Five Came Back (TV series)

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Five Came Back

Genre Documentary
Five Came Back: A Story of
Hollywood and the Second World
Based on
War
by Mark Harris
Directed by Laurent Bouzereau
 Francis Ford Coppola
 Guillermo del Toro
 Paul Greengrass
Starring
 Lawrence Kasdan
 Steven Spielberg

Narrated by Meryl Streep

Theme music
Thomas Newman
composer
Composer(s) Jeremy Turner
Country of
United States
origin
 Original
English
language(s)
No. of seasons 1
No. of episodes 3 (list of episodes)
Production
 Steven Spielberg
 Scott Rudin
 Barry Diller
 Angus Wall
 Justin Falvey
 Darryl Frank
Executive  Eli Bush
producer(s)  Jason Sack
 Linda Carlson
 Jason Sterman
 Ben Cotner
 Adam Del Deo
 Lisa Nishimura

 Laurent Bouzereau
Producer(s)  John Battsek

Editor(s) Will Znidaric

Running time 59-69 minutes
 Amblin Television
 IACF Productions
Production  Passion Pictures
company(s)  Rock Paper Scissors
Entertainment

Distributor Netflix
Release
Original
Netflix
network
Original release March 31, 2017

Five Came Back is an American documentary based on the 2014 book Five Came Back: A Story
of Hollywood and the Second World War by journalist Mark Harris.[1] It was released as a stand-
alone documentary in New York and Los Angeles, and as a three-part series on Netflix, on
March 31, 2017.[2]
The documentary focuses on five directors – John Ford, William Wyler, John Huston, Frank
Capra, and George Stevens – whose war-related works are analysed by modern filmmakers,
respectively Paul Greengrass, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, Guillermo del Toro, and
Lawrence Kasdan. Meryl Streep, who serves as narrator, won the Primetime Emmy Award for
Outstanding Narrator for her performance.

Contents
 1 Synopsis
 2 Production
 3 Episodes
 4 Critical reaction
 5 Accolades
 6 References
 7 External links

Synopsis
Five Came Back explores the experiences of five U.S. film directors – John Ford, William
Wyler, John Huston, Frank Capra, and George Stevens – and their frontline work during the
Second World War.[3] It draws on over 100 hours of archival footage and is narrated by Meryl
Streep.[4] Each modern director discusses the impact and legacies of one of the five earlier
directors: Steven Spielberg (Wyler), Francis Ford Coppola (Huston), Guillermo del Toro
(Capra), Paul Greengrass (Ford), and Lawrence Kasdan (Stevens).

Netflix is also streaming the 13 documentaries discussed in the film:[5]

 The Battle of Midway (1942, John Ford)

 Prelude to War (1942, Frank Capra)
 The Battle of Russia (1943, Frank Capra)
 Undercover: How to Operate Behind Enemy Lines (1943, John Ford)
 Report from the Aleutians (1943, John Huston)
 The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress (1944, William Wyler)
 The Negro Soldier (1944, Stuart Heisler; produced by Frank Capra)
 Tunisian Victory (1944, John Huston)
 Know Your Enemy: Japan (1945, Frank Capra)
 The Battle of San Pietro (1945, John Huston)
 Nazi Concentration Camps (1945, George Stevens)
 Let There Be Light (1946, John Huston)
 Thunderbolt (1947, William Wyler)
Production
The film was based on the 2014 book of the same name by Mark Harris.[6] The filmmakers
studied more than 100 hours of newsreel and archival footage, and more than 40 documentaries
and training films created by the five directors during the war. They also reviewed 50 studio
films by the directors and more than 30 hours of raw footage from their war films.[7] Director
Laurent Bouzereau, who has extensive experience documenting films and directors, introduced
the idea of interviewing five current directors for the project.[8]

Meryl Streep recorded the narration for the documentary on January 17, 2017, the same day she
received her 20th Oscar nomination (for Florence Foster Jenkins).[8]

Episodes
No. Title Directed by Written by Original air date
1 "The Mission Begins" Laurent Bouzereau Mark Harris March 31, 2017
The series looks at the backgrounds of the five directors as World War II begins and their
motives for helping the war effort. John Ford's The Battle of Midway was approved directly by
President Franklin D. Roosevelt while Frank Capra fights to get Why We Fight made.
2 "Combat Zones" Laurent Bouzereau Mark Harris March 31, 2017
The directors learn their vision for the films is not always permissible by the U.S. government.
Wyler is shocked by the racism he encounters against African American soldiers and refused to
make a film recruiting black soldiers. Meanwhile, the films' racist depiction of the Japanese
versus human depiction of the Germans causes worry for the War Department, which at that
time planned to redistribute the Japanese-American population from internment camps into
towns across the United States.
3 "The Price of Victory" Laurent Bouzereau Mark Harris March 31, 2017
The five directors return to Hollywood after the war but are forever haunted by what they saw.
Ford goes on a drinking bender after filming the carnage at D-Day. Stevens is wholly
unprepared for the horrors of Dachau and realizes he is not there to film propaganda but to
capture evidence of crimes against humanity. Wyler, who lost his hearing during the war, fears
his career is over. Huston chronicles soldiers suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder in the
film Let There Be Light, only to have it suppressed by the U.S. government.

Critical reaction
Five Came Back has received largely critical acclaim. It has a 97% approval rating based on 37
reviews on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.[9] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave the series
3.5 stars out of 4, writing, "Arguably the best documentary ever made about Hollywood and
wartime, Five Came Back is nirvana for movie lovers and a real eye-opener for anyone new to
the subject."[10] David Sims of The Atlantic praised the series' relevance today, and stated that it
should have been longer: "Harris's book recognized that Hollywood often shapes our perception
of reality more than we know, and that the recruitment of these directors by the U.S. military
intertwined the film industry with sometimes-dangerous assumptions of truth and realism. Five
Came Back is, in the end, a compelling examination of propaganda—its purpose, its
effectiveness, and its drawbacks. These are all things that are worth keeping in mind in 2017, just
as they were many decades ago."[11]

Allison Shoemaker, who reviewed each episode separately for The A.V. Club, gave "The Mission
Begins" a B+ and graded both "Combat Zones" and "The Price of Victory" an A. Reviewing the
final episode, she writes, "It comes as no surprise that the conclusion to this remarkable series
packs a wallop—the previous episode ends with D-Day on the horizon, after all—but what is
surprising is how gracefully Laurent Bouzereau and Mark Harris link these monstrous and
stunning events and truths to the art which followed them. Does tying Frank Capra's It's a
Wonderful Life to George Stevens' experiences at Dachau seem like a bit of a stretch? Sure, but
somehow, it isn't. George Bailey's story is also Capra's, and Ford's, and Wyler's. There's much
that this hour makes clear, but chief among that crowded group is this: the experiences of and
footage captured by these men changed the United States, the world, and the directors
themselves in irrevocable ways."[12][13][14]

John Anderson in The Wall Street Journal writes: "Overall, the series is much like its story:
mythic, adventurous, romantic. And real."[15] Brian Tallerico, writing for RogerEbert.com, called
it a "must-see" and a "cinephile and historian's dream come true."[16]

In The New York Times, Ben Kenigsberg writes, "Above all, Five Came Back is an invitation to
see more: It's hard to watch it without wanting to visit (or revisit) Wyler's Mrs. Miniver or Ford's
They Were Expendable. It's further proof, if any were needed, that these men weren't simply
creating propaganda, but art that would endure."[17]

Kristin Hunt of Slashfilm questioned why the series did not address Ford's anti-semitism or
Capra's admiration of Benito Mussolini, but was generally positive, writing, "Five Came Back is
a testament to the power of cinema, and the moral implications that come with it. Was all this
propaganda permissible? The documentary is sometimes afraid to truly grapple with that
question. But when it does, it's gripping stuff."[18] Peter Debruge, chief film critic for Variety, was
less enthusiastic, criticizing the series for leaving out the rich original research in Harris' book for
the thoughts of the five current Hollywood directors, whose purpose he felt was merely a
promotional gag.[19]

Accolades
Year Award Category Nominee(s) Result Ref.
2017 Meryl Streep (Episode: "The
Outstanding Narrator Won
Price of Victory")
Primetime
Outstanding Music [20]
Creative Arts
Composition for a Jeremy Turner (Episode: "The
Emmy Awards Nominated
Limited Series, Price of Victory")
Movie, or Special
[21]
3rd Critics’ Best Limited Five Came Back Nominated
Year Award Category Nominee(s) Result Ref.
Choice
Documentary Series
Documentary
(TV/Streaming)
Awards
Best Documentary
18th Golden (TV [22]
Five Came Back Nominated
Trailer Awards Spot/Trailer/Teaser for
a series)
Best Edited Non-
American Will Znidaric (Episode: "The [23]
Theatrical Won
Cinema Editors Price of Victory")
Documentary
Laurent Bouzereau
(director/producer), John Battsek
Outstanding
11th Annual (producer), Ben Cotner
Achievement in [24]
Cinema Eye (Executive Producer), Adam Del Nominated
Broadcast Nonfiction
Honors Awards Deo (Executive Producer), and
Filmmaking
Lisa Nishimura (Executive
2018
Producer)
Trip Brock (supervising sound
65th Motion editor), Bruce Stubblefield
Picture Sound Outstanding (supervising dialogue editor),
Editors Achievement in Sound Demetri Evdoxiadis (sound [25]
Nominated
GOLDEN Editing – Single effects editor), Raymond Park
REEL Presentation (sound effects editor), Zheng Jia
AWARDS (sound effects editor), Abhay
Manusmare (music editor)

References
1.

 Agard, Chancellor (February 23, 2017). "Mark Harris' 'Five Came Back' Is Coming to
Netflix as a Docu-Series". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved February 28, 2017.
  "Mark Harris' Five Came Back is coming to Netflix as a docu-series". Entertainment
Weekly. Retrieved February 23, 2017.
  "New Netflix series narrated by Meryl Streep to tell story of how Hollywood faced
fascism during World War II". Radio Times. Retrieved February 28, 2017.
  "Exclusive: See the Trailer for Netflix's New Documentary About World War II and
Hollywood". Time. Retrieved February 28, 2017.
  Thompson, Anne (April 3, 2017). "How 5 Directors Returned from World War II to Make
Their Best Movies". IndieWire. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Harris, Mark (2014). Five Came Back  : A Story of Hollywood and the Second World
War. Penguin Press. ISBN 9781594204302. OCLC 964586334.
  "VIDEO: First Look - New Netflix Documentary Series FIVE CAME BACK".
BroadwayWorld. February 28, 2017. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Tapley, Kristopher (March 13, 2017). "Author Mark Harris on Turning 'Five Came
Back' Into a Netflix Documentary". Variety. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  "Five Came Back: Miniseries". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved May 22, 2018.
  Travers, Peter (March 30, 2017). "'Five Came Back' Review: WWII Doc Is a Peerless
Hollywood History Lesson". Rolling Stone. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Sims, David (April 3, 2017). "'Five Came Back' and the Frightening Power of
Propaganda". The Atlantic. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Shoemaker, Allison (April 1, 2017). "Five Came Back traces the transformation of an
artist to an instrument of war". The A.V. Club. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Shoemaker, Allison (April 2, 2017). "The directors grapple with bombings and
bureaucracy in a gripping Five Came Back". The A.V. Club. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Shoemaker, Allison (April 3, 2017). "The stunning conclusion of Five Came Back makes
us witnesses to both horror and joy". The A.V. Club. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Anderson, John (March 30, 2017). "'Five Came Back' Review: When Directors Went to
War". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Tallerico, Brian (April 3, 2017). "Five Came Back Movie Review & Film Summary
(2017) | Roger Ebert". rogerebert.com. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Kenigsberg, Ben (March 30, 2017). "Review: 'Five Came Back,' and Inspired the Likes of
Spielberg". The New York Times. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  Hunt, Kristin (April 6, 2017). "What to Watch After Five Came Back". Slashfilm.
Retrieved April 8, 2017.
  Debruge, Peter (April 1, 2017). "Film Review: 'Five Came Back'". Variety. Retrieved
April 9, 2017.
  "Five Came Back". Television Academy.
  "Critics' Choice Documentary Awards: Full Winners List". The Hollywood Reporter.
  Hipes, Patrick. "Golden Trailer Awards Nominees: Warner Bros & 'Lego Batman' Lead
Pack". Deadline.
  "Eddie Awards 2018". American Cinema Editors.
  "11th Annual Cinema Eye (Highlights from the 2018 Cinema Eye Honors)". Cinema Eye.
 McNary, Dave. "'Baby Driver,' 'Dunkirk,' 'Shape of Water' Lead Golden Reel Nominations
for Sound Editing". Variety.