Production
Portrait of a small French town following its liberation during World War II.
Stanley Kubrick’s first color film, commissioned by the Seafarers International Union to promote the benefits of union membership. Shot inside the union’s Atlantic and Gulf Coast District facilities, it features scenes of ships, machinery, cafeteria life, and meetings, highlighting the daily routines and camaraderie of seafarers. Thought lost for decades, the film was rediscovered in 1973 and preserved by the Library of Congress.
In pursuance of a lucrative government contract, a private company hires its first Black female employee to comply with government regulations concerning equal economic opportunity.
During World War II, the Canadian Navy gathered a troupe of diverse performers (dancers, comedians, singers, musicians) from its ranks and sent them off to entertain their shipmates, and the show/revue ultimately played London's Hioopodrome. The acceptance was based more on wartime-London's appreciation of the gallantry of Britain's sons and daughters from over the seas than it was on the artistic value of the show or the talent of the performers. The film is a fictional/fact mixture of the adventures of the troupe members, and the ending, only part filmed in Technicolor, is primarily the Revue as seen at the Hippodrome.
