I. ‘Allied Forces in Action on India-Burma Front’ India: Indian peasant labourers build new airfields, laying tarmac and cement surfaces. Shot of American bomber (B-25) coming in to land. New Guinea: General MacArthur with General Kruger and General Rupertus inspect troops in ‘new positions won from the Japs in the north, central and south-west Pacific’ (commentary sheet). Burma: infantry troops advance in forested hills (pine trees) above Chidwin River; scenes of artillery fire. Dead Japanese soldier wedged in fork of tree. Dead Japanese soldier dragged out of foxhole by Allied troops; two dead Japanese soldiers in entrance of foxhole. Artillery fire in thick evergreen brush. Further shot of infantry, firing as they advance across clearing.

II. ‘Australian Girls Stage Mass Drill at Army Hospital’ Girls from the Sydney College of Physical Culture put on a show of exercises (commentary sheet: ‘calisthenics’) for an audience of inpatients at a military hospital, who applaud appreciatively.

III. ‘America’s Famous Quadruplets Hold Birthday Party’ Texas: the famous Badgett quadruplets Jean, Joyce, Jeanette and Jeraldine celebrate their fifth birthday at an Army-Navy recreation centre, and receive War Bonds as gifts which they hold up for the camera.

IV. ‘Latest Film of the War in Italy’ Shot of a squadron of US bombers (B-17?) in flight; aerial views of towns, and bombs exploding on the ground below (attacking Nazi supply lines around Rome, and targeting ‘the great marshalling yards outside the Italian capital’: commentary sheet). General Mark Clark aboard a transport plane (aerial shots: flying over bay of Naples); disembarking at airfield. Scenes of artillery fire; large explosions and plumes of smoke. Soldiers of 5th Army advancing through in ruined towns, during the push inland from Nettuno and Anzio. Scenes of destroyed buildings, soldiers walking through ruined streets. Italian villagers pose for the camera amongst the ruins. Very great destruction. German prisoners are marched through town, and transferred onto Allied landing craft.

V. ‘Refugees From Yugoslavia Find Haven in Italy’ Scenes of Yugoslavian refugees arriving by boat in Italy; arrow on map shows where they have come from. Men, women and children walk with bags and bundles of possessions, and are loaded into an open top truck; supplies are unloaded from a van by allied soldiers; scenes of a tent city and rations being doled out.

VI. ‘Allied Generals In London to Map Strategy of War’ London: General Eisenhower, General Sir Bernard Montgomery, Air Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder and others seen seated around table with map of Europe in background, meeting to ‘plan the strategy of invasion’ (commentary sheet). This is ‘the cameraman’s first chance to film them together…mapping the attack’. Several close-ups of Eisenhower. Scene of airfield; US marked fighters (Thunderbolts, Mustangs). Sequence of hangar containing dozens of spare propellers, followed by various shots of stockpiled munitions (bombs of various kinds). Final scenes of Eisenhower, Montgomery and Tedder looking at map of Europe.

End title page.

Edition of US-produced wartime newsreel.

Notes

Sound: International edition - music and sound, but no voiceover.