FILM OF RIVER PLATE BATTLE

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27736, 13 August 1955, Page 4

FILM OF RIVER PLATE BATTLE

“PERSONAL TOUCHES” SOUGHT “The Press” Special Service AUCKLAND, August 12.’ Badly wounded in the face and legs, a bearded New Zealand" sailor .was dragged from his action-station in H.M.N.Z.S. Achilles during the Battle of the River Plate. A doctor’ called for anaesthetics. “To bell With the drugs/’ the sailor said. “Give me a tot of rum.’’ Human-interest items like this are sought by the London producer, Mr Emeric Pressburger, who is making a film or the battle for the J. Arthur Rank organisation. In a letter to the secretary of the River Plate Veterans’ Association, Mr J. S. Bongard, Mr Pressburger asks for “interesting personal touches” which can be included in the film. Mr Bongard, in turn, asks all exAchilles men to put oh their thinking caps and pass their anecdotes on to him. A humorous incident which Mr Bongard recalls concerns a Kiwi cook who, like the legendary Captain Browri, played his ukulele while the* Graf Spee went down. Another oddity in his personal store of reminiscences is that the 1939 epic must haVe been the only sea battle in history in which the participants could listen to a running commentary from the shote. An American broadcaster watching froxp the top of a tall building, in Montevideo gave a “blow by * blow ’ ’ description. The production of the film will be in full swing by the end of September, Mr Pressburger writes. The Achilles (now with the Indian Navy and renamed Delhi) will be playing her own part. The roles of the Ajax and th,e Exeter (both of which are now out of commission) will be taken by the cruisers H.M.S. Sheffield and H.M.S. Glasgow. The Admiralty is co-operating in the making of the film, and some “at sea” scenes have already been shot—without actors. Mr Pressburger writes that he and his associate-producer, Mr Michael Powell, have already made two trips to South America to interview Uruguayan officials and others. Captain Bell, who commanded the Exeter, will be technical adviser for the film.