Armed with cameras: The Canadian Army Film Unit during the Second World War

Abstract

This thesis focuses on a previously undocumented part of Canadian military history: the Canadian Army Film Unit (CAFU). Like the official historians, war artists and photographers, the CAFU was to create an official record of Canada's Army in the Second World War. Although the National Film Board (NFB) was established in 1939, receiving complete control over the federal production of film in Canada, the CAFU was created in 1941 by the Department of National Defence outside of the mandate of the National Film Board Act. This caused a significant amount of conflict between the NFB and the Department of National Defence over which department would control the documentation of Canada's Army in the Second World War. Reconstructing the history of the Canadian Army Film Unit from 1941 to 1945, this thesis analyses a number of issues that the Film Unit encountered in the production of its motion pictures. This chronological study explores the nature of filming during combat, censorship, distribution, and the soldier-cameramen's ongoing struggle with the NFB for control over the documentation of the war on film. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)