Journey along WWI frontline the paway to winning TV formula

Related Links The winners of the 7 Best Formats 2013

EUROVISION TV Meetings Berlin 2013

EUROVISION Creative Forum

*EUROVISION Formats Core Group

EUROVISION World War 1 Centenary Project

About the 7 Best Formats The EUROVISION Creative Forum is the annual showcase for the best-licensed public service broadcasting formats produced by Active and Associate Members of the EBU.

Members pool, exchange and adapt tried and tested formats, leading to considerable development and production cost savings.

Since its launch in 2006, the Forum has recognized the 7 Best Formats in the genres Factual & Entertainment at an annual awards ceremony. Two new categories, Fiction and Childrens formats, will be introduced in 2014.

To qualify, formats must air in the country of origin during the previous 12 months. Participants attending the Creative Forum vote for the 7 Best Formats from a shortlist created by members of the EUROVISION Formats Core Group*.

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One hundred years on, the battlefields of the First World War still evoke trepidation. Belgian director Arnout Hauben, the winner of this year's EUROVISION Creative Forum "7 Best Formats" for the historical roadshow At War said he feared aspects of the 1,700 kilometre foot journey, which traces the European frontline from the Belgian coast to the legendary battlefields of Gallipoli in Turkey.

Hauben, who accepted the peer-awarded prize during the EUROVISION TV Meetings in Berlin (9-11 September) on behalf of public service broadcaster VRT Belgium, said one of his initial concerns was that the subject matter may be too heavy to translate into a format suitable for a broad television audience.

On another level, there was also an element of personal fear to walk the biggest cemetery on earth, says Hauben. Soldiers died on that soil. We wanted the project to be worthy of the men and women who lost their lives on the frontline.

The 80 day journey undertaken by Hauben and his two man crew Mikhael Cops, co-director and cameraman and Actor Jonas Van Thielen, who doubled as sound assistant began in March, 2012. Every day, they would mark their progress by hammering a white stake into the ground a modest but personal salute to those who died, irrespective of the uniform.

The threesome departed from the most western point of the frontline, the Belgian coastal town of Nieuwpoort. Along the way, they passed the famous battlefields of Flanders and the Somme and Verdun in France. In Italy, the frontline took them to the highest peaks of the Alps where soldiers fought in perpetual snow. Further on, they set foot on the uncharted Balkan front and marched on through Greece, and eventually Gallipoli.

Along the frontline, they encountered local residents who related personal tales from now and then.

The idea for the eight episode, 45-minute format arose from the documentary maker's childhood memories of his grandparents home in Passchendaele, where the British and their allies battled the German empire between June and November 1917 for control of the ridges south and east of the Belgian city of Ypres in West Flanders.

Part of my family grew up on the frontline and are living in de Westhoek beyond the river Ijzer. Thousands of British, Australians and New Zealanders visit the area every year. They are pilgrims, wanting to relive the past, to connect with the experience of relatives, friends, and names from the past. The personal stories of these strangers touched me deeply. I wanted to take it further.

This universal endeavour to make sense of life became the driving force of the project, which began in earnest in 2011.

The research period was relatively fast, nine months of gestation, says Hauben. The local In Flanders Fields Museum provided a huge amount of material, and we went to the British Imperial War Museum for maps. But it was day to day encounters with people still living on the front that triggered emotion. We were a small battalion, following our own inevitable course.

EBU Head of TV Bettina Brinkman says the themes resonated with Members attending the annual EUROVISION Creative Forum.

"There was something fresh about the directorial approach that gave the subject matter new life," she said. "Here were young men, separated from their counterparts by 100 years, exploring the frontline through new eyes. WWI is a conflict which continues to define todays geopolitical era. Next year, EUROVISION is offering its Members a portfolio of thematically-linked projects across a variety of platforms to commemorate the centenary of the war. There is no more timely example of public service media meeting audience needs."

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LINK:	http://www3.ebu.ch/cms/en/sites/ebu/contents/news/2013/09/journey-alon...
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