Released in February 1940, the first non-Nazi produced footage covering the start of World War II, the film became for many viewers their first glimpses into Nazi tactics, the first visual proof of the horrors of modern warfare.

When Germany invaded Poland in September 1939, the only American, and in fact the only neutral filmmaker in the country, was Julien Bryan. He arrived in Warsaw in early September with a cache of roughly an hour’s worth of 35mm motion-picture negative. Given open access to the city by the mayor, he filmed day and night for two weeks, documenting Warsaw’s destruction and Germany’s inexorable advance. Back in New York he assembled the footage into a ten-minute newsreel called Siege.