I don't want to write a rave review as I am listed in the credits but films without reviews don't get screened as often so I want to describe my reaction to the film anyway - take with grains of salt given my closeness to the production as a bit player and big mouth on location who loaned some 'army junk' to the propmaster.

I screened this alongside two other shorts at the Underground Film Festival in Calgary. The contrast between this, and the other shorts, was quite stark. The other shorts were also documentaries about art or artists and they really gave no sense of a cohesive story.

Leo Major is solidly told in docudrama format, with some excellent archival material and interviews with war survivors and relatives of the man himself.

The mix of interviews, recreations and archival footage is well thought out and tells a compelling story that makes good use of the available screen time. These ingredients are also mixed in an appropriate quantity, never lingering too long on an interview or a reenactment, but keeping the pace lively and fresh.

The actors with speaking roles are convincing and the interviewees are engaging.

When The Liberation Men came out not long ago, which tells the same story in a fictionalized, 90 minute feature, without the documentary elements, I was worried this one might get overshadowed. I think Jeremy Pollock went in the right direction and that a small budget recreation would have difficulty capturing the enormity of the action in Zwolle. I enjoyed The Liberation Men, but not as much as this one.

The documentary is a form of non-fiction storytelling that aims to present factual information, insights, and perspectives on real-world subjects, events, issues, or people. Documentaries can cover a wide range of topics, including history, science, culture, social issues, nature, biographies, and more.

Dziga Vertov in Man with a Movie Camera (1929)

The short form refers to creative works characterized by their brevity and concise storytelling. Unlike full-length feature films, short films have a running time of less than 45 minutes, while TV shorts have a running time of less than 22 minutes.

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Canadian soldier Léo Major liberated the city of Zwolle in the Netherlands during the night of April 13, April 1945.

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