This almost 8 hour humongous 1973 documentary by two of the filmmakers who made The Sorrow and the Pity recounts fifty years of the history of France from the 1920s to 1972. It is particularly thorough in documenting the significance and rise to power of Charles De Gaulle. The film's most valuable contributions are its interviews with all sorts of people who lived through this period of history, from Marshall Petain's lawyer (Petain headed the Vichy government of occupied France) to resistance figures, and Frenchmen who fought on the side of the Nazis in Russia.
Noël Favrelière
Mohamed Boudia
Paul Teitgen
Léopold Sédar Senghor
Jacques Duclos
Pierre Mendès France
Benoîte Groult
Colonel Argoud
Pierre-André Boutang
André Dewavrin
Jacques Isorni
Serge Ravanel
Jacques Soustelle
Pierre-Henri Teitgen