- Ever since 1919, the daily life in Ypres, in Flanders Fields, has been dedicated to commemorating the First World War. The films makes a journey through this landscape of remembrance and encounters the most diverse and contradictory ways of commemorating.
- There was hardly a house still standing in Belgium's Westhoek once WWI had reached its end and Ypres and its surroundings had pretty much been wiped off the map. The idea was pitched to leave the city as it was and not rebuild it so that it would serve as a poignant reminder of the terrible war, but in the end Ypres was given war reparations to rise from its dust and rubble as a symbol of rebirth amidst the piles of discarded ammunition and the graveyards replete with fallen soldiers. It is definitely a place of reflection: how many sacrificed their lives for their country? How horrible was the war? And how valuable and delicate is peace? The Last Post has resounded every evening ever since 1928. In and amongst the devastation at first, but today surrounded by the wonderful city centre with all the facilities a tourist could wish for, including souvenir shops, hotels, terraces for a drink or a snack, while the wider surroundings can be explored on organised bus trips, by bike or even by helicopter for those whose tastes are a little more exclusive. The last WWI veteran might have died, but the traces the war left on the landscape are eagerly maintained. So is today's Ypres the unequivocal peace-keeper in the west or do other motives play a role in this? Made by Annabel Verbeke who grew up in Ypres and has witnessed how diverse and intense remembering can really be day after day, We Will Remember Them explores the concept of remembrance from a completely different perspective. The number of visitors and tourists to the region keeps growing every year, unsurprisingly reaching record highs between 2014 and 2018. In 2017, for instance, the Westhoek welcomed about 515,000 so-called 'remembrance tourists', as regional knowledge centre Westtoer terms them. It is precisely that which has attracted Annabel's critical gaze, because however much we should cherish peace and however noble it is to reflect on those who laid down their lives so their fellow countrymen and women could live in peace, has Ypres itself not become the victim of its own success? Has it not morphed into some kind of 'Remembrance Disneyland', trampled on and groped by the roving feet and hands of the droves of remembrance tourists? Has the remembrance landscape not become one big well-trodden tourist trail? Naturally, everything to do with remembering WWI contributes a fair bit to the local economy. Or in other words, remembering has become an economic activity that should not be underestimated and which no-one in or around Ypres is able to escape. Tourists are welcomed in style, graveyards are immaculate, the Last Post is played every evening with minute precision, and in and amongst it all, scores of volunteers, supporters and enthusiasts have turned remembering into what it is today: at times dazzling, sometimes candid, but first and foremost very layered and diverse. We Will Remember Them is a poetic interpretation of the everyday dynamics generated by Great War remembrance in and around Ypres.
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