NFB Collection
Lost Over Burma: Search for Closure
199746 min 35 secFilm: Documentary
Direction: Garth Pritchard
Production: Katherine RankinJerry KrepakevichGraydon McCrea
Script: Robert Duncan
During the final days of the Second World War, an RCAF crew of six young Canadians sets out on a routine mission, dropping food and supplies for isolated Burmese villages. Their Dakota cargo plane takes off over the jungle--and vanishes without a trace. Forty-five years later, a Burmese hunter finds what's left of the wreckage on a hillside, starting a chain of events which led to the recovery of the Canadians' remains.
The volunteer crew was made up of six men from across the country: pilot William Bennet Rogers, co-pilot William Joseph Kyle, wireless operator Charles Peter McLaren, navigator David McLean Cameron, wireless operator Stanley James Cox, and cargo handler Cornelius John Kopp. Their average age was 22. Lost over Burma: Search for Closure weaves together their lives and wartime experiences--through the memories of colleagues and families--with scenes of the dramatic 1996 mission into the Burmese jungle to recover their remains and the emotion-laden funeral near Rangoon, where they have finally been laid to rest with full military honours.
Availability
Other versions
Subject categories
- Developing Countries > Asia - Southeast Asia
- History - Canada - 1920-1945 > World War IIWorld War II Military Operations
- War, Conflict and Peace > World War II
- Family Studies/Home Economics > Aging/Death and Dying
- History and Citizenship Education > Culture and Currents of Thought (1500-present)
- Media Education > Film and Video Production
- History > World War II
Credits
- director
- Garth Pritchard
- producer
- Katherine Rankin
- Jerry Krepakevich
- executive producer
- Graydon McCrea
- script
- Robert Duncan
- photography
- Daron Donahue
- sound
- Daron Donahue
- Garrell Clark
- Brenda Donahue
- editing
- Michel Lalonde
- sound editing
- Downy Karvonen
- sound mix
- Paul Sharpe
- Bill Mellow
- narrator
- Christopher Plummer
- music
- Jan Randall
Awards
- Award - Category: Best Overall Sound (Garrell Clark, Brenda Donahue, Downy Karvonen)Hot Docs