Bodies Count

SYNOPSIS 1: Battle of the Bulge, January 1945. During a lull in the battle, three American soldiers eat breakfast as they sit on frozen German corpses in a clearing. A messenger from Division Headquarters arrives by jeep with a communiqué for one Captain Wilcox, who is missing in action or dead. So shocked is the messenger by the sight of what he sees—frozen German corpses used as chairs, tables, and trench bulwarks—that not only does he not leave his message, but he also disappears into the snowy forest on foot. None of the American soldiers goes to retrieve him.

SYNOPSIS 2: Guadalcanal, October 1942. Amid stinking corpses from both sides, an American Marine climbs a palm tree to rifle the body of a dead Japanese sniper; the enemy was strapped to a limb with the express intent of killing as many Americans as possible, on the limited rations provided. The American finds some dried rice balls, climbs down from the tree, and shares them with a fellow Marine, who, under the circumstances, is at first reluctant to eat—then relents and eats.

SYNOPSIS 3: Buchenwald Concentration Camp; Ohrdruf, Germany. April 1945. Amid stacks of corpses, a surviving Jewish inmate approaches an American guard and asks for something to eat. The guard offers a chocolate bar, though he is suspicious because this man does not look as withered and unhealthy as the other prisoners. As the Jew eats his chocolate, he confesses that he collaborated with his Nazi captors in order to get better treatment. Then he asks for another chocolate bar, which he hopes he can eat before his fellow surviving Jews kill him—a killing that he knows the American guard will not stop.