaust all too well, we must be constantly reminded to oppose hate in all its forms.

Think not for a second that it can not happen again, it can not possibly happen in your nation, vigilance is mandatory.

[dixiegrrrrl]

10. FWIW.....Frontline did a show, using the footage

Frontline: Memory of the Camps 1985
available on Netflix

and the original doc, German Concentration Camps Factual Survey, was being shown at some film festivals this fall.
Here is the site of the doc which may have further info on how to see it.
http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections-research/german-concentration-camps-factual-survey/screenings

[JDPriestly]

12. All who do not understand why Israel needs to exist, please see that film.

I visited Dachau. It was not the worst of the camps. Although many died there, many were killed, it was not a death camp. A visit to one of the NAZI camps changes your life. Sheer horror of the most efficient kind.

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Dachau concentration camp (German: Konzentrationslager (KZ) Dachau, IPA: [ˈdaxaʊ]) was the first of the Nazi concentration camps opened in Germany, intended to hold political prisoners. It is located on the grounds of an abandoned munitions factory southeast of the medieval town of Dachau, about 16 km (10 mi) northwest of Munich in the state of Bavaria, in southern Germany.[1] Opened in 1933 by Heinrich Himmler, its purpose was enlarged to include forced labor, and eventually, the imprisonment of Jews, ordinary German and Austrian criminals, and eventually foreign nationals from countries that Germany occupied or invaded. The Dachau camp system grew to include nearly 100 sub-camps, which were mostly work camps or "Arbeits Kommandos," and were located throughout southern Germany and Austria.[2] The camps were liberated by U.S. forces in the spring of 1945.

Prisoners lived in constant fear of brutal treatment and terror detention including standing cells, floggings, the so-called tree or pole hanging, and standing at attention for extremely long periods.[3] There were 32,000 documented deaths at the camp, and thousands that are undocumented.[4]

On April 14 Himmler ordered the evacuation of the camp and the extermination of all inmates at Dachau, writing, "No prisoners shall be allowed to fall into the hands of the enemy alive."[5] Approximately 10,000 of the 30,000 prisoners were sick at the time of liberation.[6]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dachau_concentration_camp

[Diclotican]

13. JDPriestly

JDPriestly

I had a great Uncle - my moms uncle - who ended up in Dachau in 1942 - he barly survived the war - and ended up in Sweden, when Sweden managed to get a deal with Himmler - about sending norwigian and danish prisoners to Sweden who was nautral in the war - at the end of the war - he was in a hospital for a whole year when he came to Sweden in 1945 - as he was to weak to be traveling to Norway at the time - and they dosen't had the facilities to give him the medical attantions he was in need of after been prisoner in Dachau for allmoust 4 years - as he was tortured - treated horrible by the SS - and allmoust starved to death becouse of the lack of propper feeding and clothing at the camp...

He never talked mutch about the war - and died in 1988 - when I was just 11-12 years old - but my mom have told me some about him - and even my grand father on my moms side, who I sadly never got to know as good as I should, told a few stories about him - how mutch he had shanged from a young - joyfull man who was some of lady's friend - to a quiet man who seldom spoke - and who also was thin compared to what he had been before he was arrested - tortured by Gestapo - and then sendt to Dachau KZ camp...
And also had nightmares about what he had experienced for as long as he lived.... And I suspect many who survived the war - had horrible nightmares at times - and was scared for life, even if they had a family to care for after the war - and just had to "suck it up" and go ahead with their life... It was not mutch psyciatry back then, and I doubt they had been able to help the former prisoners of KZ camps as it was - even today more than 70 year after the end of the war - for the most part they have no clue what to really do with pepole who have survived similiar camps... For the most part, it is sink or swim for the ones who survive....

Diclotican

[JDPriestly]

14. Thank you. The Jewish and Gypsy peoples suffered in the Holocaust so much worse than

any other modern people have suffered. And the suffering during the Holocaust was simply the final suffering after centuries of ostracism and violence against them.

I do not understand the people who disregard the obligation that the world has to people who have suffered so much discrimination.

South Africa, Ireland, the slavery in the Caribbean and a few other terribly cruel abusive situations might possibly be on par with the Holocaust. But in terms of sheer hideous cruelty and murder, I don't think there is any crime comparable that I know of. Stalin's prison camps maybe. (My father thought that Stalin probably killed more innocent people than even Hitler.) But we don't know that much about them.

[Diclotican]

15. JDPriestly

JDPriestly

The jewish and gypsy pepole suffered horrible in the hands of the germans - and they willing colobrators all over Europe at the war - and the sad part - many who should have prosecuted for their role in the crimes was never prosecuted - and lived out the rest of their life in peace - something that millions of their victims never was able to do - even if they survived the war....

And th Holocaust - was the final solution - for centuries of hatered and ostracism and violence - the worst part - is that specially the jewish community in Germany, for the most part was integrated into the german population - most of them was not even so mutch into the jewish belif - as it had been a century of relative peace - and many of them also was political active - on the left - something the conservatives in Germany had against them all back to the late 1800s - but it was not untill Hitler arise to power in 1933 (Thanks to Von Papen and other conservatives, who made a treaty with the devil - when they let Hitler got into the government offices as head of the government - and from 1934, also as head of state )

We know some of about what happend in the Gulag camps in Sovjet Union under Stalin - but a lot of the documents - are still not open for the public - not even for sientific rescars as the goverment is rather tight lipped about it all - but we do know some of it - as some of the documents also was able to get to the west - specially in the early part of the 1990s - when Russia opened to the west full trottle - and many was able to get documents from the days of Stalin out of the country - thanks to Xerox mashines - who from the late 1980s even had came to Soviet Union - as a tool to make things more easy in the goverment.... And from what we do know - the Gulag camp systems, who span the whole Soviet union was rather unpleasent - with 3 diferent chatagories who goes from bad - to verry bad - and then horrible.... It depended of your crimes - and i many cases beeing a political enemy of the State (at least under Stalin) was the same as a death sentence - or at least some rather terrible years in the camps.. And you was not allowed to ever tell about it - when, and if you was given your freedom at the end of the sentence...
And even today - with the Gulag system disbanded - and most of the old camps teared down - some of them are still verry well alive - now as regular prisons - who some of the worst in russia wil live out their life as prisoners in the camps - under some brutal regimente - where the guards have most of the power and is able to quell any dissent rather easy - rather the opposite than in US, where it is the Gangs who own the inside - even if the door is locked down, and they key not in their hands...

And they still operate some of the prisoners outside of St-Petersburg - and Moshow - who goes back to the 1880s - and who was run right true the Stalin years and all the way up to our own times - and whoes walls could tell a lot about how the criminal justice system in Russia really was - all the back to the Tsars..

Diclotican

[JDPriestly]

16. Americans today do not know much about all these things. Hence the movement against Israel.

They just don't know what happened. It is something vague in the past. They think it is all patched up and repaired. You just cannot repair things like the Holocaust, the Gulags or, I must add, the Armenian genocide. There are other similar events, but I am not thinking of them at the moment. Rwanda was one. There are others. South Africa for example. But none of them were as enduring as the discrimination and killings of Jews in Europe over centuries.

When we lived in Austria, the last of the Catholic shrines against the imagined Jewish crimes was closed. So the discrimination continued for centuries. I would not want to live in Europe if I were Jewish.

[Diclotican]

19. JDPriestly

JDPriestly

Sadly - history in general is a subject young pepole tend to have a rather ignorant wiew about - it is something they tend to let go off the second they are out of class - and for many history is something that happend a long time ago... and not to care for in general - even if it happend just around the corner in some degrees..

World war Two did gave Europe a lot of damage - damage who in many cases was just turned under the rug - becouse the new leaders was not willing to do the right thing - making things right - and in many cases never learned the new generation born and rised after World War Two - the lessons the parents had been learing the hard way - specially when it come to anti-semetism who in many cases was devestating to the jewish community in many of the countries - in central and eastern europe - who for the most part was allmoust destroyed by the german extermination of the jewish communities - who also was helped in many cases by the local population who turned against their nabours as fast as they was able to do it... Anti-semetism is of old age in most of Europe Im afraid to say - and in parts of europe it is worse than in other parts of Europe - and I suspect many who still is alive - have not learned the lessons learned about killing pepole just becouse of their religious belife... Even pepole who othervice are kind, caring pepole - have a ugly underbelly I admit I had problem understanding... My dear uncle - who in all other ways was a kind and caring man - who I respected greatly - once told me about Sions Vice protocoles and about how the jewish rase was planning to destroy everything ... As the history buff I am - I know about that protocol - and I also know it was a forgery - and I told my uncle so too - this was before handhold devices was aviable, phones was really not that smart - rather stupid - and internet was really a rather new thing... After a rather sivilized debate - he never was telling about that again - at least in my pressence... And this was from a man who was soft spoken - and never did anyone wrong... But even he had this idea about the jews who rather shocked me....

In many nations - both in West and the east - to really repair - and to prosecute everyone who had a finger in Holocaust was a daunting task - mostly becouse if a country was to operate in a fashion - some of the lesser criminals was never prosecuted - some who was defently in the program sending jews to their death in the camps - they should have known - or did know about what was the deal - was never prosecuted at all - and the higher up often got easy off - but the lover classes got hit harder by the criminal courts - where many ended up in prison for a long time.... In Eastern Europe - who until 1989-91 was under control of the communist regimes - anti-semetism - and hatered for gypis was never really confronted - and in some cases some of the worst criminals from that time - was even protected by the new governments - becouse they had some knowlegde who was more important that the fact they had been part of a horrific criminal act against humanity.... And some even 60 or 70 years after the facts - never show any regret for what they did - in fact they was, or still are rather proud of what they did - when they was killing of jews and others who was meant to be killed into extinction by the new master rase.. and their helpers all over the continent...

Austria had it share of anti-semetism - Hitler was orginaly from Austria - and got some of his views from Vien when he lived there in his youth - as a young man who was reading a lot of materiale from authors who was full of anti-semetistic ideals... But Hitler would never have managed to do what he did - if he had any helpers - who put him on his way to the Chanslor in Germany - and then for the Greater German Reich - and then to do what happend in the war... It was a horrible time in our history - a time who still after 70 years are pretty near, if you look at all the books who came from different sources about different aspects of the war.... And as new archives is open all over the continent - even in Russia, who have had a long tradition of anti-semetism - have tonns of materiale from World War Two come to light - and given historians at least a few new decades to get to the bottom of it all - and to write at least a few thousand new books in the following decade or two..

Im not sure if it is a danger to be a jew in Europe today - But in some countries it is maybe more troublesome than in others sadly enough - and I do understand how many jews can be afraid for their life - and for their families life when you hear about some pepole express their view about things.... It is horrible to read about to be honest - even if I have no bones what so ever in the matter - Im proberly more "germanic" than most of the neo-nazis who claim to be of a pure rase.... As my ancestors have been living in Norway for as long as the papertrail goes back in time - at least since 1350 on my mothers side - and at least a few centuries on my fathers side... But even then I have been told to get the F*** back to my own country a few times...

Diclotican

[WillyT]

17. K & R !!!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. I'm pretty sure I saw (probably on PBS) clips of British soldiers liberating Bergen-Belsen

Maybe it was the Frontline documentary.

But I distinctly remember a British soldier saying to the camera something like, "Now I really understand what we've been fighting for."