Night and Fog is one of the most emotionally powerful films I have ever experienced. It is a film which approaches its unpleasant subject matter with such minimalism, in order to make it that much more powerful. While only 33 minutes long, Night and Fog is perhaps the greatest film ever made documenting the events which occurred in World War II Germany.

What differentiates Night and Fog from numerous other World War II documentaries is both in it's screenplay and the overall skill shown, both as editor and director, from Alain Resnais. The film is constructed in such a way that the current footage (1955) is displayed in full color, documenting the remains of the concentration camps, and is spliced together with authentic black and white footage from the very same concentration camps. The sequences are edited together masterfully and are only helped by an understated score consisting of arrangements of flutes and strings. The music helps elevate these scenes into something completely unique when compared to what we're accustomed to seeing in pictures of this type.

The footage that is shown is horrifying, and perhaps more difficult to watch than any movie I've ever seen theatrically. Sequences of prisoners being lined up naked, having lost significant weight from malnutrition, become sequences of the starved, lying motionless, lifeless eyes staring directly into the camera. These sequences soon culminate into an arrangement of footage depicting piles of bodies being shovelled into mass graves. There are sequences displaying the remains of bodies that were burnt in the camp when the crematorium could accommodate no more. The imagery in this film will stay with you long after viewing.

Night and Fog is an incredibly well put together film which documents, in incredibly powerful fashion, the atrocities which occurred in Nazi Germany. Certainly this is not a subject were unfamiliar with, yet Resnais remains relatively non-judgemental, and offers this film with little objectivity. It is narrated from a fairly neutral position and the music is a haunting contrast to the events which are being depicted onscreen. The final scene warns us that (in 1955) we've turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to the events that occurred in Nazi Germany, and suggests the possibility that these atrocities could happen again.

Highly recommended viewing for anyone who has an interest in history, and/or World War 2. Also, for those interested in the possibilities of film as an involving and emotional form of media, there is no better example of what film is capable of, than Night and Fog.

Available on a Criterion Collection DVD from Amazon.com.