Nazi Party Rally, Nuremberg, 1937

Julien Hequembourg Bryan (1899-1974) was an American documentarian and filmmaker. Bryan traveled widely taking 35mm film that he sold to motion picture companies. In the 1930s, he conducted extensive lecture tours, during which he showed film footage he shot in the former USSR. Between 1935 and 1938, he captured unique records of ordinary people and life in Nazi Germany and in Poland, including Jewish areas of Warsaw and Krakow and anti-Jewish signs in Germany. His footage appeared in March of Time theatrical newsreels. His photographs appeared in Life Magazine. He was in Warsaw in September 1939 when Germany invaded and remained throughout the German siege of the city, photographing and filming what would become America's first cinematic glimpse of the start of WWII. He recorded this experience in both the book Siege (New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1940) and the short film Siege (RKO Radio Pictures, 1940) nominated for an Academy Award in 1940. In 1946, Bryan photographed the efforts of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Agency in postwar Europe. Nazi Party Rally, Nuremberg main square, crowds. Nazi banners decorate town square, Nazi leaders and officials present. Swastika banners are hanging from every window, people watching from windows looking onto the square. Marching units enter square, march past and salute. Crowds including large numbers of SS and SA men, cameras on tripods among them, gathered as Hitler arrives, walks past quite close. Hitler seen against cobblestones, CS, saluting in direction of camera; military and SS men in BG. CS profile of people giving Nazi salute. LS Hitler standing in car, taking salute as units march past on one side of square. Close view of German military officers walking up and past camera in viewing stands; march past, seen beyond. CU, sausages sold by women with aprons, SA men with swastika armbands. LS of SS men in black uniforms lining sidewalk across fame, Nazi officials in FG, talking, candid. Goebbels seen milling in crowd of officials and uniforms, informal Nazi salutes, soldiers. More informal views of Nazi officials, including Goering and Goebbels talking to each other, SS men, SA, etc; cameras on tripods, some mounted on cars; all in busy square when no one is marching. Shot of famous clock and moving figures; views of rooftops, people in windows with flags, crowds in the square raising arms in unison salute. (Camera close among the civilian crowd) Long shots of goosestepping units with banners, other units goosestep in review past car with Hitler and Nazi leaders. More good close and medium views of saluting crowds in the square. MS, rear view of uniformed men seated at top of stands, saluting. Pan down back of stands to shop and signs reading, "Grossdeutsche Buchhandlung: Antisemitische Buecher; Andenken - Zeitungen; Postkarten off. Fuehrer." [Greater Germany Bookshop: Antisemitic Books; Souvenirs & Newspapers; Postcards] SS men and others can be seen at stalls. Street scene and crowd at store window: Ludendorff Buchhandllung. SA units goosestepping L to R. Group of BDM girls cross the square R to L FG, while SA units march L to R in main action behind, and SS men line the shops beyond them. Camera pans to left, showing rear view of Hitler standing in open car taking the salute, BDM girls still in view, as they carry food bags. CS, among crowd , head-on shot as they look, point towards Hitler and marching. More views of onlookers. BDM girls assisted by SS and SA men, distributing bag lunches to onlookers, which include Wehrmacht, SA, civilians; cheerfully passing the bags back.