"What they found"
The BBC Factual announced that Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA winner Sam Mendes is directing his first documentary, "What they found" , for BBC Two and iPlayer, which uses archive footage and first-hand testimonies to tell the story of two members of the British Army’s Film and Photographic Unit who accompanied the troops liberating Bergen-Belsen at the end of the Second World War.
The film, which is due to air in April to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation, is being produced by leading US-UK documentary production company Lightbox, co-founded by Academy Award, Emmy Award and BAFTA-winning producer Simon Chinn and Academy Award-nominated and Emmy Award-winning producer Jonathan Chinn, in association with Sam Mendes and Pippa Harris’s Neal Street Productions, and Imperial War Museums.
The title is directed by Sam Mendes and is a Lightbox production in association with Neal Street and Imperial War Museums. Producers are Simon Chinn, Jonathan Chinn and Gaby Aung. Executive Producers are Pippa Harris for Neal Street, Caro Howell and Vicky Stanbury for Imperial War Museums and David Baddiel. Vanessa Tovell serves as co-producer for Lightbox and the editor is Andy Worboys. The film was commissioned by Jack Bootle, Head of Commissioning, Specialist Factual. The Commission Editor is Simon Young, Head of Commissioning, History for the BBC, and All3Media International is the worldwide distribution partner.
On 15 April 1945, British soldier-cameramen Sgt. Mike Lewis and Sgt. Bill Lawrie, members of the Army Film and Photographic Unit covering the campaign in North West Europe, accompanied British troops to what they were told was a typhus hospital in Northern Germany, named Bergen-Belsen. When they arrived there, the full horrors of what was going on inside the camp were revealed to them and, through their footage, to the world - for the first time.
Simon Young, Head of Commissioning, History, reviewed the historical context in which the documentary is set: "In April 1945, BBC Radio broadcast a horrifying eyewitness report from Bergen-Belsen. There could be no more fitting way to mark the anniversary of the liberation than by working with Sam Mendes and his team to create a chilling vision of what the liberators found. It has been an honour to collaborate with the Imperial War Museum, Lightbox and Neal Street on this unique project," commented.
Also, Simon Chinn and Jonathan Chinn, Producers of "What they found", and co-Founders of Lightbox added: “The last survivors and witnesses to the Nazi atrocities at Bergen-Belsen and elsewhere sadly won’t be with us for much longer. Through making What they found' Sam Mendes has created a powerful and undeniable record of these events at a time when surveys show that more and more young people aren’t aware of the Holocaust, and its veracity is being debated or denied in ever-increasing numbers," noted.
Finally, Dr James Bulgin, Imperial War Museums’ Head of Public History and curatorial expert on the Holocaust appreciated the proper use of the institution to illustrate the historical context: “The sights captured by the AFPU cameramen who were present at the liberation of Bergen-Belsen have left an indelible mark on the world. 'What they found' uses IWM’s collections to give those scenes critical context, describing them from the unique perspective of those who witnessed them first hand. The film is a searing and timely reminder that each person caught up in this terrible history experienced it as an individual," stated.
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