There are many conspiracy theories that hold that Hollywood movies predict the future. Highly unlikely, right? But there is one particular movie that many theorists believe predicted World War II. That movie is called High Treason.
It was originally a science fiction movie considered a very important film at the time it was made, and it still receives that distinction to this day. It was later released as a full-length “talkie”, which made it Britain’s first “talkie” movie. However, it was originally made as a silent movie and then converted to a “talkie” version. The original film itself has been discovered and restored. For several decades, people thought that only the silent version of the movie was available. They believed that the version with the sound added had been lost. That is, until a Washington film collector had discovered it among several other film cans.
Sadly, the collector looked for people who were interested in preserving his collection of older films, but there weren’t any takers. This resulted in the Washington collector sending the movies up to the Alaska Moving Image Preservation Association. The reason they were sent to Alaska? It was believed that there was footage that involved Alaska in them. The Alaskans who received the movies sure got a surprise when they opened and viewed what was in the film cans.
One of the most interesting things about the movie itself is that nobody really knows much about its plot. Viewers and experts know that the movie is set in the futuristic year of 1940, and just so happens to depict a time when a Second World War is beginning to take shape.
The movie was originally based off a play by the pacifist writer Noel Pemberton-Billing. The movie not only predicts aerial bombing on civilians during this particular war, but it also has a terrorist bomb attack on American skyscrapers.
After the Alaskans discovered the film cans’ contents, they released a news report based on what they watched in the film. The story goes that the world had been divided into two great powers – the Empire of Atlantic States, which included South and North America excluding Canada and Alaska, and Japan and China and the Federation of European States. Then, there was the League of Peace – the antithesis to the drums of war and the part of the movie the Alaskans believed to be the best.
.jpg){kind=link}
The Alaskan report stated that there had been sexual stereotypes written in the original script; because of that the movie got much ridicule, and it still does now that the movie has been restored. However, the report states that strong, handsome men and voluptuous women who are there to just look at are what sells movies, even in today’s movie market.
Here is a little history about the movie:
It was originally made in 1929 and, as stated above, was based on the play by Pemberton-Billing. The movie was directed by Maurice Elvey and had stars such as James Carew, Humberstone Wright, Benita Hume, Henry Vibart, Hayford Hobbs, Irene Rooke, and Jameson Thomas.
The film had been presented in a London trade show on August 9, 1929 and then went into UK general release in both silent and sound versions on September 9, 1929. The sound version had been released in the United States by Tiffany Productions on March 13, 1930.
The silent version and the original trailer for the sound version are preserved and kept by the British Film Institute. The only known surviving original copy of the sound version is still held in Alaska.