That Justice Be Done

That Justice Be Done
That Justice Be Done
Directed by	George Stevens
Distributed by	Office of War Information
Release date	1945;
Country	United States
Language	English

That Justice Be Done (full film)

That Justice Be Done was a one-reel American propaganda film directed by George Stevens and made in 1945 by the Office of War Information for the US Chief of Counsel at Nuremberg and the War Crimes Office of the Judge Advocate General's Corps.

Content

The film opens with a shot of the Jefferson Memorial and a voice over of Thomas Jefferson declaring his opposition to all forms of tyranny, then slowly fades to footage of Adolf Hitler making a speech soon dubbed into English "We have the right to do anything which benefits the German race, including complete expulsion of inferior peoples." The camera then moves to the crowds of people shouting "Sieg heil" and the soundtrack continues over pictures of war crimes.

The narrator describes how the various classes of war criminals, traitors, and people who committed specific acts are dealt with, then moves on to the major Nazi war criminals. The narrator states that we cannot torture or poison them like they did to their victims, but must uphold a higher standard of justice, exemplified by George Washington. The film states that 1945 must be the year of not only Germany's military defeat but also that of a trial and therefore a public exposure and repudiation of the ideas of Nazism itself.