"The Hollywood War Film: 1942-1944"
Excerpt from Dorothy B. Jones, “The Hollywood War Film: 1942–1944,” Hollywood Quarterly 1, no. 1 (1945)
Excerpted by Rafiza Varão
Traditionally, the motion-picture industry has maintained that the primary function of the Hollywood film is to entertain. However, in a world shattered by conflict it has become increasingly evident that only through solidly founded and dynamic understanding among the peoples of the world can we establish and maintain an enduring peace. At the same time it has become clear that the film can play an important part in the creation of One World. The motion picture can help the people of the world to share and understand one another's viewpoints, customs, and ways of living; it can interpret the common needs and hopes of all peoples everywhere. It is well within the power of the film to reduce psychological distance between people in various parts of the world, just as the airplane has reduced physical distance.
Whether or not the picture makers of the world will meet this challenge remains to be seen. In the case of the Hollywood picture makers perhaps some indication of the answer to this question may be found in an examination of the way in which they met their responsibilities to their nation and to the United Nations during wartime.
The present article reviews the Hollywood feature product of three years of war. It makes no attempt to examine or evaluate any other part of Hollywood's many-faceted war program.
Furthermore, it does not presume to explore the entertainment function of the film in wartime as such, although the entertainment quality of films is taken into account in assessing their value to the war program. By an analysis of the war features released during 1942, 1943, and 1944 an attempt will be made to evaluate how far Hollywood has aided in interpreting the war at home and giving a better understanding overseas of America's role in the conflict.
WHAT IS A WAR FILM?
Any analysis of war films immediately raises the question, What is a war picture? The term "war film" has been bandied about very loosely in Hollywood. Usually it has referred to films depicting battle action. When Hollywood producers said, "The public is tired of war pictures," this is usually what they meant. By this definition Wake Island would be considered a war film, whereas Forever and a Day, which was produced in the hope of increasing Anglo-American understanding, would not.
Topics relating to the war were much more broadly defined by the late President Roosevelt in his address to Congress on the State of the Union one month after Pearl Harbor. Emphasizing the necessity for increased public information and understanding about the war, he outlined six aspects which needed to be more fully understood: the Issues of the War; the Nature of the Enemy; the United Nations and Peoples; Work and Production; the Home Front; and the Fighting Forces. This classification was subsequently adopted by the Office of War Information, and, because of its comprehensive nature, has proved useful generally in the dissemination and analysis of war data. […]
In order to segregate war films for the years 1942-1944 it was necessary to review the entire feature product of this period, a total of more than 1,300 films. Most of these films were viewed before being classified. The classification of some was made on the basis of a final script, and, of a much smaller number, from reviews appearing in the press. Approximately two-thirds of the entire three-year product was either viewed or read in the final script.
HOW MANY WAR FILMS?
During the three years following American entry into World War II the motion-picture industry released a total of 1,313 feature films. Of this number 374, or approximately three in every ten, were directly concerned with some aspect of the war. These were distributed over the three-year period as follows:
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FILMS TELLING WHY WE FOUGHT
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the American people were psychologically unprepared for war. Relatively few people understood why the conflict in Europe, like the war in Asia which had been going on since 1931, had inevitably been our concern from the beginning why the very existence of fascist nations anywhere in the world was a threat to our democracy. Once this country had been attacked, most people favored a declaration of war. But unless Americans could come to a true understanding of what the shooting was all about, there was little hope that they could wage an all-out war and win an all-out peace.
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FILMS ABOUT THE ENEMY
Films dealing with the ideology, objectives, and methods of fascism, both at home and abroad, have been included under The Enemy. Such films were most acutely needed during the days immediately following Pearl Harbor, when Americans not only knew little about the nature of fascism, but also had small comprehension of the fact that we faced enemies much stronger and better prepared for war than ourselves.
During 1942-1944, Hollywood released 107 motion pictures depicting the enemy. These films represented 28.6 per cent of the war product of these years and more than 8 percent of the total output of Hollywood:
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Although there were more films about the enemy than in any other category, this subject by and large received a distorted and inadequate portrayal on the screen. Features of this type were the first to be produced in any quantity in Hollywood, because they required only a slight adaptation of the usual mystery formula and thus provided an easy means for capitalizing at the box office on interest in the war. As the war proceeded, films treating the enemy more seriously began to appear. When taken in relation to the total number of films about the enemy, however, such constructively oriented pictures were relatively few.
FILMS ABOUT OUR ALLIES
The United Nations theme in pictures is important for several reasons. With American entry into the war, it was necessary that the American public to whom the war was a distant, far-off event should come to a more intimate understanding of the role that was being played by allied nations.
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Films about our allies were needed to broaden American understanding of the many aspects of the United Nations battle. They were needed abroad as testimony of our appreciation of the role these people had played in our mutual fight against the enemy.
During the first three years of the war, the motion-picture industry produced a total of 68 films about the United Nations and peoples. This number represented 18 per cent of the war films released during these years, and 5 per cent of the total product. These 68 films were released as follows:
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FILMS ABOUT THE HOME FRONT
In a country like ours, which did not actually witness the hostilities, one of the most difficult problems was the mobilization of the home front. Early in the war, civilians were called upon to volunteer for civilian defense. American families were asked to conserve food, save scrap metal and waste paper, and in many other small ways to assist in the war effort. The public was asked to cooperate in the prevention of inflation and to buy war bonds. To mobilize the country for these and other war activities was no small task. There was a place for films which would stimulate interest in and dignify these chores, and convince the public of their importance. In addition, it was extremely important that films destined for overseas audiences which depicted America in wartime should tell something about these home-front activities.
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During 1942-1944 the industry released 40 features concerned primarily with home-front problems. These pictures accounted for 11 percent of all war films produced during these years, and for 3 per cent of the entire film product of this period.
During 1944, Hollywood released a cycle about delinquency in wartime America: Where Are Your Children?, Are These Our Parents?, Youth Runs Wild, I Accuse My Parents, etc. These films gave a sensational treatment of this problem, and offered little or nothing constructive toward a solution. Rather, such pictures caused concern because they tended to hinder the recruitment of women to industry. Conscientious mothers, fearful that their children might become delinquent, refused to enter industry where they were badly needed to release men for the armed services. It was generally agreed that delinquency films of the type produced by Hollywood created fear and hysteria, thereby intensifying the delinquency problem.
Thus the feature film did little to dignify and interpret for American audiences the home-front war. Instead, Hollywood pictures tended to ridicule, exaggerate, or sensationalize these problems. This treatment was particularly unfortunate in its effect on audiences abroad.
FILMS ABOUT OUR FIGHTING FORCES
With the exception of films about the enemy, more features dealing with the American fighting forces were produced by Hollywood during 1942-1944 than on any other war topic. In these years, 95 pictures about the Army, Navy, and Merchant Marine were released:
Approximately one out of every four war films produced during the three years following American entry into the war dealt with the fighting man, his training, his combat experiences, his adventures when on leave, etc. […]
HOLLYWOOD’S WAR JOB
The analysis of Hollywood's war product shows that, of a total of 1,313 motion pictures released during 1942, 1943, and 1944, there were 45 or 50 which aided significantly, both at home and abroad, in increasing understanding of the conflict. This means that approximately 4 per cent of the film output of these three years, or about one out of every ten war pictures, made such a contribution. There were many causes for Hollywood's failure to make maximum use of the feature film in the war effort. To begin with, the Hollywood industry, like most others in America, was unprepared for the war emergency. For years, motion-picture studios had been turning out six or seven hundred films a year, the great majority of which were musicals, domestic comedies, westerns, and murder mysteries based on well-worn formulas. For years producers had been adamant in their opinion that what the American public wants, above all else, is to be entertained. It is small wonder, then, that, faced with the task of making films which would educate the public about the war, most Hollywood movie makers did not know where to begin. They lacked experience in making films dealing with actual social problems. And, like the rest of America, they themselves lacked real understanding of the war.
The formula picture, and the tendency of many producers to cling to it as a safe and sure bet at the box office, proved a serious handicap during the war years. Whenever Hollywood lapsed into its usual formulas in the making of war pictures, the results were disastrous, since the material itself became secondary to the development of the stereotyped plot. That is one reason why most of the war films produced by Hollywood were inconsequential, misleading, or even detrimental to the war program (for example, the spy series, or the blood-and-thunder combat pictures).
Another important factor limiting Hollywood's effectiveness was lack of knowledge and concern about audiences abroad. Primary attention in production has always been focused on domestic box office, the main source of industry revenue. With the advent of the war, however, Hollywood's indifference about foreign audiences became a critical factor. Every film made in Hollywood either contributes to or detracts from the reputation of America and the American people overseas. In the case of pictures portraying the role of this nation and of our allies during this war, the influence of Hollywood was multiplied a thousandfold. Yet most film makers failed to realize that the melodramatic blood-and-thunder combat film, with the American hero single handedly disposing of a score of Nazis, would bring jeers and hisses in a London movie house, or that a musical singing out that the Yanks had done it once and would do it again would cause a riot between American and British soldiers in a theater in Bombay.
The problem of timing was perhaps the most difficult one facing the industry in its production of useful war films. A feature film cannot be written, photographed, edited, and released overnight. Production of an "A" feature takes from nine to twelve months, sometimes longer. The releasing problem itself caused further delays, particularly in recent years when the large backlog of unreleased pictures meant that completed films might stay in the can for many months before reaching the screen. As a result, by the time they reached the screen many war films were outdated, or the time when they would have had maximum usefulness was passed. The industry as a whole did little about meeting this serious problem. It might have been possible to speed up production on a series of "B" pictures treating immediate problems, and let the "A"-budget war films treat long-range subjects which would not become outdated. Then, too, the releasing structure could have been adapted to bring timely films to the screen more rapidly. However, the release of some important war films was excellently timed, notably Mrs. Miniver, Wilson, and Mission to Moscow.
Hollywood's experience with the making of war films has led forwardlooking writers, producers, story editors, and others to the realization that something must be done about these problems if the film is to play the vital role in world affairs for which it is so admirably suited. There are many indications that important changes are taking place in the motion-picture capital, that the traditional notions about film making which have so long governed the industry are slowly yielding to more progressive ideas about the function of the film in the world today. This is reflected in some of the fine films which were produced during the war, and in certain noticeable changes in the content of films generally (a more constructive portrayal of minority groups, more films realistically portraying American life for foreign audiences, etc. The changes taking place in Hollywood will be accelerated by the return of film makers who have been in the Armed Services making day-to-day use of the film as a dynamic weapon of war.
Hollywood has gained immeasurably in social awareness and in new techniques of film making as a result of the war. Now that the smoke of battle is clearing away, a world public is waiting to see whether Hollywood will accept the greater responsibilities and opportunities that lie ahead by helping to create One World dedicated to peace, plenty, and the pursuit of happiness.