Nostalgia Worl War II Video Library #12

1738. NOSTALGIA WORLD WAR II VIDEO LIBRARY #12 (1944,1945, USA).
1. OBJECTIVE…SECURITY (1945-USA). Easter Sunday, 1945: Nazi Germany is crumbling under the assault of United States military might. However, there still is a war to be fought, and won, a half a world away in the Pacific. This gritty documentary detai Is the American marine effort to secure the Japanese- held island of Okinawa, strategically located 400 miles from Tokyo. Just as important, too, is the attempt to win the hearts and minds of the Okinawan people. The film was shot on location by United States Marine Corps combat photographers
2. THE ARMY NURSE (1945-USA). Summer, 1945. World War II is one million men old. Too many of those men have been wounded in battle, and a key link to their survival is the army nurse: a woman who symbolizes safety, comfort, home. She hands clamps to surgeons; counts sponges; prepares and administers anesthetics; watches over the disabled and keeps records of their progress; and, ultimately, eases their pain, and the pain of war. This is a revealing look at the varied roles played by members of the United States Army Nurses Corps: over 57,000 women who “live roughly and work gently,” and who toil tirelessly, using “their hands, their head and their heart.” Plus, there’s some fascinating footage of GARY COOPER performing for the troops
3. PHOTOGRAPHY FIGHTS (1944-USA). This is an illuminating dramatization, which opens with a middle-aged couple commenting over their breakfast about a local boy, a military photographer. He’s not really contributing to the war effort, they complain, because he shoots a camera rather than a gun. However, a military photographer does not gallivant across the world, snapping arty pictures of flowers and trees. His “photographic coverage” can, for instance, help confirm the presence of Japanese airstrips, and save countless American lives.
4. LT. GENERAL HOLLAND M. SMITH, U.S.M.C. AND PACIFIC HEROES (1944-USA). In this short U.S. Savings Bond commercial, the title generaI interviews wounded GIs who’d been slugging it out with the Japanese in the Pacific, and buying war bonds with each paycheck.
5. SIXTH WAR LOAN APPEAL (1944-USA). Every two-and-a-half minutes, an American soldier falls in combat, killed or wounded by Nazis and Japanese. “Let’s get it over with,” the narrator pleads. “Every war bond you buy shortens the time to victory.”
6. RAF and 8TH AIR FORCE REPORT FROM BRITAIN (1944-USA). Much extraordinary footage can be found in this report on the efforts of flyers, particularIy American and free French piIots, and their attempts to bomb German munitions factories. Each bomb they drop would prove to save thousands of lives on D-Day. The combat footage was shot by photographers from the United States Signal Corps, Army Air Forces, Navy and Marines. There’s one bone-chilling moment in this film, as the camera pans the faces of a group of weary, battle-hardened GIs and the narrator observes, “These are American soldiers, with war in their faces.”
7. TARGET-INVISIBLE (1945-USA). Here’s a dramatization which serves as a detailed look at the specifics of a bombing mission over Japan, from briefing to take-off to the hours in the air until the plane reaches its target. You’ll recognize the voice-and, later, the face-of the narrator as that of ARTHUR KENNEDY; one of the actors in the plane is none other than CLAYTON MOORE, without his Lone Ranger mask. 67 minutes total. Propaganda