Independent Film in the Wars
An independent British film telling the story of a New Zealand WW2 hero has ignited a “trans-Atlantic row over Hollywood movie muscle.” Two Men Went to War is to be screened in a paltry 6 out of over 3,000 cinemas in the UK because its makers and distributors are unable to foot the £200,000 promotion bill. The film, praised by critics as “a cross between a classic Ealing comedy and Dad’s Army, brings to the screen the adventures of Private Leslie Cuthbertson, a 20-year-old trainee dental technician, and Sergeant Peter King, a 55-year-old New Zealander. The odd-couple mounted a two-man invasion of occupied France in 1942, two years before the official D-Day landings.