Dare To Be Free
01/01/2004About
Dare To Be Free
The incredible real-life story of a Kiwi soldier who broke out of a German POW camp and his hair-raising adventures to escape the Nazis.
Screened on ANZAC Day, Dare To Be Free is a half hour documentary with a script to rival every blockbuster escape movie ever made. It was the highest rating NZ documentary of 2004.
The hero is ballsy, blustering Kiwi soldier. WB ‘Sandy’ Thomas.
So keen to have an ‘adventure’ that he lied about his age to enlist, Walter Babbington ‘Sandy’ Thomas, was a garrulous young lieutenant from rural Marlborough. Sandy was near death on Crete, when he fell into enemy hands. Hospitalised, he escaped. Recaptured, he escaped. Imprisoned and recaptured, he escaped again – the young Kiwi commander got away from the Germans no less than five times.
Sandy’s last escape, dodging searchlights and bullets outside a high security prison barracks, started an epic night-time trip through the Greek countryside to a peninsula populated strictly by male monks. He stole four boats before he finally made it to Turkey, where the first troops he ran into were Kiwis from his old unit, including his own brother.
He tells the story with such incredible good humour, it is easy to forget that Sandy risked death by firing squad, hypothermia, and drowning, and tramped most of the way around Greece. All of it hobbled by a leg wound so severe that doctors wanted to amputate his left leg.
Thomas finished WWII as the youngest ever NZ battalion commander, and by the end of his career he retired from the incredibly high rank of Major General.
Featuring dramatic reconstructions and an excellent set of interviews.
Technical Specifications
TV Production
Production Year: 2004
Category: Documentary
Director: John Hagen
Producer: Gary Scott
Duration: 24 mins
Outline: An autobiographical story of one of New Zealand's greatest soldiers, and of the amazing escape that forged his reputation as 'one of the most dashing and seasoned commanding officers.'
