WWII Films, Documentaries

• Air Forces Escape and Evasion Society:  For documentaries including interviews with downed airmen and helpers, see http://airforceescape.org/test-page-for-evade-dvd/

• Behind the Wire: Allied Airmen in Captivity in Germany: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL5kU91pWK4&list=PLfO3-TNAQN-paJ3iZVjxoYVJtJ0yUlAQ_&index=21

• Why We Fight –The following films are from the Why We Fight series:

• Divide and Conquer (Part I) (1943), US War Department: http://archive.org/details/Dividean1943

• Divide and Conquer (Part II), US War Department: http://archive.org/details/Dividean1943_2

• Divide and Conquer (Part III), US War Department: http://archive.org/details/Dividean1943_3

• Divide and Conquer (Part IV), US War Department: http://archive.org/details/Dividean1943_4

Other films:

Target for today, the US 8th Air Force During World War Two: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVhHCMewvgI.

Het Verbogen Front (The Hidden Front).  This is a three-part program broadcast by Dutch television station L1 from May 3-9, 2010 about the Resistance and Liberation of Limburg plus the Liberation Festival held in 2010.  Parts 1, 2, and 3 include WWII newsreel footage and interviews with members of the Resistance.

• Deel 1 (Part 1), Humanitaire Hulpverlening (Humanitarian Aid): http://www.l1.nl/nieuws/bekijk-aflevering-1#.UDpSDdaPXWg.
• Deel 2 (Part 2): De Knokploegen (The Strongarm Gang): http://www.l1.nl/nieuws/bekijk-aflevering-2#.UDpSddaPXWg.
• Deel 3 (Part 3): De Bospartizanen (The Forest Partisans): http://www.l1.nl/video/verborgen-front-deel-3-en-slot#.UDpS2daPXWg.
• Liberation Festival (2010): http://www.l1.nl/nieuws/bekijk-aflevering-3#.UDpTQ9aPXWg.

Way to Freedom, More than 1080 (Weg naar de Vrijheid, Meer dan 1080): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x96V6SiqMlc.  This is a 1967 documentary by Dick Verkijk on the Dutch-Paris Line which helped Dutch Jews and Allied airmen.   In Dutch but, thanks to the Weidner Foundation, it has English subtitles.  Rarely do you get to see the helpers of people fleeing the Nazis talk about what they did.  Here you do.

Zes Jaren (Those Years), a 1946 film featuring members of a student Resistance group at Leiden University.  Features Elisabeth (Elsie) Boon and Jan Glastra van Loon playing themselves.  In Dutch.  http://wn.com/Zes_jaren_1946.

The Reckoning: Remembering the Dutch Resistance, filmed and directed by John Evans, Storytelling Pictures, 1 hr. 36 min., 2007.  https://www.amazon.com/Reckoning-Remembering-Dutch-Resistance/dp/B002VSKL5I/ref=tmm_aiv_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

Trial at Nuremburg: U.S. High Commissioner for Germany: http://wn.com/Zes_jaren_1946

War on Film (British National Archives): http://media.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php/category/war-on-film-2/?dm_i=MAN,Z61W,3BMWTB,2YKD9,1

National Archives and Records Administration (NARA):

Yanks Help Repair French Railroads, Eisenhower, Montgomery, Bastogne, Battle of the Bulge, Red Army, Poland: http://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.39153

Bf109 Pilot Franz Stigler and B-17 pilot Charlie Brown’s First Meeting.  The link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8EkmyoG83Q serves as an introduction to the new book, A Higher Call, and is worth watching.

Dogfight Commentary on Battle Over the English Channel: http://www.battleofbritainmemorial.org/watching-it-unfold-charles-gardners-famous-dogfight-commentary/.

Flt. Lt. William Walker – How His Spitfire Was Shot Down Over the English Channel: http://www.battleofbritainmemorial.org/flt-lt-william-walker-ae-on-storyvault/

The Long Way Home–The Flight of the Pacific Clipper: http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=Ms84WfJwalI&feature=pla%20yer_embedded

Interview with Roger Wade, 8th AF, 384th BG, 546th Sq: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lp5iIUsIMbM

Battle Stations: Lancaster Bomber.  Development of the Lancaster bomber to replace the Manchester bomber.  Designer of the Lancaster was Roy Chadwick.  Interviews with crew members.  Scenes of bombing missions. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRa8LXUS4Yg

Battle Stations: Messerschmitt 262: Race for the Jet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwOrPGLMYCM&feature=player_detailpage

In Search of RAF Bomber Command (color film of RAF Lancaster bombers): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7b_w5EX04E

Operation PLUTO (Pipe-Lines Under the Ocean) (1944): http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/Nv9lBqPVuoE%26feature=uploademail

The Mosquito Raiders (The History Channel): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G31MCPp-azY.  Includes scenes of the Operation Jerico attack on the Amiens Prison in France and the Operation Carthage attack on Gestapo HQs in Copenhagen.

WWII Movie List (By Country): http://www.imdb.com/list/–RL3RWbNb0/

Greatest Mysteries of WWII: Hitler’s Stealth Fighter 720P: https://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=NaJzKjtjZnY&feature=fvwp

BBC: Code Breakers, Bletchley Park’s Lost Heroes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF48sl15OCg

Bugging Hitler’s Soldiers (PBS): http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/episodes/bugging-hitler%E2%80%99s-soldiers-watch-the-full-episode/947/

Spitfire 944: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie3SrjLlcUY&feature=share

Comete Visit to Perth (Australian TV Interview with Andrée “Nadine” Dumon of the Comet Line and Ivan Davies): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZHbrj9YV5Q 

The Jail Breakers 1944 (attack on the Amiens Prison): http://www.britishpathe.com/video/the-jail-breakers/query/Amiens

Fallen Heroes of the Mighty Eighth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oWM-ppDBf0.  Includes an interview with Jean-Paul Favrais who is promoting monuments throughout France in memory of 8th A.F. airmen who were killed during WWII.  As a nine-year-old boy in Breal, near Brittany, France, he found the charred body of an American airman in the wreckage of of his plane on June 14, 1944, never forgot the experience.  He later identified the airman, 1st Lt. Russell G. Quinn, of Harrisburg, Oregon, located Quinn’s family, and spearheaded a movement to build a monument of granite shaped like the wing of a plane in Quinn’s memory.  He also arranged for Quinn’s younger sister to be present at a ceremony in Lt. Quinn’s honor in 1995.

Great Escapes of WW2–The French Resistance (Military History Channel): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9vZZvf8GPk

WWII Dutch Officers and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, Interview with Maj. Gen. Syp van der Pol, 25 Aug. 1989, Ukrainian Canada Research and Documentation Center, Canada: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjTOTJYfFCI.

Airmen from the Commonwealth Join RAF Bomber Command: http://cometepaysbasque.blogspot.fr/.

Aerial Bombing of Civilians in WWII–Debate between Anthony Grayling and Christopher Hitchens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3doYSqBWhZI

Canadian songwriter, vocalist, and guitarist Menno Versteeg’s story of how his Dutch grandfather, Karel Versteeg, saved the life of the German officer who saved his life in WWII: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6R9yW4QxSfQ. Huff Post story on Versteeg’s video, “So It Goes,” and the story behind it: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/07/31/so-it-goes-hollerado-video_n_3678479.html

Kate Smit Singing “God Bless American”:

Hell Over Germany (narration by Clark Gable):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pl6CaJWif1M

Flying Cadets of the U.S. Army Corps (1940): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3DEAmEaWJI

Richard Garrity RCAF Escape and Evasion 1944: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niW9NfgMrKU

Lancaster Bomber–D-Day’s Workhorse, Canadian Broadcasting Company: http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/TV+Shows/The+National/About+the+Show/Peter+Mansbridge/ID/2462775125/.  See also Sneak Peek: Trailer for Lancaster Documentary: http://www.thespec.com/news-story/5270407-sneak-peek-trailer-for-lancaster-documentary-goes-viral/.

514 Squadron, Lancaster, Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKeXrJlVYoc.  Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5KqaSrNcxc.  Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypNUEgNSV1w.  

Berlin en Couleurs (Berlin in Color), 1945: http://www.tdg.ch/video/?video_id=215197

Dead Man’s Ridge Commemorative Walk: http://www.vivreici.be/les-gens-d-ici/detail_morhet-the-dead-man-s-ridge-walk?videoId=65886

Battlefield Normandy (color): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MMiNDm5FsU

American Women in WW2, 1944, documentary short “It’s Your War Too”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGp93ijzok4

D-Day June 6, 1944 Normandy Landings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkvOZPRBz9U

Blinded by flak shrapnel, this airman helped save his B-17 crew: http://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/blinded-by-flak-shrapnel-this-airman-helped-save-his-b-17-crew/amp

Audio From the Past – WW2 – Avro Lancaster Crew Radio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MF5_hvE4WEA

Lancaster (a dramatization): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSXiny5mEpg

Last Best Hope: A True Story of Escape, Evasion, and Remembrance, a PBS documentary first aired on Oct. 29, 2006: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zECvEQuJzqw&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR3GdnlLYfA1roMGV2nFMQtaYwJfh8I3bFDE-UwmEELMU7O3dJTX8RWd_i4

Beeld van Nederland – De oorlogsjaren 1940-1945: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP4X6mohMBQ