The Spanish Earth

Spanish Earth, The (1937)

*** (out of 4)

Nice documentary from Joris Ivens about the struggles of the Spanish Republic who were trying to save their lives against forces led by Gen. Franco who was being backed by Nazi Germany. Ernest Hemingway narrates this documentary, which lasts just over 53-minutes. At that short of a running time you know not every aspect of this legendary battle is going to be talked about so if you're needing a history lesson then this here probably isn't going to be for you. We really don't learn too much about how this battle got started and of course there's no conclusion but THE Spanish EARTH remains rather interesting simply because of the images and the heart behind the storytelling. There's no question that the production company and director Ivens wanted to stand up against those they felt were doing evil things against human beings only wanting to put food on the table for their children. There are many striking visuals where we see people waiting in line for food, which of course runs out before everyone could be fed. We get images of the young men going off to war to fight and of course with war comes the images of many who lost their lives. The production is rather crude as the cinematography isn't all that impressive and there are many issues with the sound but this really doesn't take away from the film and in many ways it makes it even more raw. What I was most impressed with where the images that really put us in the middle of this battle and one of the most striking happens at a bread line where we see that even bread has been stamped so that the poor knows who it belongs to. Film buffs will notice that Orson Welles gets credited for "narration" but his vocals were dropped and replaced by Hemingway.