{"id":9036,"date":"2015-05-27T13:00:44","date_gmt":"2015-05-27T19:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.micro-film-magazine.com\/cublog\/?p=9036"},"modified":"2015-05-27T00:52:19","modified_gmt":"2015-05-27T06:52:19","slug":"valiant-ode-to-marine-veterans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.micro-film-magazine.com\/cublog\/?p=9036","title":{"rendered":"VALIANT ode to Marine veterans"},"content":{"rendered":"

While he may have chronicled the rock-and-roll lifestyles of old-guard musicians in a previous project<\/span><\/a>, independent filmmaker Bob Zimmerman<\/strong> of R.A.Z. Films<\/strong><\/span><\/a> more recently engaged veterans of another stripe to help account for an episode in their lives when key doses of discipline, timing, and pure luck determined their very survival if not just success. Having fought in the intense Battle of Okinawa<\/strong> during mid-1945, six surviving members of the fabled Sixth Marine Division<\/strong><\/span><\/a> shared their memories with Zimmerman for his new documentary RISE OF THE VALIANT<\/strong>, available through Parasol Records<\/span><\/a>, That\u2019s Rentertainment<\/span><\/a>, Exile on Main Street<\/span><\/a><\/strong>, and Amazon<\/strong><\/span><\/a>. The video combines these candid discussions with archival visuals to dramatize the soldiers\u2019 experience in the last major United States<\/strong> military action of World War II<\/strong> prior to the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima<\/strong> and Nagasaki<\/strong> in Japan<\/strong> that August.<\/p>\n

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The filmmaker attended a ceremony on Saturday, April 25<\/strong>, at the National Museum of the Marine Corps<\/strong> in Triangle, Virginia<\/strong>, to receive the Major Norman Hatch Award<\/strong> given annually by the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation<\/strong>, the goal of which is \u201cto recognize exemplary examples of creative art depicting Marine Corps<\/strong> culture and history.\u201d Zimmerman was one of 18 honorees that day.<\/span><\/a> \u201cGetting an award that really is on a national level like this means a lot to me,\u201d he told C-U Blogfidential<\/strong> in an e-mail exchange. \u201cIt is nice to be recognized for the film by the Marine Corps. To be on stage and presented the award with the top brass is really an honor.\u201d Attendees included the 36th Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Joseph F. Dunford, Jr.<\/strong>, currently a nominee for Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n

RISE OF THE VALIANT<\/strong> is the Tuscola<\/strong> native\u2019s first military-themed video. \u201cI decided to make [VALIANT<\/strong>] after I found some letters my dad wrote home from the war. It really inspired me to tell this story,\u201d explained Zimmerman; his father also served in the Marine Corps at Okinawa during WWII. \u201cThe Battle of Okinawa [ranging across several small islands off the southern tip of Japan] that claimed the lives of 250,000 [soldiers and civilians] in 82 days is [a story] not often told \u2026 I started in March of 2014 and by October the film was completed.\u201d The director and his wife Brenda<\/strong> traveled 6,000 miles to five states in order to meet the veterans \u2013 Dick Whitaker, Jim White, Bill Pierce, Junior Montgomery, Roy Wilkes<\/strong>, and Fred Westphal<\/strong> \u2013 as well as author Bill Sloan<\/strong><\/span><\/a>, who wrote the Okinawa history The Ultimate Battle<\/strong><\/span>.<\/p>\n