Informed by the conviction that film was a means to advocate patriotism, Lai established China Sun Motion Picture Company in the early 1920s. He teamed up with friends to follow Dr Sun, traversing provinces for several years and filming precious historical moments such as Sun's inspection of the country and the Northern Expedition led by Chiang Kai-shek after the death of Sun. Some of those footage was edited into A Page of History, available to the public today, albeit deteriorated and incomplete. The Battle of Shanghai records the famous conflict at the beginning of the war in 1937 when, fervently resisting the invading Japanese army, 800 soldiers defended a warehouse until the very last moment. Shot by Lai and his team at the risk of death, the film is now an invaluable visual document in Chinese modern history.
A dramatization to promote the Territorial Army.
After the capture of Shanghai, Japanese soldiers make a trip to Suzhou.
After serving in the trenches of World War I, Jean Diaz recoils with such horror that he renounces love and personal pleasure to immerse himself in scientific research, seeking a machine to prevent war. He thinks he has succeeded, but the government subverts his discovery, and Europe slides with seeming inevitability toward World War II. In desperation, Diaz summons the ghosts of the war dead from the graves and fields of France to give silent, accusing protest.
The propaganda documentary about the readiness of the Red Army to repulse any enemy is based on documentary shots taken during the real maneuvers of the Red Army. Armadas of tanks, immense columns of infantry, dozens of fighters and bombers, thousands of cavalry, legendary divisions of the Civil War. The film glorifies Soviet military power and shows the Soviet people what the war will be like when the imperialists attack the USSR — quick, victorious, almost bloodless.
Professor Lo Yeung-guo (Hou Yao) and his students escape death from the Japanese army, and call on villagers in the countryside to form a guerrillas group. His son Lo Yung (Lau Hark-suen), however, indulges in debauchery. Entrapped by the Japanese, chicken-hearted Yung leaks information about the guerrilla that leads to deaths and injuries in the group. Yeung-guo reprimands his son for being an invisible traitor, inflicting even more harm than an outright traitor. Placing righteousness before family, he decides to execute his own son. As a writer-director-actor in the film, Hou Yao proclaimed his unwavering stance on resistance on the screen, and delivered a scathing attack on the cowardly ‘invisible traitors‘ at that time. Not long after, Hou was sadly arrested and executed by the Japanese army in Singapore.
In 1915 France, Major Brand commands the 39th Squadron of the Royal Flying Corps. The young airmen go up in bullet-riddled "crates" and the casualty rate is appalling, but Brand can't make the "brass hats" at headquarters see reason. Insubordinate air ace Captain Courtney is another thorn in Brand's side...but finds the smile wiped from his face when he rises to command the squadron himself. Everyone keeps a stiff upper lip.
A group of disparate travelers are thrown together in a posh Alpine hotel when the borders are closed at the start of WWII.
Nazi propaganda film about the Condor Legion, a unit of German "volunteers" who fought in the Spanish Civil War on the side of eventual dictator Francisco Franco against the elected government of Spain.
British Air Ministry short film highlighting the need for the public to stay clear of aircraft wreckage during World War II.
This short documentary about the Canadian seamen who manned Canada's eastern ports during WWII is the first film in the Canada Carries On series. The film depicts the work of the Royal Canadian marines who accompanied convoys of military supplies to the Allied Forces and those who remained on the eastern coast to defend against the Germans.
This short documentary is part of the Canada Carries On series of morale-boosting wartime propaganda films. In Home Front, the various WWII-era social contributions of women are highlighted. From medicine to industrial labour to hospitality, education and domesticity, the service these women provided to their country is lauded.
This black-and-white archival film outlines the importance of Canada's forests in the national war effort during the Second World War.
Part of the Canada Carries On series, this short film portrays the First Division of the Canadian Active Service Force in Aldershot, England. Using an intimate letter home as a narrative device, this film reveals how the troops were received, what their living conditions were like, how they would get along with their English allies and how they spent their leisure time.
Flock to your local keep fit class - there's a war on and Britain needs its citizens in tip-top shape.
As WWII begins, vaudeville entertainer Tommy Towers is called up to serve. He arranges a job for his girlfriend at the local pub. To keep moral up, his commanding officer orders him to perform for the troops.
A classic about an anteater who makes life rough for a colony of ants. In the ant community, the queen spreads warnings of their greatest enemy, the Anteater. "He's a menace, he's a brute, he will scoop you with his snoot." Their motto is "make him yell uncle," which they do when the anteater invades them.
Wartime short promoting the evacuation if urban children to rural areas.
A wartime short encouraging workers to join free, government-organised engineering training schemes.
When a neutral Danish merchant ship is forced to put into port after trying to evade British wartime contraband control, its captain becomes involved in a beautiful British Naval Intelligent agent's efforts to capture a group of German spies operating from a London cinema.