"Forgotten Soldiers", the Philippine Scouts — a documentary film to be released in January 2012

A friend of the Philippines, Carol Merrill, alerted me to “Forgotten Soldiers”, a documentary about the U.S. Army’s Philippine Scouts, which will premiere in January 2012. This is a film that I hope fervently will be seen and gain an audience. For Producer/Director Donald Plata and writer Chris Schaefer it has clearly been a labor of love.

This is the story of a group of elite US Army soldiers who fought America’s first major ground battle of the Second World War. They were General MacArthur’s best soldiers at the start of the conflict. They were credited with being widely responsible for the prolonged siege of Bataan, an action that drained so much time and resources from Imperial Japan that it prevented the Japanese invasion of Australia. Half of them were killed in action and in captivity. Only a few survive today. This documentary will honor these gallant men who gave so much for the cause of freedom. They were the United States Army’s Philippine Scouts, America’s FORGOTTEN SOLDIERS.

The extended trailer shows a great deal of promise — it captures the poignancy that we as Americans should feel when contemplating the sacrifices of warriors who fought on behalf of America, yet have never been properly recognized for their sacrifice.

Writer Chris Schaefer writes:

Golden Globe and Tony Award-nominated actor Lou Diamond Phillips is narrating our movie, “Forgotten Soldiers,” about the U.S. Army’s Philippine Scouts. He is an experienced actor and narrator, and we hope that his participatio in the film will make it appealing to younger viewers who are not familiar with the events that took place in the Pacific during the early months of World War II.

I can tell you, it is a real thrill to hear a professional actor read the words you’ve written. He went through the entire script in just a few hours, kind of self-directing his own efforts and making re-takes as he went. Even the people in the recording studio were impressed–the sound technician said he had never heard an actor go through a script so thoroughly, and with so few mistakes or re-takes. Lou Diamond Phillips was pretty impressive. (He’s from Corpus Christie, you know.)

Come join us in New Orleans for the World Premier on Wednesday, Jan 18.