‘The German invasion of England took place in July 1940 after the British retreat from Dunkirk. Strongly resisted at first, the German army took many months to restore order. But the resistance movement, lacking outside support, was finally crushed. Then, in 1944, the resistance movement reappeared.’
That is what happened when history was re-written: Nazi Germany has won the Second World War and England is under occupation. Kevin Brownlow was only 18 when he and Andrew Mollo – just 16 - embarked on this ambitious neorealist-tinged drama, which took eight years to complete. The result is a chilling and timely reminder of what might have been had Nazism not been defeated.
"A tour-de-force of imaginative recreation"Evening Standard
"Provocative, thoughtful and shock providing"Daily Mirror
"Makes the blood run cold" New York Sunday Times
"An Orwellian nightmare"Newsweek
Extras
Presented in High Definition and Standard Definition
Mirror on the World (1962, 10 mins): full version of fake German newsreel
It Happened Here: Behind the Scenes (1956-66, 22 mins): previously unseen footage with new commentary by Kevin Brownlow
Original UK and US trailers (1966)
It Happened Here Again (1976, 7 mins): excerpt from a documentary on Winstanley
Interview excerpt with the directors (2009, 2 mins)
The Conquest of London (1964/2005, 4 mins): Italian TV item
On Set With Brownlow and Mollo (2018, 12 mins): interview with Production Assistant Johanna Roeber
Kevin Brownlow Remembers It Happened Here (2018, 65 mins)
Image gallery
Introduction to How It Happened Here: text of David Robinson's foreword to the book (Downloadable PDF DVD only)
Illustrated booklet with writing by Kevon Brownlow and new essays by Dr Josephine Botting, DoP Peter Suschitzky and military historian E W W Fowler
