Actor Colin Firth filmed at Kanchanaburi War Cemetery
11 June 2012
The Kanchanaburi War Cemetery in Thailand was the backdrop for
some filming for The Railway Man, a movie starring Colin Firth and
Nicole Kidman, to be released next year.
Firth plays Eric Lomax, and Kidman his wife Patti, in the film
based on Lomax's book of the same title.
It tells of his suffering as a young prisoner of war on the
notorious Burma-Siam railway and how, with the help of his wife, he
travelled back to Asia to meet one of his torturers to try to let
go a of a lifetime of bitterness and hatred.
During the day's filming the Commission's manager in Thailand
gave Colin Firth a printout of the details of a casualty named
Firth who is buried at Kanchanaburi. The actor said he came from
the same part of the country.
The Burma-Siam railway was built by Commonwealth, Dutch and
American prisoners of war, and civilian forced labour. About 13,000
PoWs died, and many more civilians.
The graves of those who died (except for the Americans, whose
remains were repatriated) were transferred from camp burial grounds
and isolated sites along the railway into three cemeteries at
Chungkai and Kanchanaburi in Thailand and Thanbyuzayat in
Myanmar.
There are now 5,084 Commonwealth casualties of the Second World
War buried or commemorated in Kanchanaburi. There are also 1,896
Dutch war graves.
Take a look at our Facebook page for shots from
the day's filming.