The meeting that sold Czechoslovakia for a lie. History's most expensive handshake.
A television documentary directed by Marcel Ophüls examining the Munich Conference of September 28, 1938, when European leaders met to avert the outbreak of war. Through archival documents and interviews, the film reconstructs the political atmosphere surrounding negotiations between Britain and France on one side and Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy on the other, situating the agreement within the broader context of European appeasement in the face of fascism.
Direction
Ophüls builds dread through bureaucracy. Paperwork as horror.
Editing
Juxtaposition of diplomatic chatter and looming catastrophe.
Director
Marcel Ophüls
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Ophüls couldn't secure Czech interview subjects because the Soviets had already imprisoned or executed many surviving officials from 1938.
The title's bitter irony — 'Peace in Our Time' — quotes Chamberlain's return speech, now synonymous with delusional optimism.
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