The original version of December 7th was an 85-minute film dealing with many embarrassing subjects. Shortened down to only 20 minutes, the film won the Oscar in 1943. December 7th actually made the history: for years its images of the attack have been used as factual footage; in fact, Gregg Toland and Ray Kellogg did shoot these scenes in the Fox studios, since very few real images of the attack were available. The original 85-minute version is the only one which can show us the original Ford’s project and ideas. This version remained unknown until the National Archives preserved it and made it available to all those who love John Ford’s movies.

“December 7th, although released after The Battle of Midway, was made before it: Ford’s Navy photographic unit arrived in Hawaii about a week after the Pearl Harbor attack. The film, which gives the moral justification for American participation in World War II, established the didactic base upon which Ford’s Korea and Vietnam documentaries rest. The original version of December 7th is about ninety minutes long; somebody (who?) objected to its length, or its content, or both, and the film was released in a twenty-minute version that won an Oscar. Ford says that Gregg Toland, who was a Lieutenant in the Naval Reserve, and who photographed the film, was also in charge of its direction; and that “I helped along”. Whatever that means, December 7th has the look and tone of a Ford film, and the techniques (especially of repetition) identifiable in his other documentaries”. (Tag Gallagher, John Ford: Midway – the War Documentaries, in “Film Comment”, Vol.11, n.5, 1975)