Night & Fog - The Criterion Collection [DVD] [1955] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

Night and fog is somewhat like a brief beginners guide to 'real' holocaust documentaries that avoid the usual pathos of films and instead simply lay bare the facts and leave you to your own feelings on what you've seen rather than bludgeon you with sentiment.

First off dont let the short running time put you off, Resnais achieves more in 30 minutes than hollywoods finest can achieve in 2.5 hours. very brief interview clips and original footage are rapidly spliced together to form a whole picture that lingers in the mind long after the final credits. Resnais illustrates how less is so much more as he uses every second he has to show the sheer horror of the camps.I return to watch again and again and still keep finding details I missed.

Having been made so close to the end of the war this has a resonance of a world still shocked by what it saw.

watch this, think about it and after taking a deep breath move on to 'the sorrow and the pity' dvd and then ' shoah'.

just remember that documentaries, even the most open minded, show you what they want you to see and those interviewed tell you only what they want you to hear. so watch as wide a variety as you can before making your own mind up.

Even though this is a very short film it is extremely powerful. it shows the horrors of the camps that are not often mentioned by Auschwitz survivors in their books.
The film shows how women's hair was made into rolls of material, human skin into paper and bones boiled down for glue.

It also shows the nail marks on the ceiling of the gas chambers where people had tried to claw there way out. The film is not a ghoulish look at the horrors of concentration camps, rather a very important documentary that all should see. On the back of the box it notes that after a spate of anti-semitism all French television channels cut their listings on the same evening and showed this film instead.

The commentary is in French but the sub titles are in English and as I was unable to tear my eyes away from the screen anyway I didn't find this a problem at all.

'Night and Fog' is an astounding documentary on the hideous events of the Holocaust. Although only thirty minutes long, it nevertheless provides an excellent and moving account of Auschwitz.

Its 'beauty' lies in its simplicity - there is no drama or sensationalism. It depicts the Holocaust simply as it was, using original footage as a testimony to the unprecedented horror. The commentary is equally excellent in its simplicity and clarity, and compliments perfectly the moving and heart-wrenching images. What makes the documentary great is its power to shock, to make the viewer utterly unable to understand how such industrialised inhumanity could ever occur in a civilised and cultured nation. It also illustrates the immense scale of the genocide, and the total dehumanisation of the victims, whose skinny, lifeless corpses are used as an economic resource for Nazi Germany - to make cloth, to make soap, even to make 'art'. 'Night and Fog' is superb in its depiction of the modern, bureaucratised, and production-line nature of Nazi genocide.

Made in 1955, 'Night and Fog' shows the Holocaust as it was before much scholarly debate had begun. It shows us simply what happened, leaving us with utter incomprehension as to why it happened. Seeing original footage, it makes us wonder what was going through the minds of the perpetrators. Did they really believe that what was being done was in the name of progress? Did they feel any pity? Did they enjoy what they were doing? 'Night and Fog' captures the inability to comprehend how such unspeakable horrors occurred, and does not pretend to have any answers for why the Holocaust could have happened.

At a time when the Holocaust is fading from public memory, I think this documentary should be watched by all. I do not understand why moving and explicit documentaries like this are not broadcast on Holocaust Memorial Day. Perhaps by showing the Nazis' totally repugnant disregard for human life, we can achieve man's new categorical imperative - to never again allow Auschwitz to happen.