Overlord

A unique 1970s British take on the Second World War film genre, Stuart Cooper’s seminal classic Overlord is a drama constructed from a combination of genuine period material and new footage shot using 1936-1938 lenses and black and white film. It’s part documentary; part mournful, part imaginative and occasionally surreal fiction.

This celebrated film follows an ordinary young man, Tom, as he sets off to join Operation Overlord (codename for the invasion of Normandy). The film segues between the intimacy of Tom’s ill-fated journey (his dalliance with a young woman, worries about his cocker spaniel, his reading of David Copperfield) and the grand, horrific spectacle of the actual D-Day invasion.

The film was made with the assistance of the Imperial War Museum, which gave Cooper access to its 39 million feet of archive footage. He spent around 3,000 hours viewing newsreel, captured German film and footage shot by soldiers and naval men. Working with writer Christopher Hudson, they developed a narrative that could incorporate the researched footage. The result is utterly transporting.