The lobby card was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2018 by Ken Sutak and Sherri Venokur.
The Cinema Judaica Collection consists of more than 1,200 objects relating to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical subjects, from 1923 to 2000, from the United States, Europe, Israel, Canada, Mexico, and Argentina. The collection was amassed by film memorabilia collector Ken Sutak, to document Holocaust-and Jewish-themed movies of the World War II era and the postwar years. The collection includes posters, lobby and photo cards, scene stills, pressbooks, trade ads, programs, magazines, books, VHS tapes, DVDS, and 78 rpm records. Sutak organized these materials into two groups, “Cinema Judaica: The War Years, 1939–1949” and “Cinema Judaica: The Epic Cycle, 1950–1972” and, in conjunction with the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion Museum (now the Dr. Bernard Heller Museum in New York), organized exhibitions on these two themes in 2007 and 2008. Sutak subsequently authored companion books with the same titles.
Lobby card printed on rectangular, off-white paper. The card has a white exterior border on all four sides with a large illustrated image in the center, overlaid by two photographic scene stills from the film. The color-illustration depicts a battlefield with the shadowy figures of soldiers operating a row of heavy artillery pointed up into the air. There are multiple yellow-and-orange explosions, as well as dark gray plumes of smoke in the background, which contrast against the blue sky. The film title is printed in large, uppercase letters across the top of the card, and the film credits are printed in small text within a box in the upper right corner. At the bottom of the image is a line of red text. Both of the black-and-white photographs are canted with white borders. The image on the left depicts two columns of men riding white horses. They are wearing a uniform that includes a long, white cloak. The image on the right depicts sailors on a war vessel with artillery and circular gun shields. Copyright information is printed in small blue text in the bottom margin. The paper is discolored throughout and there is a pinhole in each corner. There is a small tear in the bottom edge, and faint ink transfer from another image on the back.
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Restrictions on use. Copyright status is unknown.
Overall: Height: 11.000 inches (27.94 cm) | Width: 14.000 inches (35.56 cm)
Lobby card for the documentary film, “At the Front in North Africa” (also known as “At the Front”), shot by the U.S. Army Signal Corps in November and December 1942, and released to the public in March 1943. Lobby cards are promotional materials placed in theater lobby windows to highlight specific movie scenes, rather than the broader themes often depicted on posters. “At the Front” documented the early Allied campaign in Algeria and Tunisia. Darryl F. Zanuck, 20th Century-Fox production head and an Army colonel, led the Signal Corps unit that shot the footage, while Hollywood director, John Ford, directed the Navy unit. The film was heavily criticized for its lack of a storyline and overall poor quality, in comparison to other wartime documentaries. Zanuck argued that the film was intended to be viewed as a newsreel report more than a documentary, which he equated with skillfully edited propaganda that included staged reenactments and intended to impart a particular message. This object is one of more than 1,200 objects in the Cinema Judaica Collection of materials related to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical themes.
Lobby card for the film “At the Front in North Africa” (1943)