1940: Taking over French Cinema

Paris, 1940. German occupation forces create a new film production company, Continental, and put Alfred Greven – producer, cinephile, and opportunistic businessman – in charge. During the occupation, under Joseph Goebbels’s orders, Greven hires the best artists and technicians of French cinema to produce successful, highly entertaining films, which are also strategically devoid of propaganda. Simultaneously, he takes advantage of the confiscation of Jewish property to purchase film theaters, studios and laboratories, in order to control the whole production line. His goal: to create a European Hollywood. Among the thirty feature films thus produced under the auspices of Continental, several are, to this day, considered classics of French cinema.

Director: Pierre-Henri Gibert

Cast

Sarah-Jane Sauvegrain

Self (voice)

L

Louis-Émile Galey

Self (archive footage)

C

Claude Heymann

Self (archive footage)

Jean Dréville

Self (archive footage)

Marcel Carné

Self (archive footage)

R

Raoul Ploquin

Self (voice) (archive footage)

H

Henri Calef

Self (archive footage)

Jean-Paul Le Chanois

Self (archive footage)