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Catherine Varlin's 27-minute Playtime in Paris (1962) is almost a practice run for Le joli mai, a sampling that starts in a classroom and then observes various subjects from afar. A woman is compared to a cat, and then we see a little girl on a playground, kissing, hugging and swatting a little boy companion as if he were a doll-plaything. A supermarket is compared to a flea market; an upscale equestrian event is compared to a soccer match, a comic bullfight and other attractions. Marker edited and Lhomme was the cameraman.
Director
Status
Released
Original Language
FR
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) aimed 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, as treatment advisor, his friend Alfred Hitchcock. Yet, despite initial support from the British and US Governments, the film was shelved, and only now, 70 years on, has it been restored and completed by Imperial War Museums under its original title "German Concentration Camps Factual Survey".
