“Night and Fog” / 「夜と霧」, Original Japanese Re-Release Movie Poster 1972, B2 Size (51 × 73 cm) — T194

This is an original Japanese B2 theatrical poster produced for the 1972 Japanese re-release of Night and Fog / Nuit et brouillard, Alain Resnais’s landmark documentary about the Nazi concentration camps.

Originally made in 1955, the film combines contemporary colour footage of abandoned camp sites with archival photographs and moving images. Its examination of atrocity, memory and collective responsibility remains one of documentary cinema’s most important achievements.

This Japanese re-release design uses a stark photographic montage, dominated by camp architecture and a large red title, to convey the gravity of its subject.

Film background

Directed by Alain Resnais, Night and Fog was made approximately ten years after the liberation of the camps.

The film moves between the apparent stillness of the surviving sites and historical images documenting the machinery of imprisonment, exploitation and mass murder. This contrast makes the distance between past and present central to its argument: an empty landscape cannot, by itself, communicate what happened there.

The commentary was written by Jean Cayrol, a writer and concentration-camp survivor, and spoken by Michel Bouquet. Music by Hanns Eisler contributes to the film’s restrained but deeply unsettling atmosphere.

Rather than offering reassurance that these events belong safely to the past, the film asks viewers to remain alert to the conditions that made them possible.

Its treatment of memory anticipates concerns that Resnais would explore in later works, including Hiroshima mon amour. Here, those concerns take the form of a concise historical documentary whose moral force comes from the relationship between image, testimony and reflection.

Poster design

The composition brings together several disturbing photographic elements against a grainy grey background.

Camp watchtowers and barbed-wire fencing recede across the upper half, creating a long, enclosed horizon. A vertically inverted human figure occupies the centre, intersected by a narrow white strip that divides the image.

Below, an enlarged open crematorium furnace fills much of the foreground. Its heavy door, hinges and projecting metal framework create an oppressive architectural presence.

A smaller yellow-tinted photograph of a camp entrance appears near the bottom, connecting the monumental foreground machinery to the wider setting.

The predominantly black, grey and muted violet imagery is interrupted by the large red Japanese title:

「夜と霧」

“Night and Fog.”

Printed vertically down the left side, its simple, forceful lettering provides the principal colour accent.

Yellow promotional text beside the title warns:

「この狂気と残虐は遠い過去のものではない　ふりむけば其処に近づいている」

“This madness and cruelty are not things of the distant past; turn around, and they are drawing near.”

The wording reflects the film’s insistence that remembrance must be accompanied by vigilance.

At upper right, the campaign copy includes:

「ノーカット版公開禁止から11年」

“Eleven years since the uncut version was prohibited from release.”

This is the historical claim made by the poster’s own publicity, documenting how the Japanese re-release was presented to audiences.

The lower credit block identifies Alain Resnais, Jean Cayrol and Hanns Eisler, with Japanese distribution branding for Nippon Herald Films. The French title:

“NUIT ET BROUILLARD”

appears beneath the credits in red.

The design is a sombre example of Japanese documentary advertising, bringing together historical imagery and direct typography without relying on conventional star portraiture.

Release and format note

This is the 1972 Japanese re-release poster for Resnais’s 1955 documentary, which first reached Japanese cinemas in 1961.

Japanese B2 format: approximately 51 × 73 cm.

An important title for collections focused on Alain Resnais, documentary cinema, historical remembrance and Japanese film poster design.

Condition

Excellent condition.

Once framed, this poster will display excellently.

Reference: T194.

Please review all photographs, including the front and reverse, as they show the exact poster for sale.

This is an original Japanese theatrical poster from the film’s 1972 re-release campaign.

It is now over 50 years old.

It is not a reproduction or a reprint.

Certificate of Authenticity included.