Night Will Fall (2014) User Reviews

Unique, if graphic documentary

[richard6 · 8/10 · 25 January 2015]

Night Will Fall is a potent documentary produced by the British Imperial War Museum covering the consequences of Nazi brutality towards Jews, Slavs and man, women or child considered inferior. As the Allied forces of Great Britain, United States and Canada advanced on the Western and Southern area of Germany, evidence of actual rumored, reported, alleged, speculated and widely believed accounts of state sponsored systematic murdered became distressingly real to the liberating soldiers.

The documentary (originally titled: German Concentration Camps factual Survey) contains recently restored actual footage of Nazi atrocities filmed in 1945 by Army camera crews on instructions by the British Psychological War Division. A plentiful amount of footage was gathered throughout the duration of the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, Dachau and Auschwitz Concentration Camps. Originally, the footage was intended for a 1945 release to highlight the horrors hidden from public view, ignored by others, advocated by some the shocking truth discovered, which later became termed; The Holocaust.

Likewise the film makers intended not only to reveal the truth; yet, to edit, clarify and comment on what the world can learn from the reality of in-humanity still unimpaired and unforgettable to many. This restored footage is then inter-cut between interviews and melancholy testaments from British, American and Soviet soldiers, or camp survivor who witnessed the act of atrocities or its aftermath. Evoking as these testaments and interviews are, the uneasy commentary by The BBC War Correspondent Richard Dimbley who witnessed the Liberation of Bergen-Belsen is made even-more dismaying by the revelation that British Intelligence, skeptical of his statement, refrained the BBC from transmitting his broadcast to the public for a week after the April 1945 liberation in order to factually confirm the unbelievable horrors uncovered. Dismaying are also the incitable testaments from a Soviet perceptive of what was similarly, yet more eerie witnessed during the Red Armies liberation of the camps in Poland. Decorously, the documentary-makers have rightfully included a few captivating scenes of the Soviet liberation of Auschwitz. Granted, the images captured by Soviet film-crews are truly worthy of admiration. Unfortunately, because these scenes, combined with the commentary of Soviet War Correspondents, are so captivating, more should have been contained. Engaging, is also the explanation of film-makers and Producers Alfred Hitchcock and Sidney Bernstein and their involvement in the documentary.

Night Will Fall is a well presented, somber in commentary, extremely graphic in detail and at times may-be distressing to the viewer. Not only is the visual evidence of The Holocaust painfully revealing; yet, what is also represented is the advanced practices of reporting and commentary of War Correspondences combined with use of newly formed Army Camera Crews. Both methods intended for public exhibition; the original footage captured and the correspondence were innovating in 1945 for allowing the general public, authorised by the Government, with relatively minimal censoring, to bear witness in full overwhelming scenes of war crimes. Therefore, Night Will fall is clear in its focus, effective in its message and one of the best produced documentaries on The Holocaust.

A view on the Holocaust touched by Hitchcock

[FoolintheFields · 9/10 · 19 January 2015]

'German Concentration Camp Factual Survey' was a powerful Holocaust documentary that spent decades in limbo for very dubious reasons. Filmed at the end of World War II, it was only recently completed in a full-length restoration by London's Imperial War Museum. The project has long been part of forgotten movie history, partly because directing legends Alfred Hitchcock and Billy Wilder were both involved in creating it.

The completed documentary adds Brett Ratner and Stephen Frears as producers. The director is André Singer, whose own production credits include multiple Werner Herzog projects and 'The Act of Killing'.

In the spring of 1945, with victory in sight, Allied forces encountered the full horror of the Nazi concentration camps as gained more and more ground. The liberation of slave labor and extermination camps including Bergen-Belsen, Dachau and Buchenwald were recorded by traumatized military film crews from the UK, the US and Russia. The horrifying images they collected of corpses and mass graves shocked the world.

Under the command of British director Sidney Bernstein, the footage was shipped back to London as raw material for a film designed to inform about the cruelty of the Nazi regime, especially among ordinary Germans who still claimed ignorance of mass murder next door. Bernstein assembled a team including writer and future government minister Richard Crossman. Hitchcock also took a break from his Hollywood career to offer suggestions on style of the film. Billy Wilder edited some of the footage into a 22-minute newsreel-style short for U.S. audiences, called 'Death Mills'. But by the fall of 1945, as the political situation changed in the eyes of the British government, Bernstein's work-in-progress was quietly shelved by the UK government. Though clips from Bernstein's incomplete documentary were permitted to be shown during the Nuremberg trials, it remained unfinished for almost 70 years.

The documentation 'Night Will Fall' fills in the back story of the film, from its battlefield origins to its restoration process. Singer and his team blend archive footage and contemporary interviews with elderly military veterans, members of the original film crews, historians and Holocaust survivors, including Branko Lustig, producer of Schindler's List. Wilder appears briefly in library clips. Hitchcock makes does his to be expected cameo. The documentary was already part of Berlinales' 2014 "Work in progress" - section.

As an important historical and educational document, 'Night Will Fall' is unquestionably a must see. A little more investigation into the backstage machinations that forced the shelving of the original footage would also have been welcome but nevertheless the film is filled with shocking truth that always is in danger to be ignored.

Never Again...If We Collectively Vow To Be Sure Good Trumps Evil

[AudioFileZ · 9/10 · 5 February 2015]

This is a miraculous film...miraculous in that it exists, but more than even that; miraculous in it's unadulterated depiction of the worst of humanity in wartime.

The dichotomy of war is depicted here. In Bergen-Belsen we see life struggling to be what life is and just feet away from piles of death as the corps were strewn. How can these two depictions of life occur so physically close? Only in the worst of war can such atrocities be present, if diversely repugnant. See this film and only trust your moral center as everything must be judged by inherent good.

The old adage that we are doomed to repeat history unless we learn from it comes to heart. Right now we have ISIS, a modern day Nazi style faction. Can we sit idly by and let evil fester. This film makes it clear that the cost will only exponentially multiply if good men sit by and do nothing. See this, weep for those lost at the hands of evil in the past, and renew your resolve that we must stand for good at this later day time where evil once more rears a powerful head.

The revolting truth about the Nazis

[boatista24 · 9/10 · 13 October 2015]

This film describes in detail what we already knew about the Nazis. The details of their horrible atrocities need not be gone to in detail here, except as to the contents of the film, itself. Few people realize the immediate effects of the initial sight of the camps on American Generals. Patton toured one camp and emerged so outraged that several adjutants said that they had never seen him so angry. Eisenhower toured a camp and remarked that many US soldiers didn't know what they were fighting for, but now, he could show them what they were fighting against. The large responses to the holocaust were, "oh, it'll never happen again, now!" Look at Uganda 1994, and Serbia 1995. This will never stop unless somebody intercedes. It is the opening of the gateway to hell, with evil piloting the way. If this is not stopped in its tracks, the armies of darkness will march across the earth. It could happen to any one of us, if we don't meet the measures of a tyrannical police state.

A message to all those who question the Holocaust

[bastard-cynical · 8/10 · 30 January 2015]

As above, a factual and irrefutable documentary about the appalling conditions experienced in concentration camps, and the simply dreadful outcome suffered by so many of those who were interned.

The scenes were graphic and disturbing, and if they seem repetitive, then that is because the atrocities were so commonplace. It was not a performance, the film is a factual record, thus the purpose in making it was to educate those who want to know the truth, not to entertain anyone.

As the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz fell this week, I felt that this film serves to help educate all of us who who were not even born at the time of such events. To help us understand the depths of depravity that mankind is capable of, to help us to understand the dreadful consequences of any kind of racism and to remind us that it shouldn't be necessary to have a war to draw allies together (how many people are aware that a staggering 26M Russians were killed in the process of defeating the Nazis?)

A monumental and depressing work, brought together as a lesson to us all that this must never happen again

Should be required viewing in schools

[ppasake1 · 10/10 · 27 January 2015]

I am the daughter and granddaughter of German Jews who got out just before Kristalnacht. I am also the relative of many many who were not as fortunate. My great-aunts and great-uncles along with unborn generations perished. Little to nothing is known about their fates; where or how they died and where they were interred.

In high school, I saw a French documentary that showed me, for the first time, images I had never even imagined. Horror I could not believe. I remember my classmates getting up at the end of the film and walking out of the room seemingly unfazed. I couldn't move.

Night Will Fall should be seen in every classroom on earth at least once. You cannot be too young or too old to understand the immense nature of mass insanity and those who stand idly by.

I will never forget and, in fact, am galvanized in my belief that we are too quick to assume evil will not touch us.

An absolute must see film. You will want to discuss this in depth with children before you let them watch and after.

NEVER AGAIN.

Making of a documentary deemed to horrifying to complete

[HEFILM · 9/10 · 28 January 2015]

A fascinating film. A horrifying film. To be clear this is not the documentary about SS concentration camps that was left unfinished, and suppressed after the war. That film can be seen elsewhere. To be clear, having seen that film, this documentary does leave out just a few key elements. The original film goes out of it's way to say these camps were not only for Jews and lists all the nationalities and religions that came to be killed here. So to say that film is about the Holocaust is not entirely true and is specifically not the point of the original film.

What this film does is set the discovery of the camps and the aftermath into context both large--the governments involved, and small--the military camera crews and even some camp survivors who are seen both now and in the vintage footage. A real feat to find these people so many years later.

Sure you may think you've seen this all before, both in fiction films and in various documentary ones. But this still packs a punch, perhaps even more so since you will think you already know all there is to know. I've spent a lot of my life studying WW2 and I was still blown away by this film. I'm also a Hitchcock fan, and his name is being used to "sell" this film and the restoration and completion of the original documentary.

A point made in this excellent film is that the intention was to make a documentary that was a warning that unless what happened in Germany is seen and understood that 'night will fall' again and these type of large scale inhumanity will re-occur. Of course you can argue that does in fact happen.

This film shows footage not used in the original documentary and is as much about those who made the film as it is about everything else. Interestingly it talks about Hitchcock's input to help make the film convincing. The horrors of reality being so unreal that they might seem created for effect. You can also see in some of the dead faces some dead faces that will appear in Hitchcock's own fiction films after this one.

This film also contrasts the film which was suppressed with the film that did get finished and released--that version being supervised by Billy Wilder. The makers of this film obviously preferring Hitchcock's version.

And fans of both great directors will see their hand in how they shaped material shot by others. The camp footage was shot by army camera men without a director being there.

The graphic concentration camp footage is very graphic but focuses on the horrible expressions on the faces of the dead that is what makes it overwhelming and gripping.

Very little music is used, the voice over work is first rate as is haunting sound effects work. Part of what Night Will Fall does, by being a behind the scenes making of film is help to show just how real and unstaged these horrors of war were. It is hard to watch this film and come away thinking somehow all this was made up just for the sake of the Jews. In fact its impossible to believe that after you see this film.

Once more let me say this is not the so called Hitchcock film, though portions of that are shown within this film. That you have to seek out elsewhere and see for what it is, it has different things to show and say. This is almost an extended preview and background that helps viewing that film.

Some of the most painful footage I've ever seen.

[MovieGeekBlog · 7/10 · 9 December 2014]

The footage shown in this documentary is really excruciating... And it goes on and on and on. The film never really shies away from showing you the horrors of hundreds and hundreds of dead bodies in concentration camps being dragged across and piled up one of top of the others as if they were just mannequins. It's a nightmare-inducing vision that I don't think I will ever be able to erase from my memory. Mountain of personal objects, spectacles even human hair carefully sorted according to type and colours.

And yet after a while I felt it was all beginning to be a little too much and I thought the film was probably going around in a circle and did not really have a lot more to say other than just showing detail over detail of the horror. Not that there is anything to say about the carnage that took place in those places, but somehow I felt this was probably a 40/50 minutes or so film stretched to 1 hour and 15 minutes. Yes the footage found is an incredible discovery and a terrifying testimony of a past that shouldn't be forgotten, but other than that, the film has very very little else to say. I also felt some of the use of the interviewees was a bit heavy-handed: cut to people staring into the void, or the use of pointless bit of dialogue just for the sake of seeing this people breaking down into tears half way through the phrase... There wasn't really any need for that. The original footage was heartbreaking enough without having to resort to people crying to make us the audience feel sad about it... or to dark ominous music. But that's just a question of taste. It's hard to review a documentary like this. Give it a small rating and you can be accused of being insensitive. But that's when you should really make a distinction between the subject matter and the material being shown and the actual craft of the documentary. The later is rather plodding, uneven, and as I said before a bit heavy-handed, but since the subject matter is so powerful, on balance 7 out 10 is perfectly justifiable.

A suggestion to prevent night from falling again

[franscott-07097 · 27 January 2017]

This has made me think of something that never occurred to me watching other documentaries of the holocaust. These tragic victims were disposed of without ceremony or dignity; each was an individual and when we think of the unthinkable events of this time the numbers of victims are too enormous to encompass, I mourn them all and yet as one person I cannot do enough to honour to six million. Could there be some way that we could have a worldwide movement to have individuals adopt one victim - if possible to know their birthday and date of death, to undertake to honour that one person in whatever way they might honour a friend or relative who had died. As one reviewer said this is about Jewish people but also intellectuals, homosexuals, gypsies - if six million people across the world were all honouring and remembering one of the victims, as time passes might we not do more to prevent night from falling again.

You likely do not know the scope of German atrocities in WWII unless you watch this film.

[karenbwill · 10/10 · 25 April 2017]

If you think that you understand the scope of the German atrocities committed during WWII, even if you have been to the Holocaust Museum, unless you have seen this film, you likely do not. With footage much of which had not seen publicly before this 2014 documentary, this film chronicles the liberation of prison and death camps as filmed by British, American, and Soviet army photographers, as well as the healing of the survivors after liberation, and the prosecution of those who managed the death camp industry. The title comes from the narration, "Unless the world learns the lesson these pictures teach, night will fall. But by God's grace, we who live will learn." A must-see film to understand the catastrophic consequences that hate and bigotry can bring.

Harrowing but worthy

[Leofwine_draca · 7/10 · 24 February 2015]

NIGHT WILL FALL is a shocking film indeed, containing as it does plenty of real-life 'death footage' from the Nazi concentration camps. Only strong stomachs need apply here, as the film features close-up clips of numerous dead bodies being thrown around and disposed of. It's certainly the most shocking WW2 footage that I've yet seen. It's disturbing and makes for incredibly harrowing viewing, but at the same time it's incredibly worthy. Lest we forget, and all that.

The structure and narrative of this documentary is less revealing. There's a tenuous link to Alfred Hitchcock here, even though he had little to do with the actual production of the concentration camp films (other than acting as an adviser). Still, when the material is this distressing, the images speak for themselves, making NIGHT WILL FALL unmissable viewing.

Harrowing and moving. But, as had been said, where is the film?

[elhoggo-08306 · 8/10 · 3 July 2018]

I saw a documentary on this on TV some time back and bought the video expecting to see the actual remastered film in its entirety. Sadly its not there. Where is it? We are told of how the Imperial War Museum has obtained and restored the film and I was expecting to see it here. Without it, this is simply a documentary, albeit an extremely good one. The content itself is moving, harrowing and essential viewing if we are to learn from the atrocities of the past. I can't fault the quality and content of the documentary itself or the extra features. But to see the actual film as had been originally commissioned would have been even more powerful a message.

Hypnotic Documentary

[IOBdennis · 7/10 · 28 January 2015]

Last night I watched a documentary I had recorded previously on HBO: "Night Will Fall". It is a documentary of the filming of the macabre consequences after the Holocaust by Alfred Hitchcock (and Billy Wilder secondarily). It is positively harrowing. As a film, it isn't well put together. Like another reviewer here, I couldn't rate the film itself higher because I just didn't think it was assembled very well.

It has a sub-text in which the British and Americans vie over the making of the actual documentary which isn't told very well. It's scattered, superficial, and in the long-run rather pointless. But as for its major subject matter, the extermination of so many men, women, and children, it is relentless. It is brutally blunt, and in that there's a point: how the hell can you put together images of such atrocities artistically? You can only record (document) the horror. I cannot get those images out of my head.

Very good but WHERE'S THE FILM?

[TKBlackburn · 5/10 · 18 March 2017]

If you're looking to see the actual film, it's not here & there is no clue to where it is.

"German Concentration Camps Factual Survey" is the film. Where is it? Don't bother clicking on anything on YouTube. Nothing there but ads & still shots of studio logos.

Other than that HUGE letdown, this is a wonderful documentary. The very end is most poignant to SEE the apathy of Germans who lived down the road throughout the atrocities.

Searing

[dougdoepke · 31 January 2015]

The imagery is searing. Yes, the finished documentary is loosely assembled, as others point out. But then it's the graphic horrors that count. At 75, I've seen the hellish horrors in other documentaries. Nonetheless, the tale must be told every generation, and what could be more persuasive than such footage. I'm glad the filming comes from a number of death camps, showing the systematic nature of the extermination, and what, I think, most any of us are capable of given certain conditions.

I am sorry that footage showing the gas chambers was apparently not yet available. That would further demonstrate the murderous Nazi intent. I've heard apologists claim that the mounds of emaciated dead resulted from a wartime lack of food, not the result of intentional starvation. Still, those German civilians parading through the camps do look well fed. Too bad that more isn't detailed about how the documentary got caught up in the politics of the day. As a result the film ended up filed away for decades. That appears an interesting story deserving of more explanation. Also, the interviews with survivors bring a bygone time to life, and are often as wrenching as the past is. For them, the reality of the camps is still a vivid presence.

No, the 75-minutes are not entertaining, as others point out. Nonetheless, the visible record of "human junk piles" presents an opportunity for our deepest reflection.

MUST be seen

[fiendishfugs · 10/10 · 10 January 2021]

I didn't give this documentary 10 stars to glorify this documentary, there is nothing 'glorious' about it. It's shocking, it's graphic, It's despairing, it's numbing, more so due to the matter-of-factness about it, but it needs to be watched at least once. People need to learn from it.

A wake up call to all Westerners

[indiedavid · 10/10 · 7 February 2015]

As I watched this gut wrenching documentary, I found it hard to believe that there are people in the western world who think we should not take every means necessary to eradicate groups like ISIS. We have a holocaust unfolding before our very eyes on the internet and television, yet millions of people are against taking action against these barbaric, ideologically driven monsters. Perhaps we have become so pampered by our luxurious lives that we can compartmentalize those actions as "someone else's problem" or taking place in a "place far from home". Maybe we are too cowardly to make personal sacrifice for the greater good of humanity. Maybe we have become too optimistic, thinking that there is good in all people. As someone who has faced these "people" face to face, I can assure you that there is nothing redeeming about these demons. They would rape your infant daughter right in front of you, decapitate her and laugh in your face with absolutely no remorse. If we allow this enemy to strengthen, our society has about 5-7 years left.

Far right should be destroyed and this shows why.

[deloudelouvain · 8/10 · 18 September 2020]

Well this had to be one of the most difficult-to-watch-documentaries I came across lately. I've seen my share of documentaries about most of the wars but this was just of another level. The images are very hard, almost inhumane to watch, but it's a necessary evil so the future generations can see what some people (if you can call them that) were capable of during World War II. The atrocities that took place over there, in total impunity, tolerated by the Germans living close to it, it's unimaginable. This documenraty should be a yearly mandatory watch everywhere in the world, so we would never forget and never forgive, and maybe so we could eradicate the far right once and for all. People that deny the Holocaust ever happened should watch this, and imagine it could be anybody dying like an animal, lesser than an animal actually, it could be their own family one day. The last part of the documentary was lesser interesting, when it was more about the diffusion of the movie than about the atrocities. To me that was a point not worth mentioning in this otherwise good documentary, not after the cruel images shown before. Parents should be warned though that this documentary contains images that will never be erased from a memory, not really material to show young children.

truth

[SnoopyStyle · 8/10 · 18 February 2023]

It's 1945. British troops are approaching Bergen-Belsen. Under the white flag of truce, they travel behind German lines to take control of the concentration camp. Producer Sidney Bernstein and his film crew follows to document what they find. With his friend Alfred Hitchcock, the British intends to generate a film called "German Concentration Camps Factual Survey" as proof of the reality of why they fought.

It was obvious to even those who witnessed it that people will deny the truth. That's why all this footage is important. This documentary is narrated by Helena Bonham Carter. It recounts the progress and the suspension of this documentary. The British military finally finishes the film some 70 years later and that's the next step. I have to find it and watch it.