'History Speaks' WWII documentary brings harrowing stories of 'the greatest generation' to light

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A group of SoCal filmmakers is bringing the harrowing stories of "the greatest generation," when ordinary people were faced with living in a world at war, to light in a new documentary.

"History Speaks: Diary of a Generation" is a WWII documentary produced by local filmmakers Shari Doran and Susan Cummings. Both of their fathers served in the war.

Their film is a labor of love more than 15 years in the making.

"It took us a while to get all those stories," said Executive Producer Shari Doran. "There's 119 in the film, and we met some of the most amazing people on the journey."

"There's no narration in the film. It's all the interviews, it's all them telling their own story so they bring us through," said the documentary's editor Sean Blodgett.

"The stories really affect you. The stories of what war does to people, but the heroism that isn't just about the battlefield," Blodgett said. "The heroism that's about living through that and coming back from that."

"One gentleman, he was a POW, his family never knew. They sat there sobbing in the room," Doran said. "They had never known what he had gone through."

"History Speaks" has screened at various locations including the National WWII Museum, at Pearl Harbor, and at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley.

The documentary is now available on Amazon Prime.