As part of International Culture Week 2004, Year 12 historians
designed a visual documentary on the subject of the Spanish Civil
War. The documentary uses 68 carefully selected photos and short
archive video clips, one image for each year since the war began in
1936. Displayed on four screens simultaneously and asynchronously,
the six minute film is a chronicle of the war that attempts to tell
a human story without the limitation of words.
The Film Photo editing by
Katie Greer,
Video archive selection and editing by
Susannah Leahy, DV editing by Russell Gay.
Interview with the makers -
DV editing by Katie Greer
The film opens with scenes of hope in Madrid's Puerta del Sol
in 1936 and then progresses chronologically though to a conclusion
of refugees fleeing across the French border. Along
the way, major events (the battle for Madrid, the bombing of
Guernica) are interlaced with scenes of everyday life that tell
the social history of the war. In this story, the famous names
(Orwell, Hemingway et al) are almost indistinguishable from the
peasants and workers they fight alongside. Entitled 'War Without
End', the film loops continually in recognition of the legacy of a
war which in Toulouse, as much as anywhere, remains as important
today as ever. The film's only colour image is a photograph taken
in summer of 2003 at the cemetery and memorial to the
International Brigaders who died at Le Vernet 'internment' camp, a
short drive south from Toulouse.
