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They Shall Not Grow Old

New Zealand film guru, Peter Jackson has collaborated with
Britain's Imperial War Museum to produce a documentary based
around the restoration of original World War I 35 mm film
footage.
The film which debuted at this year’s London Film Festival, has
almost proved to be too good.
Britain's Imperial War Museum expressed concern that viewers
of the Kiwi's film-maker's upcoming documentary They Shall
Not Grow Old would think many of the scenes had been staged.
In order to create the hour-long documentary, Jackson removed scratches, sharpened, images,
changed film speeds, colorized the footage and made it 3D.
Approached by the Museum to create something original from their extensive archive of footage,
Jackson's aim was to create "something authentic" – the life of a soldier on the Western front,
what he ate, felt, thought. "It was purely about human experience."
He said he was helped by the fact that dozens of films were shot during the 1914 to 18 conflict
("It was like a World War I franchise").
"We also found a trench raid, You can always tell combat footage because the cameraman is
behind sandbags trying to stay alive."
For audio, he took advantage of the BBC archives which included 500 hours of interviews about
for 1960s TV series The Great War.
"We used 120 different veterans and they are incredible. There's no self-pity. Just matter-of-fact
guys with a lot of humour."
Jackson also revealed that if it hadn't been for that war, he might not exist. "My dad only emigrated
to New Zealand and met my mum because he'd heard good things about Kiwi soldiers in that war."
Source: https://www.stuff.co.nz/
Left half: restored, enhanced and colorized. Right half: unrestored original footage

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