The Passing Bells | |
---|---|
Genre | Historical drama |
Written by | Tony Jordan |
Directed by | Brendan Maher |
Starring | Patrick Gibson Jack Lowden |
Composer | John Lunn |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Original language | English |
No. of series | 1 |
No. of episodes | 5 |
Production | |
Production location | Poland |
Running time | 30 minutes |
Production company | Red Planet Pictures |
Original release | |
Network |
|
Release | 3 November – 7 November 2014 [1] [2] |
The Passing Bells (Polish: Dzwony wojny) is a five-part British-Polish television drama that was first broadcast on BBC One in 2014. The series is set during World War I and was a part of the BBC First World War centenary season. [3]
It shows events through the eyes of two very ordinary teenagers, one from England and one from Germany, who enlist in the war, which they expect will be over within months. [3] [4] The drama stars Patrick Gibson and Jack Lowden, and was written by Tony Jordan and directed by Brendan Maher. [3] [5] [6] [7]
The series operates in parallel as it follows two teenagers in two countries, one German (Jack Lowden) and one British (Patrick Gibson), who sign up as soldiers at the outbreak of the First World War. The plot covers the time period from just prior to the war to its conclusion.
The story includes the boys' families, their love interests, and the friends and comrades they make during the war. It reveals the toll the war takes on the two young men and their fellow soldiers as it lasts far longer than expected, and grows harsher and more meaningless. The two soldiers encounter each other at certain points, including at the conclusion of the war.
The series was announced by the BBC in October 2013, along with other programmes that played a part in the BBC World War I centenary season. [3] It was a Red Planet Production with BBC Worldwide as the distributor. [8] Filming took place in Poland. Telewizja Polska and Apple Film Production were co-producers. [9] [10] [11]
The series aired in the pre-watershed time-slot of 7pm, and the script was written for a younger audience and family viewing. [12] The title was taken from the first line of Wilfred Owen's 1917 poem, "Anthem for Doomed Youth": "What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?" [13]
The series was broadcast on five consecutive days on BBC 1 beginning on 3 November 2014. [14] In Australia, the series premiered on BBC First on 28 May 2015. [15]
The Region 2 DVD was released on 10 November 2014. [16] The streaming video is available on various services.
Edith Louisa Cavell was a British nurse. She is celebrated for treating wounded soldiers from both sides without discrimination and for covertly helping some 200 Allied soldiers escape from German-occupied Belgium and return to active service during the First World War, which in wartime was a death penalty offence under the German military law. Cavell was arrested and court-martialed for that offence as an act of Kriegsverrat, found guilty, and sentenced to death by firing squad. Despite international pressure for mercy, the German Government ruled that Cavell knew that her acts were punishable; they thus refused to commute her sentence, and she was shot. Her execution, however, received worldwide condemnation and extensive global press coverage arranged by Wellington House.
BBC UKTV is an Australian pay television channel in Australia and New Zealand, screening British entertainment programming, sourced mainly from the archives of the BBC, RTL Group and ITV plc. The channel was originally a joint venture with Foxtel, the RTL Group and BBC Worldwide. It is now owned solely by BBC Studios. It is the home of the channel's flagship programme The Graham Norton Show.
Adam Fidusiewicz is a Polish actor.
Fremantle Australia Pty Ltd. is the Australian arm of global British production and entertainment company Fremantle. It was formed in 2006 by the merger of market leader Grundy Television and comedy specialists Crackerjack Productions, which had both been acquired previously by Fremantle.
Days of Honour is a Polish World War II television drama series, broadcast on TVP2 from 7 September 2008 to 23 November 2014, on STV Glasgow from 2 June 2014 and STV Edinburgh from 16 January 2015.
Jack Andrew Lowden is a Scottish actor. Following a four-year stage career, his first major international onscreen success was in the 2016 BBC miniseries War & Peace, which led to starring roles in feature films.
The First World War centenary was the four-year period marking the centenary of the First World War, which began on 28 July 2014 with a series of commemorations of the outbreak of the war organised across the continent of Europe, and ended with the centenary of the 1918 Armistice on 11 November 2018.
The Fall is a crime drama television series filmed and set in Northern Ireland. The series, starring Gillian Anderson as Detective Superintendent Stella Gibson, is created and written by Allan Cubitt and features Jamie Dornan as serial killer Paul Spector. It is produced by Artists Studio, and shown on ZDFneo in Germany, RTÉ One in the Republic of Ireland, and BBC Two in the UK.
Peaky Blinders is a British period crime drama television series created by Steven Knight. Set in Birmingham, it follows the exploits of the Peaky Blinders crime gang in the direct aftermath of the First World War. The fictional gang is loosely based on a real urban youth gang of the same name who were active in the city from the 1880s to the 1910s.
Atlantis is a British fantasy-adventure television programme inspired by Greek mythology and created by Johnny Capps and Julian Murphy with Howard Overman. It premiered on 28 September 2013 on BBC One. In the show, submarine pilot Jason washes up on the shores of legendary Atlantis and must navigate the powerful leaders of the mythological realm.
Generation War is a 2013 German World War II TV miniseries in three parts. It was commissioned by the public broadcasting organization ZDF, produced by the UFA subsidiary TeamWorx, and first aired in Germany and Austria in March 2013. The series tells the story of five German friends, aged around 20, on different paths through Nazi Germany and World War II: as Wehrmacht soldiers on the Eastern Front, a war nurse, an aspiring singer, and a Jewish tailor. The narrative spans four years, starting in 1941 Berlin, when the friends meet up for a last time before embarking on their journeys, enthusiastically vowing to meet up again the following Christmas. The story's conclusion is set shortly after the end of the war in 1945.
The BBC World War I centenary season was the marking of the centenary of the First World War across the BBC. Programming started in 2014 and lasted until 2018, corresponding to 100 years after the war. The BBC season included 130 newly-commissioned radio and television programmes which lasted over 2500 hours, including more than 600 hours of new content. The programmes were broadcast on over twenty BBC television and radio stations.
The Crimson Field is a British period drama television series that was broadcast beginning on BBC One on 6 April 2014. The series shows the lives of medics and the patients at a fictional field hospital in France during the First World War.
War & Peace is a British historical drama television serial first broadcast on BBC One on 3 January 2016, produced by BBC Cymru Wales, in association with The Weinstein Company, Lookout Point and BBC Worldwide. It is a six-part adaptation of the 1869 novel War and Peace by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy, written by Andrew Davies and directed by Tom Harper. War & Peace aired on A&E, Lifetime and History Channel in the United States as four two-hour episodes, beginning on 18 January 2016. The serial stars Paul Dano, Lily James and James Norton in the leading roles.
BBC First is an entertainment subscription television channel featuring comedy, crime, drama and film programming, originating from UK and mostly from the BBC. The channel is wholly owned and operated by BBC Studios. The channel began rolling out internationally in 2014, launching first in Australia. It is supported by extended localised advertising breaks.
The centenary of the outbreak of World War I was commemorated in Europe in late July and early August 2014. A century earlier, the July Crisis, which occurred after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, had culminated in Austria-Hungary declaring war on the Kingdom of Serbia, which Austria-Hungary blamed for the assassination, on 28 July 1914. Over the following days and weeks, this action and the invasion of Luxembourg and Belgium by the German Empire led to a succession of other declarations of war that drew the major European powers into a worldwide conflict. A century later, governments in Europe held a series of official commemorative events to mark the occasion.
Tommies is a British radio drama series, broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was part of the BBC's World War I centenary season and was broadcast over four years, the same length of time as the war itself. Based on actual unit war diaries, it tells the story of a one day in the conflict exactly 100 years ago to the day of an episode's release.
Erika Kaar, born Erika Marta Karkuszewska, is a Polish actress.
Tommy's Honour is a 2016 historical drama film depicting the lives and careers of, and the complex relationship between, the pioneering Scottish golfing champions Old Tom Morris and his son Young Tom Morris. The film is directed by Jason Connery, and the father and son are portrayed by Peter Mullan and Jack Lowden. The film won Best Feature Film at the 2016 British Academy Scotland Awards.
World on Fire is a British war drama television series created by Peter Bowker. Set in the Second World War, the series follows the intertwined lives of ordinary civilians across Europe who are caught up in World War II.