Frank Capra's Why We Fight and film documentary discourse in public relations

This article analyzes the influence of Archibald MacLeish's “strategy of truth” and the principles of the Government Information Manual for the Motion Picture Industry in the production of Frank Capra's documentary series Why We Fight. One of the main contributions of this research is to show how this series is the most important example of the application of the strategy of truth and, at the same time, one of the main examples of public relations audiovisual product realized to be addressed to American Army as well to the American public opinion. It is argued that Capra's Why We Fight made a substantial and long-lasting contribution to public relations, particularly in terms of its discourse and the use of analepsis has PR narrative resource. Overall, the article positions Why We Fight as one of the greatest efforts ever made in the history of military public relations.