World War II suddenly becomes a very modern experience. The visual layer takes precedence over the narrative layer here, the text is not as important as the image. And the Poles and their perspective appear wherever they want.
It is presented as an image that, through digitally restored color photos, will highlight the horror of war and bring to light previously hidden stories and perspectives. The series “World War II. Stories from the Front” broadcast on Netflix caused heated discussion among Polish viewers due to numerous errors and omissions.
Where is the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact?
The series is produced by David Glover and Mark Raphael, founders of the independent studio 72 Films. In recent years, they have created many popular documentary series, such as “9/11: A Day in the Life of America” and “The Elon Musk Show.” On Rotten Tomatoes, where opinions from various sources are collected, the series has so far received 68 percent. positive evaluations.
Factual problems appear at the very beginning of the first episode, which begins with information about the German attack on Poland on September 1, 1939. The narrator does not mention the previously concluded Ribbentrop-Molotov pact and the alliance of the Third Reich with the USSR. As a result, September 17 and the Soviet Union’s attack on Poland do not appear in the series at all. This is the most important and undoubtedly justified accusation against the creators of the series, because many historians believe that without the pact with Stalin, Hitler would not have started the war in September 1939. The co-responsibility of its triggering therefore also rests with Stalin.
Interestingly, Polish viewers were not the only ones who noticed the lack of information about the German-Russian alliance.
