The Spanish Earth (1937)
52 min
Joris Ivens’s advocacy documentary for the Republican cause intercuts a besieged Madrid with a nearby village digging an irrigation canal, linking the war to bread, land, and survival. Produced by the writers’ collective Contemporary Historians, edited by Helen van Dongen, scored by Marc Blitzstein, and narrated in its U.S. version by Ernest Hemingway (after an initial Orson Welles track), it blends frontline reportage with persuasion against Franco’s forces and their German–Italian backers.
- Release date
- July 11, 1937
- Country of origin
- United States
Cast
- Enrique Lister as Self - Commander 1st Division Republican Army
- Carlos Romero Giménez as Self - Commander 5th Division Republican Army
- José Díaz as Self - Member of Parliament
- Gustav Regler as Self - German Writer
- Dolores Ibárruri as Self - Republican Leader
- Manuel Azaña as Self - President of the Republic
- Martinez de Aragón as Self - Commander 2nd Division Republican Army
- Commander Martinez de Aragón as Self (Republican Army)
- Orson Welles as Narrator (English version) (later replaced by Ernest Hemingway)
- Ernest Hemingway as Narrator (English version)
- Ernest Hemingway as Narrator (English version)
Crew
- Joris Ivens · Director
- John Dos Passos · Writer
- Ernest Hemingway · Writer
- John Fernhout · Cinematographer
- Helen van Dongen · Editor