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Jan 26, 2015 By Zach Hollwedel Web Exclusive

January 27 marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and in honor of the somber date, HBO is premiering Night Will Fall. The film, directed by André Singer, is a sort of documentary within a documentary. In 1945, as World War II drew to a close in Europe, American and British forces collaborated on a documentary which was produced to reveal the horrors of the concentration camps to the world. The film, titled German Concentration Camps Factual Survey, turned an unflinching eye on the horrors that befell Holocaust victims in such infamous, terrible places as Dachau and Bergen-Belsen.

Infantrymen with little or no technical training were given handheld video cameras and tasked with capturing the horrendous conditions in the camps as the Allies liberated them. Legendary producer Sidney Bernstein oversaw the operation and—at one point—even brought on Alfred Hitchcock to supervise the documentary’s direction. Between the various Allied crews working on the project, hundreds of hours of film were recorded, which graphically revealed the depths of the depravity and torment occurring in the camps. However, the film was abandoned prior to its completion, in part due to the Allies desire to enlist Germany in the Cold War, should tensions with Russia necessitate such an alliance. The existence of a film, which depicted a total lack of humanity on Germany’s part, was considered a potential deterrent to future diplomatic relations.

Finally, seventy years later, André Singer brings fruition to the German Concentration Camps Factual Survey mission. Night Will Fall explores the history of the original documentary’s intent, while finally exposing the world to the footage British and American G.I.s captured in 1945. The images recorded are devastating, and the impact they left on the cameramen—some of whom are interviewed—haunt them to this day. It is hard to watch Night Will Fall; harder still, is it to truly comprehend how such horrors occurred for so long and to such great extent less than three quarters of a century ago. On this International Holocaust Remembrance Day, as on every day, Night Will Fall is an unsparing yet unfortunately necessary reminder of the atrocities committed seventy plus years ago, and of just how far off track humanity can fall when blind eyes are turned to horrors.

www.hbo.com/documentaries/night-will-fall

Author rating: 6.5/10