The recent sell-out screenings of the new 1941 Greek campaign documentary at the Greek Film Festival in both Melbourne and Sydney has exceeded the creator’s expectations. An estimated 700 attendees have seen the film so far, with more screenings to come.
The film is the latest project of Melbourne’s Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee who received a major grant from the Australian Government’s Saluting Their Service funding program to help finance the project.
The Committee engaged filmmakers Dr Peter Ewer and John Irwin as co-directors to undertake the project, assisted by Associate Producer and historian Jim Claven OAM. This project team was assisted by Greek Community of Melbourne Board Director Vicki Kyritsis who brought her professional communications and community liaison skills to the project.
The genesis of the project lies in the archival work of Dr Ewer, the author of Forgotten Anzacs. It was his foresight in seeking out and encouraging a large number of Greek campaign veterans to tell their story in their own words, filming them as they recounted their own experience of the Greek campaign. Along with a number of Greek accounts of the war, this archive amounts to over 130 hours of film footage and selections from these forms the bedrock of the new documentary.
Along with Dr Ewer, the project brought together the filmmaking and field research of Irwin and the historical research of Claven, the author of Grecian Adventure. Claven has worked over many years researching the Hellenic link to Anzac across both world wars, conducting field research in Greece and assisting veteran’s families in the donation of their personal archives, including those of Private Syd Grant and Sergeant Alfred Huggins.
It was Claven’s initiative to approach the well-known Australian journalist Barrie Cassidy to provide the narration for the documentary. As a Greek campaign veteran’s son himself who has written of his father’s war in Private Bill, Cassidy did not hesitate in agreeing to join in the project.
The resulting documentary is a unique combination of veteran’s speaking themselves, archival movie footage sourced from major institutional collections across the world, new drone footage from the battle sites of Greece and still photographs, including iconic images taken by Syd and Alfred in 1941, overlaid with Cassidy’s narration. The whole effect is to tell the story of this often-overlooked campaign from the view of the participants, as they vividly recount their own personal experiences of war.
After over two years work the documentary was finally completed and ready for screening. A special private screening was organised at Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance as a thank you to all those who have supported the project, with over 100 attending. Through the advocacy of Kyritsis and Claven the film was accepted to premiere at the 29th annual Greek Film Festival in both Melbourne and Sydney last October. The planned three screenings were soon expanded to four due to popular demand, with an estimated 600 attendees coming to see the film.
Each screening was viewed with deep interest, the audiences clearly engaged by the drama of the film. While the lighter moments in the film were met with laughter – such as when one digger recounted losing his helmet overboard while on his evacuation ship – many more instances of moving reflection on the horrors of war and emotional accounts of the Greek hospitality were met with heartfelt emotion by the audience. Each screening concluded with warm and spontaneous applause.
One of the most important aspects of the screenings has been how the film has brought together the descendants of Greek campaign veterans and the wider Greek Australian community. The screening gives a feeling of taking part in a very private event. All who see it are witnessing the experiences of those who were there, told in their own words by themselves. This result is a unique shared experience for these audiences of Australian and those of Greek heritage, seeing the story of the link between Greece and Australia told in such vivid terms by the veterans themselves.
Representatives of service organisations including Presidents Dan Cairnes of Oakleigh Carnegie RSL Sub Branch, Michael Fallon of the 2/2nd Field Regiment Association and Elizabeth Lavender of the Australian Nurses Memorial Centre were joined at the screening at the shrine by many campaign veterans. The latter included Catherine Bell and Robert Grant (the children of Private Syd Grant of the 2/8th Battalion), David Huggins (the son of Sergeant Alfred Huggins of the 2/3rd Casualty Clearing Station), Peter Vial (the son of Captain Robert Vial of Australian 6th Division Headquarters) and Peter Ford (the son of Frank Ford of the New Zealand 22nd Battalion).
The Greek Film Festival screenings saw the attendance of more veterans’ families including Mel Johnson and Robert Lennie, the children of Gunner Douglas Lennie of the 2/2nd Field Regiment from Narre Warren who was wounded and then captured following the battle of Brallos Pass. Another Greek campaign descendant who attended the screenings was Dr Robin Wood, the daughter of English-born Stanley Arthur Bond, a former journalist who served with the New Zealand 4th Field Ambulance who was captured on Crete. Dr Wood has recently published her father’s memoir, Twists of Fate. And of course the narrator Barrie Cassidy, the son of Private Bill Cassidy from Stanhope who served with the 2nd Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment and who was captured on Crete, was not only part of the film but participated in both Question & Answer sessions held at the screenings in Melbourne and Sydney.
Committee President Lee Tarlamis OAM MP thanked the Greek Communities in Melbourne and Sydney for their support in screening the film as part of this year’s Greek Film Festival. “This important public film festival was the perfect showcase for the premiere of our film”, he said.
Tarlamis said that credit must be awarded to Dr Ewer in having recorded these accounts over 20 years ago. “All of these veterans and witnesses have now passed and but for Dr Ewer’s initiative their stories would have been lost”, he said.
He also credits filmmaker John Irwin for bringing his filmmaking skills to Peter’s script and bringing together this montage of interviews, stills and much more, into a coherent whole. “Thanks are also due to the contributions of narrator Barrie Cassidy and Vicki Kyritsis for her community liaison”, Tarlamis said.
“I would also congratulate our Secretary Jim Claven OAM for developing the project proposal and bringing it to our own Lemnos Gallipoli Commemorative Committee for support. He not only successfully submitted the funding proposal but also managed the project and contributed to its content as Associate Producer. Our Committee thanks him for his continuing work”, Tarlamis said.
Tarlamis pointed out that the documentary is just the latest in a long line of successful commemorative projects undertaken by the Committee since its founding in 2011. Through its memorials in Australia and Greece, major publications, photographic exhibitions, presentations and commemorative events the Committee’s work has built community awareness of the Hellenic link to Anzac across both world wars. This latest project is a credit to the Committee and has extended awareness of the link between Australia and Greece to a new level, creating at the same time an important legacy project for the future.
“I am especially proud to be associated with this important documentary not merely as President of the Committee but also as someone of Greek and Australian heritage myself and the descendent of an Australian soldier who served on Lemnos during the Gallipoli campaign. The film represents a legacy for future generations of Greeks and Australian of this important campaign and the individuals who served there”, Tarlamis said.
Discussions are well advanced on a number of community screenings of the film. These include service organisations, educational institutions and local authority venues. The Committee is looking forward to screenings in Adelaide and a number of secondary schools across Melbourne. Kyritsis and Claven have also held discussions at a senior level with authorities in Greece for the holding of a number of screenings surrounding the annual Anzac Day commemorations to be held there next year.
Readers will be able to see the documentary over coming weeks and months at various community screenings. The next community screening will take place 2-4pm, Saturday 23 November at the Australian Nurses Memorial Centre on St Kilda Road Melbourne.
To find out about the film and other future screenings go to the Committee weblog page – or contact Jim Claven OAM via email – jimclaven@yahoo.com.au.
