Last of our ‘Angels’ moves director to capture history

A DOCUMENTARY on the Kokoka campaign of World War II was launched in Port Moresby on Monday.
Fuzzy Wuzzy, Beyond the Legend looks into the history of the Kokoda Track from a Papua New Guinean perspective, according to writer and film director, Marco Venditti.
He said the documentary was focused on the role played by the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels – a group of heroes that saved countless lives on the track during the war.
“Something significant that triggered me to pursue getting this documentary done was because out of all the Angels, there was only one left and there was no other chance to get firsthand information from someone like that, five to 10 years down the line,” Venditti said.
“Most stories of Kokoda were told in the Australian, American or Japanese perspective. This is a first, having a documentary of Kokoda filmed from a Papua New Guinean perspective.”
Venditti said working on the documentary gave him and his crew the opportunity to dig into the history of four different countries that were involved in the World War II, including Papua New Guinea.
“Most of the archived information gathered to compile this documentary was retrieved from American archives,” he said.
“We tried searching for information about the Kokoda Track in Australian archives but could not get enough information from them, basically because at that time, Australians were not prepared for the war.
“The Americans, however, had known that this was one of the biggest events in history and during World War II, they bought journalists and reporters with them to capture events.”