Interesting film made in 1938–39 but released commercially in 1945 . It shows defense of the 2nd Spanish Republic by the Republican air force , filmed on location in northeastern Spain , Teruel , Catalonia and Paris . A jinjoistic picture , praising the feats of II Republic , blending real deeds , documentaries , fiction and breathtaking scenes . 1937 , during the Spanish civil war (1936-1939) , Spanish Republican forces fight against the better-equipped Francoist armies in the desolate Sistema Ibérico mountains of the Province of Teruel . This fight was inspired by actual events based on Republicans who battle with very poor means against fascist army of General Franco . There appear the followings heroes : commandant Peña (José Sempere) , captain Muñoz (Andres Mejúto) , captain Schreiner (Pedro Codina) , a politician commissar with high commitment called Arrignies (Julio Peña) and including the valuable help a countryman (José Maria Lado) , all of them execute a dangerous assignment : get to destroy and bombing a bridge on the road to Zaragoza , an essential objective to advance of the rebel forces . Meanwhile , peasants support the Republic and refugees flee bombing of Teruel and surroundings . But the plane crashes and countrymen and villagers rescue and help the wounded fliers .
This is a fiction/documentary film written/directed by Andre Malraux based on a chapter of his novel ¨La Esperanza¨ or ¨The hope¨ . It includes spectacular scenes of street fighting and a bombing raid , adding shot footage . And an impressive as well as epic finale with lots of people helping the injured pilots transported through mountains , influenced by classy Russian filmmakers (Sergei M Eisenstein , Pudovkin) and in Italian Neorrealist style . Film copies were pursued by the Gestapo , though remained one washed-out print , subsequently being remastered and it was not commercially released until 1945 . Malraux wrote the novel L'Espoir, or Man's Hope, being supervised and assisted by the prestigious Max Aub , published in 1937 , which was basis for the film . The crash of a Spanish Republican Air Force Potez 540 plane near Valdelinares inspired André Malraux to write the novel . Different years are given for the film's completion . The novel was published in French in 1937 and in English in 1938 . The film uses war footage from 1938 and was edited , and other scenes shot, during 1938-1939 . It was finished in July 1939 and shown twice in Paris , but the Francoist regime applied pressure to censor it . All known copies were destroyed during World War II , since both Spain and France were ruled by Fascist regimes sympathetic to the forces that shot down the plane . A copy was found and the film was released again in 1945 . In Spain , it was banned and was not screened until 1977, after the death of dictator Franco .
Spanish/French co-production , being financed by 2º Republic , supported by French government and producer Eduard Cogniglion Molinier . Sierra De Teruel (English title : Days of Hope or Man's Hope) is a 1938-39 Spanish-French black and white war film well photographed by Manuel Berenguer , Louis Page and other cameramen , and compellingly directed by Boris Peskine and André Malraux in his only movie . It can be seen as romanticized witness and a lyrical work of filmmaker and screen-writer Andre Malraux. The novelist and essayist André Malraux (1901-1976) , who joined the Republicans in 1936 , was a commandant of an aviation squadron during Spanish Civil war and resistance member against the invading Nazis in WWII . This notorious writer/director won the 1945 Prix Louis Delluc .
This unfinished ¨Sierra De Teruel¨ is considered to be the best film about Spanish Civil War , along with ¨The Last Train from Madrid¨ (1937) by James P. Hogan ; ¨Blockade¨ (1938) by William Dieterle ; ¨Comrades at Sea¨ (1938) or ¨Kameraden Auf See¨ by Heinz Paul ; ¨Frente De Madrid¨ (1939) by Edgar Neville ; ¨Arise, My Love¨ (1940) by Mitchell Leisen ; ¨The siege of Alcazar¨(1940) by Augusto Genina ; ¨The Squadron¨ (1941) by Antonio Román , ¨Rojo y negro¨(1942) by Carlos Arévalo ; ¨The Fallen Sparrow¨ (1943) by Richard Wallace ; ¨For Whom the Bell Tolls¨ (1943) by Sam Wood ; ¨The Angel Wore Red¨ (1960) by Nunnally Johnson ; ¨La Paz Empieza Nunca¨ (1960) by Leon Klimovsky ; ¨Five Cartridges¨(1960) by Frank Beyer ; ¨Morir En Madrid¨ (1963) by Frederic Rossiff ; ¨Behold a Pale Horse¨ (1964) by Fred Zinnemann ; ¨Viva la Muerte¨ (1971) by Fernando Arrabal , among others .
