A film biography of Dr. Norman Bethune, the Canadian doctor who served with the loyalists during the Spanish Civil War and with the North Chinese Army during the Sino-Japanese War. In Spain he pioneered the world's first mobile blood-transfusion service; in China his work behind battle lines to save the wounded has made him a legendary figure. This hour-long documentary film pieces together his remarkable career.
Direction
Brittain's unsentimental NFB approach lets contradictions breathe.
Writing
Bethune's own letters read with uncomfortable conviction.
Production
Archival footage that feels stolen from another century.
Director
Donald Brittain
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
In China, Bethune remains a household name taught in schools; his 1939 death poem to 'Commandant Nie' is memorized by millions. Canadians mostly learned him from this film.
Donald Sutherland played Bethune in two later films (1977, 1990), becoming obsessed with the role — this documentary was his gateway drug.
CA
US
