Bear witness to atrocities
For Kate Winslet, focusing on this very specific period in the life of Lee Miller, to whom she brilliantly lends her features, allows “to evacuate all preconceived ideas about his image as a model scrutinized by male artists”. “We wanted to tell the truth, without concession, about her person and understand her evolution when she decides to photograph war scenes”she explains in a press release. As the film unfolds, the audience follows his journey across the continent in the footsteps of American soldiers, alongside David E. Scherman, photojournalist for Life played here by Andy Samberg. Equipped with her Rolleiflex, she captures details that stand out, gives a voice to the victims and thus bears witness to the atrocities of the Nazi regime, which the populations will subsequently discover, in particular thanks to her prints. On the screen, they appear subtly and come back to life, finding a context that we can only imagine today. This treatment of the image also highlights the complexity of war photography, as well as its importance, its key role in the construction of memories and their transmission to future generations.
Raise readership awareness of the war effort
As a reporter, Lee Miller fought to tell the story. Considered too shocking for British Voguehis photographs of the camps were finally published only later in its American version, in an article entitled ” Believe it “. While it may seem surprising that a women’s medium was able to show the war in such a concrete way, the different editions of Vogue nevertheless established themselves as key players, who could influence the morale of the home front. Audrey Withers, the editor of the British title, played by actress Andrea Riseborough, helped raise awareness of the war effort among its readership. Over the course of the issues, he could stay informed and have access to other points of view, to files centered around the place of women in the conflict. Proof of its reach, while many media outlets have had to close due to lack of resources, British Vogue managed to obtain extra paper, as shown in the film, thanks to the support of the Ministry of Information. In addition to participating, from its infancy, in the rise of photography, to which it gave pride of place, the magazine thus offered a unique, sometimes paradoxical, space for speech to those who did not have one. and allowed free and talented women such as Lee Miller to emancipate themselves a little from patriarchal society.
