Introduction

“Les Sentinelles Oubliées” is a documentary by French director Frédéric Rossif telling the story of ‘forgotten’ early communists in the United States of America. When Rossif received a letter from Connecticut asking him to film their group, he organised a crew and traveled to the United States to document the stories of Eva and David Rosenberg, and Jack and Erika Karan. Almost all of the American communists were Polish and Russian Jews, many of whom had fought in the Spanish Civil War and served five years in prison under McCarthyism.

The documentary was broadcast by Antenne 2 on the 5th of October 1990 20:40 hrs as an episode of the “Envoyé Special” series presented by Bernard Benyamin. “Les Sentinelles Oubliées” would be Rossif’s final project, and due to his passing on the 18th of April 1990 the documentary had to be edited and mixed in his style by his colleagues.

The music heard in “Les Sentinelles Oubliées” is a selection of contemporary music from the 20th century, mixed with cues by Vangelis and Eddy Harris. Vangelis did not provide original music for the documentary, but his cues are sourced from earlier documentaries by Rossif, such as “Cantique Des Créatures” (1970), “Au Pays Des Visages” (1972), “L’Apocalypse Des Animaux” (1973) and “Georges Braque Ou Le Temps Différent” (1974),  “La Fête Sauvage” (1976)  and “De Nuremberg À Nuremberg” (1989).

Details and credits

• Title: Les Sentinelles Oubliées
• Year: 1990
• Country: France
• Lenghth: 58 minutes
• Directed by Frédéric Rossif.
• Based on an idea by Florence Quentin and Frédéric Rossif.
• Text by Florence Quentin
• Editing: Dominique Caseneuve
• Mixing: Elvire Lerner and Norbert Pheulpin.
• Cinematography: Jean-Jacques Flori
• Sound engineer: Jean Umansky
• Photography: Dominique Nabokov
• Music by Eddy Harris and Vangelis.
• Dialogue by Philippe Murgier.
• Production assistant: Virginie Lemessager
• Produced by Jean Mylonas.
• © Miroirs Productions
• Envoyé Special presented by Bernard Benyamin.

Media

Although the documentary Les Sentinelles Oubliées was never officially released after its original television broadcast, for some time it was available for order through the INA.fr website.

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