Target for Tonight (DVD)

Produced in association with the British Royal Air Force (RAF) Target for Tonight documents in painstaking detail a night time bombing raid on a Nazi installation, from its initial planning to its explosive execution. We follow the crew of bomber "F" (for Freddie) into the cockpit as they take out a German oil storage facility on the Rhine River. The exciting aerial footage was directed by documentarian Harry Watt, a protege of Robert Flaherty (Nanook of the North.) Target for Tonight utilizes an authentic cast of actual British officers (tragically, Watt later noted that not all of them survived to see the end of World War II.) When this documentary was released in the United States by Warner Brothers, the pilots' voices were re-dubbed as the Warner studio execs found their accents indecipherable. According to modern sources, the film also underwent a re-edit by an uncredited Alfred Hitchcock. It was this version that won an Honorary Academy Award in 1942. Seen today, Target for Tonight can be appreciated as both nostalgic wartime propaganda and as a tribute to the heroic WWII British pilots who sacrificed themselves so others could live.

BONUS: The Air Force Story 'Road to Rome' (1953): The Air Force Story was a multi-part history of the United States Air Force produced by the government early into the Cold War. Owing to the time it was made, much of it dealt with America's triumphs in World War II. This installment, 'Road to Rome', shows operations by the 12th Air Force from September 1943 through June 1944 in Italy, including the Battle of Monte Cassino that destroyed the Gustav Line that separated the Allies from Rome.

• war