Behind Enemy Lines: the OSS and the Italian Resistance in World War II will be a one-hour documentary film, incorporating first-hand interviews with key members of the OSS and the Italian Resistance, archive film, photography, and selected reenactments using an experimental approach to reconstruct key moments recounted in stories by OSS veterans and Partisans.
This project is the first documentary of its kind to explore the sacrifices and common sense of purpose shared between OSS volunteers and their Italian Partisan counterparts. Moving away from stereotypic stories of bravery, our film will emphasize a wide range of human emotions that reflect the conflicts and contradictions in any war of liberation.
“We did not fight a conventional war; we fought a dirty war, one without uniforms, POW camps or rules laid down by the Geneva Convention. We slept under a starry sky at night…we lived in fear of being discovered by the enemy, of Nazi reprisals among our population and close family, and of betrayal within our own ranks.” (Partisan soldier)
For the past six years, University of Texas Radio, Television and Film Professor Nancy Schiesari has recorded the testimonies of twenty Italian American veterans and Partisans three of whom have subsequently passed away. The necessity to document the testimonies of the war generation is magnified by the fact that current and future generations are about to lose all first hand accounts by the participants themselves. These events will be chronicled and re-interpreted in history books and films of the future, but if their protagonists are not allowed to tell their own stories, valuable material will be lost.
The scope of this project goes beyond creating an archive of stories by Italian Americans. Showing positive examples of bravery by an ethnic minority that has been repeatedly maligned as cowardly or criminal is in itself a worthwhile endeavor. The history of the struggle for democracy that Americans carry into this new millennium would benefit from acknowledging those who sacrificed, suffered emotional and physical loss, and risked their lives to defeat Hitler and Mussolini.
The contributions of Italian-Americans and the Italian Partisan Forces to the Allied campaign in Italy have long been largely overlooked. The efforts initiated by the OSS, whose commitment, courage and egalitarian behavior toward partisans--including communist-led groups, created lasting relationships that changed Italian perceptions of America and laid the ground work for acceptance of western democracy. This is the story of brave men whose efforts went largely unrecognized and this website and the eventual film will tell their story.
This project is the first documentary of its kind to explore the sacrifices and common sense of purpose shared between OSS volunteers and their Italian Partisan counterparts. Moving away from stereotypic stories of bravery, our film will emphasize a wide range of human emotions that reflect the conflicts and contradictions in any war of liberation.
“We did not fight a conventional war; we fought a dirty war, one without uniforms, POW camps or rules laid down by the Geneva Convention. We slept under a starry sky at night…we lived in fear of being discovered by the enemy, of Nazi reprisals among our population and close family, and of betrayal within our own ranks.” (Partisan soldier)
For the past six years, University of Texas Radio, Television and Film Professor Nancy Schiesari has recorded the testimonies of twenty Italian American veterans and Partisans three of whom have subsequently passed away. The necessity to document the testimonies of the war generation is magnified by the fact that current and future generations are about to lose all first hand accounts by the participants themselves. These events will be chronicled and re-interpreted in history books and films of the future, but if their protagonists are not allowed to tell their own stories, valuable material will be lost.
The scope of this project goes beyond creating an archive of stories by Italian Americans. Showing positive examples of bravery by an ethnic minority that has been repeatedly maligned as cowardly or criminal is in itself a worthwhile endeavor. The history of the struggle for democracy that Americans carry into this new millennium would benefit from acknowledging those who sacrificed, suffered emotional and physical loss, and risked their lives to defeat Hitler and Mussolini.
The contributions of Italian-Americans and the Italian Partisan Forces to the Allied campaign in Italy have long been largely overlooked. The efforts initiated by the OSS, whose commitment, courage and egalitarian behavior toward partisans--including communist-led groups, created lasting relationships that changed Italian perceptions of America and laid the ground work for acceptance of western democracy. This is the story of brave men whose efforts went largely unrecognized and this website and the eventual film will tell their story.
