The History Channel's two-disc compilation about the waning--yet astonishingly violent and sometimes surreal--final months of WWII in Europe offers an excellent combination of big picture insight and small picture detail. Between epochal opening and closing bookends--Hitler's initial prediction that the Third Reich would last 1,000 years, and the final sentencing of German war criminals at Nuremberg--the title documentary interweaves archival footage and commentary from scholars and eyewitnesses to examine a number of topics: Nazi tactics to hold onto chunks of Europe even as Germany was losing the war, the story of the Battle of the Bulge (600,000 Allied troops staving off a Nazi surge into Belgium), Russia's fierce assault on Berlin, and Roosevelt and Churchill's wary relationship with Stalin. The second disc includes USS Eagle 56: Accident or Target?, a fascinating production about the explosion of a U.S. submarine chaser off Maine in 1945, and a subsequent Navy cover-up of information about U-Boat activity in the area; and Last Secrets of the Axis, a documentary examining the relationship between Japan and Nazi Germany. Another excellent, value-added WWII-themed compilation, this is highly recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (T. Keogh)
The Last Days of World War II
(2004) 2 discs. 279 min. DVD: $29.95. The History Channel (dist. by A&E Home Video). PPR. Color cover. ISBN: 0-7670-6180-2. Volume 19, Issue 4
The Last Days of World War II
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