Boots on the Ground

Normandy, France, June 1944. A clearing in the woods, outside a village. An American soldier interrupts the execution of six French peasants accused of stealing boots off the bodies of dead G.I.s. (whose graves lie at the edge of the clearing). He questions the officer in charge of the firing squad as to the legitimacy of the executions and is met with stiff resistance. When the soldier persists in his objection, the officer orders him to leave at gunpoint. The soldier leaves the clearing, watches the executions from behind a hillock, then quickly runs away. After the officer and his squad themselves depart the area, French villagers come out of the woods and ransack the bodies of the dead peasants. With loot in hand—including boots—they, too, depart the area. The dead peasants remain, not far from the graves of the American G.I.s.