US War Department. Director Frank Capra; Producer Anatole Litvak; Editor William C. Hornbeck, William A. Lyon; Music Dimitri Tiomkin
In The Battle for Russia, Lt Col Frank Capra, of the Special Service Division, Army Service Forces, turns out by far the most notable in the series of Why We Fight army orientation pictures. Fifth of the series of seven documentaries, Battle for Russia is a powerful, yet simple, drama vividly depicting the greatest military achievement of all time.
As in the case of its predecessors, Prelude to War, The Nazis Strike, Divide and Conquer and Battle of Britain, Russia is a brilliant compilation of carefully edited footage culled, in the latter instance, from official Soviet sources and from newsreel and Signal Corps film, with a good part of the Russian material made available to the War Dept exclusively for this production.
Portraying the historical background of Russia from the time of Alexander Nevsky to the present, the film explains the reasons motivating the various conquests over Russia. Effective use of animated maps helps detail its enormous resources, raw materials, manpower, etc.
Keyed to Gen Douglas MacArthur's statement that: 'The scale and grandeur of the (Russian) effort mark it as the greatest military achievement in all history', this Capra-Litvak documentary is primarily the story of the titanic struggle up to the successful defense of Stalingrad.
(B&W) Extract of a review from 1943. Running time: 80 MIN.
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