A revolutionary anti-war & anti-Nazi movie, full of romantism -and romanticism- about the music of Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin and the independence of Poland, centered on events from March up to the German invasion in September 1939.
The film immortalises through stock footage many important monuments of Warsaw -like the bronze monument of Chopin by the sculptor Waclaw Szymanowski from 1926- that were all systematically destroyed by the Germans in 1940.
The original screnplay was written by the American writer and producer Elias (Ellis) St. Joseph & the American playwright and screenwriter Howard E. Koch (of Jewish descent, because of his script IN OUR TIME (Death to Fascism!) he was accused as a leftist and a Communist and, blacklisted by Hollywood in 1951 by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, he was forced to leave to Europe until 1956 using for his work the pseudonym Peter Howard): the full screenplay of IN OUR TIME (Death to Fascism!) is here
https://www.scripts.com/script/in_our_time_10724 .
The movie draws many lines of political, economic and social comments and leads all of them to a culmination-revelation of the true structure of bourgeois society when challenged by State Socialism (that is, clear Fascism), having the philosopher as a revelator, played symbolically by Mikhail (Michael) Chekhov who was actually the nephew of ANTON CHEKHOV, was persecuted by the Stalinish regime after 1927 and became a great teacher of acting for famous Hollywood stars.
Music by the German composer Franz Waxman (Wachsmann, of Jewish descent, born in Poland's Silesia, he was persecuted by the Nazi regime in Germany during 1932-34 and left Berlin to go to France and, later, to the US where he met a huge success in Hollywood).
The movie was produced by the great American screenwriter and producer Jerry Wald (Jerome Irving Wald, of Jewish descent).
Filmed at Warner Bros' Studios in Burbank (California) and directed by the American stage actor, screenwriter and director Vincent Sherman (Abraham Orovitz, of Jewish descent) who was also accused as a leftist Communist and was blacklisted for some years in the 1950's in Hollywood.
Cyd Charisse makes a short appearance as the Ballerina.
THE GREAT STAR OF THE FILM IS PAUL HENREID (the double or doppelganger of Albert Camus).
Henreid was an Austrian -of Jewish, Moravian, Greek descent- who was born in Trieste but lived in Vienna and Berlin where he was persecuted by the Nazi regime as a strong anti-fascist. In Hollywood, he was also blacklisted for a long period after 1951 by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. His family's original name (Hirsch Schefteles Rosenberg) was changed to Von Hernreid.