The Time of Our Lives

Year: 2007 
Aspect Ratio: 16:9 
Director: Gaylene Preston 

On the road to the NZ Memorial in London with 32 war veterans and Dave Dobbyn.
When they were young they went off on the big adventure, now they are back on the road again to the dedication of the New Zealand Memorial in London remembering ‘the TIME of our Lives’.
5 November 2006, 32 New Zealand war veterans gather in the morning at Ohakea Airport. Maori and Pakeha, they’ve been selected by ballot from all the Services.
They’re flying to London for the dedication of ‘Southern stand’ – The New Zealand War Memorial that has been installed at Hyde Park Corner.
They’ll represent more than quarter of a million New Zealand men and women who fought and served in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East over the past century: the 28,000 who lost their lives in that service: and present day New Zealanders too at home and abroad.
Gaylene Preston joined them and filmed them on a journey very different from the one many had set out on 60 years ago. They remember and reminisce – battles, friends and brothers lost, new friendships, dangers they had passed and love in a time of war. Sometimes they reflect on the meaning of it all and the pity of it.
And they shop for a Marks and Sparks jersey or a top hat, ring their wives (often), do their washing and wait - everyday things that we all do because it’s peace time.
But on the day, when Hyde Park Corner is tied down by anti terrorist soldiers and helicopters and security is water tight because of an other war: when Dave Dobbyn sings of home: when the Queen and Her family come to salute them – and us all back home: when the haka roars out across the Hyde Park Corner traffic, the veterans march again with a pride in their past and their present – which is our pride too.

WINNER at the Qantas Television Awards 2007
Best Popular Documentary

See more about this title at NZ On Screen