Public Domain Movies

"Report from the Aleutians," directed by John Huston, follows the daily life of American soldiers serving in the Aleutian Islands, which extend in sequence off the shores of Alaska. Despite being cold, barren, and generally disagreeable, the Aleutians held military bases of immense strategic value in the Pacific theater of World War II. The film describes the geographic importance of the islands, and provides a portrait of daily wartime operations, such as attack planning and bombing raids, that take place at the bases. Huston pays particular attention to life on the island of Adak in the wake of the Battle of Dutch Harbor, culminating in a first-person perspective of an actual American bombing run against the Japanese.