Beneath Hill 60, the book

Simpson and his donkey

or

The 20 or so Aussie field ambulance officers and men who ministered to the infantry on the Kokoda campaign.

I would love to see the story of Vivien Bullwinkle and other Australian nurses who were POWs after the fall of Singapore , bought to the big screen . She was such a courageous woman and her strength has been highlighted in a documentary and also a book . The movie Paradise Road covered some of the attrocities but failed to show the true enormity of the situation as it was loosely based .This subject has also been touched on by a BBC series called Tenko , but once again , the true strength of these magnificent woman was only glossed over .

I’d like to see a movie based on the Word War I nurses serving on the hospital ships at Gallipoli and who then went on to work among the slaughter in France. They had to put up with the same conditions as the men yet were not accorded decent wages or respect from those higher in the Army or government.

The counter attack on Villers Brettonneux on the night of 24th/25th April 1918.
The “Other ANZAC Day”

I know it’s another war topic, but the Battle of Milne Bay in PNG. Only lasted two weeks but was the first time the Japanese army was ever defeated in WW2 and was the first time Australia & the US fought side by side. 10 days into the battle, the Australians were being pushed back, with more Japanese landing by the day. Then, the Australians defended their last airfield, starting pushing back & within days, the Japanese were annihilated. More loss of life per day than the Kokoda Track, all while the battle raged on the Track. A loss here would have opened Port Moresby up to the Japanese and the course of the war would have changed irrevocably.

Michelle Spencer: you should read the original screen play Bruce Beresford used to make Paradise Road. It was written by the 2 gentlemen who were credited in his film as ‘Story By’. It was partly written in my kitchen in Brisbane in 1991 and was originally called, “A Voice Cries Out”. It remains one of the most powerful screenplays (wartime or otherwise) that I have ever read. What you didn’t get from Paradise Road, which really failed to deliver the goods on any level by comparison, you would get from this very heart felt wrenching screenplay that dealt with the true human story. The screenplay has high drama and a beautiful brave story with song and sheer determination that is real and written to the actual experience. That script was how the money was raised, but Beresford changed several crucial scenes and messed with a few characters and it became a skeleton of what it was …and tragically a poor show at the box office.

Anne Whitfield: you have a bit longer to wait, but I have been writing such a story set in a Tasmanian Military Hospital during in WWI. The main character, a young nurse (Kay), is posted to a Casuality Clearing Station (a M.A.S.H. like medical unit only a few hundred meters from the trenches) when, during a lull in the fighting, she goes off in search for her husband whose war is mostly fought over the trenches in a Sopwith Camel (biplane with a machine gun) in the Flying Corps.

It’s ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’ meets ‘The English Patient.’ The characters and storyline are charted, just filling in the dialogue right now. But don’t hold your breath, these things take a crap load of time between the day job! It’s a love story with a twist and some lights moments of humour to break up the very grizzly and no holes barred experience of the meat grinder the Western Front was known for.

Tim Adams: You are very right.
However, just so you know; formed at Richmond Airbase in 1942, Australia’s 30 Squadron RAAF flying Beaufighters aka ‘Beau’s’ were responsible for the Australians winning the Battle for Kokoda. Had we not won that battle, Australia would definitely ave been overrun, at the very least to Brisbane and possibly, all the way to Hobart. Bristol Beaufighters were one of the deadliest high powered twin engine, twin seater, air to surface attack fighters of the war and were known to the Japanese as “Whispering Death” because they hit the enemy ground troops and ships before their powerful engines were even heard! In February-March 1943, 30Sqn commanders put into place probably the first combined USAF-RAAF operation in what is known known as ‘The Battle of the Bismarck Sea’ in which Australian Beaufighters & Beaufort bombers along with USAF B-25 Mitchell bombers with several fighter group escorts engaged the Japanese Navy & Airforce in the Sea just off Papa New Guinea. Over 3 days, a Japanese armada with around 7000 Japanese marines and crack soldiers on board that were to reinforcement the Japanese positions at Kokoda and ultimately overrun all the Australian and American positions very quickly perished in this extensive and highly orchestrated battle. Several destroyers and heavily armoured ships were also sunk. Sadly, the Battle of the Bismarck Sea is not a very known fact, but it was the single most important air-action of the War in the Pacific.

I known this, because I am part of 30Sqn Beaufighter Association. Watch out for the coming comprehensive website that commences construction tomorrow (yes tomorrow!), and it should be up by August.You can also obtain the DVD, “Whispering Death” from any SBS TV outlet (not sure if it is the ABC shops) for more detail.

Grey Wolf. (Kamal Ataturk).

Flip side of ANZAC – flip side of Islam.

Wonder how contemporary audiences would receive a story about a secular icon who praticed & preached a pholsophy deemed so dangerous that Turkish police recently foiled a plot to crash an aeroplane into his tomb?

Another moment in Australian history that has to be made into a film (an historically accurate film) is the Battle of Amiens. The Australia Corp under General Sir John Monash achieved what the British generals could not, they broke the German Hindenburg Line and brought about what the German General Erich Von Ludendorff described as “the Black Day of the German Army.” This should be made into a movie because it was a shining example of the quality of the Australian soldier, even greater than Gallipoli.