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The years 1945 and 1946 were among the most momentous in American history, and nowhere were the period’s outsized dreams and nightmares better documented than in the movies. The studios had contributed mightily to the effort to defeat Fascism, but after the war they took up the task of illuminating the transition from chaos to relative stability. The film industry was also girding itself for the advent of television and a renewed market for the importation of foreign films. The idea for this series was suggested by Charles and Mirella Jona Affron, whose new book Best Years: Going to the Movies, 1945–1946 (Rutgers University Press) authoritatively and entertainingly gives a genuine sense of what it was like to ritualistically attend movies in those halcyon postwar days before TV and multiplexes.
Organized by Charles Silver, Curator, Department of Film. Thanks to Martin Scorsese.
Related Film Screenings
Upcoming
There are no upcoming film screenings currently scheduled.
Past
Nobody’s Children (March of Time, Volume XIII, Number 5)
1946. USA. Unknown. 16 min.
Die Letzte Chance (The Last Chance)
1945. Switzerland. Leopold Lindtberg. 104 min.
Of Thee I Sting
1946. USA. Friz Freleng. 7 min.
The North Star
1943. USA. Lewis Milestone. 105 min.
Two Down and One to Go
1945. USA. Frank Capra. 28 min.
The True Glory
1945. USA/Great Britain. Carol Reed, Garson Kanin. 85 min.
Challenge of Hollywood (March of Time, Volume XII, Number 5)
1945. USA. Unknown. 17 min.
Canyon Passage
1946. USA. Jacques Tourneur. 92 min.
Life with Baby (March of Time, Volume XII, Number 6)
1946. USA. Unknown. 19 min.
Diary of a Chambermaid
1946. USA. Jean Renoir. 87 min.
Stage Door Canteen
1943. USA. Frank Borzage. 131 min.
Synopsis:
It is winter in a Ukrainian village occupied by the Nazis. The corpse of a boy from the village lies
unburied in the snow. A girl from the village is the mistress of the Nazi commander. A pregnant woman
who's husband is with the partisans is brought before the Nazis. They torture her for information. A child
from the village who tries to help her is shot. His family secretly takes his body and buries it. Meanwhile, one of the villagers is an informer and gives continuous information to the Germans. The people of the village, who all wear large identification cards, are brought before the Germans who demand to know where the body of the boy is. Since the villagers will not cooperate, the Nazis take hostages. Some German soldiers enter the house of the boy who has been shot and frighten the other children. Now the pregnant woman gives birth to a boy, and the Nazis threaten her again if she won’t inform. She refuses and, enraged by her obstinacy, they kill her newborn son, and then kill her as she holds the child in her arms. One of the village partisans returns home and kills the village informer. When Russian prisoners pass by the village, the villagers try to give them food, but the Germans shoot at them. The mistress of the commander tries to bribe her loyal sister for information about the partisans, but the sister refuses. Some partisans sneak into the village. Planes fly over the village and drop leaflets. There is an explosion, and the partisans ride openly into the village. The Germans shoot at them, but they are overcome. The partisans liberate the hostages. One of the partisans is the husband of the woman who is the mistress of the German commander. When he finds out how she has betrayed her people, he shoots his wife. Now that the partisans control the village, the women, who have
suffered much at the hands of the invaders, are like the Furies. They would kill their torturers. At the
height of their fury, a rainbow appears in the sky. We do not see if the Germans are killed. One of the villagers says, “Let them live with their consciences.”
Atomic Power (March of Time, Volume XII, Number 13)
1946. USA. Unknown. 18 min.
Raduga (The Rainbow)
1941. USSR. Mark Donskoy. 89 min.
The Great Piggy Bank Robbery
1946. USA. Robert Clampett. 8 min.
Playing by Ear
1946. USA. Pete Smith. 9 min.
The Dark Corner
1946. USA. Henry Hathaway. 99 min.
Badminton
1945. USA. Pete Smith. 10 min.
La Bataille du rail (The Battle of the Rails)
1945. France. René Clément. 87 min.
Hare Conditioned
1954. USA. Chuck Jones. 7 min.
Equestrian Quiz (What’s Your I.Q.? #11)
1946. USA. Pete Smith. 10 min.
The Town
1944. USA. Josef von Sternberg. 13 min.
Where Are Your Children?
1944. USA. William Nigh. 70 min.
They Were Sisters
1945. Great Britain. Arthur Crabtree. 114 min.