When Allied forces liberated the Nazi concentration camps in 1944-45, their terrible discoveries were recorded by army and newsreel cameramen, revealing for the first time the full horror of what had happened. Making use of British, Soviet and American footage, the Ministry of Information’s Sidney Bernstein (later founder of Granada Television) collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock to create a documentary that would provide lasting, undeniable evidence of the Nazis’ unspeakable crimes. He commissioned a wealth of British talent, including editor Stewart McAllister, writer and future cabinet minister Richard Crossman and, Hitchcock as treatment advisor. Yet despite initial supportfrom the Britsh and US goverments, the film was shelved, and only now, 70 years on, has it been restored and completed by the Imperial War Museums. This eloquent, lucid documnetary by André Singer (executve producer of the award-winning The Act of Killing) tells the extraordinary story of the filming of the camps and the fate of Bernstein's project, using original archive footage and eyewitness testimonies.
