Moscow Strikes Back

The Soviet documentary is about the Battle of Moscow between October 1941 and January 1942, the months in which the Red Army stopped the German advance before the capital. The footage was shot by a large number of cameramen at the front and includes, besides the fighting, the condition of civilians, burned villages and what was left behind in the retreat. The account ties all of this to the theme of Russian heroism and the survival of a culture, so it is as much a document of morale as an account of a war. The fifty five minute film by Leonid Varlamov and Ilya Kopalin first appeared under the title Defeat of the German Armies Near Moscow; the English version was called Moscow Strikes Back and was narrated by Edward G. Robinson. It was completed in 1942 and won the Academy Award for best documentary in 1943. The film contains harrowing images.