The Sinking of the Lusitania (1918)
*** (out of 4)
This WWI propaganda piece is from Winsor McCay, the famed animator who decided to use his skills and so something quite different. This film documents the German attack on the Lusitania ship, which was carrying 2000 people when it was hit by a couple torpedoes and sank fifteen-minutes later. The film clocks in at twelve-minutes and the animation is used to show what happened and then we're given actual footage talking about how evil Germany is and we also have a brief tribute to some of the men who were lost. This is a fairly interesting film on many levels but the biggest is because of all the fire and passion that McCay brings to the material. There's no doubt that this was a very personal film to him and he clearly makes his feelings known by attacking Germany on pretty much every level. There's no question that the gloves are off as the title cards are quite damning to the actions that were done that day. The animation of the boat sinking is quite simple on one hand but I'd argue there are still some very striking moments here. I think the greatest are the shots of the ship and the smoke coming from it. The long, complete shots of the ship are quite striking in their animated form and just watch the way that the smoke comes off of it. The previously mentioned tribute shows some of the famous people that died on the ship, which was somewhat questionable and especially since none of the other victims are even mentioned and no tribute is given to them. With that said, this is still very much worth seeing just for the passion that it displays.