Agency:.Co-produced by the NFB and International Documentary Television Corporation. Study guide available.

Director, Robert Duncan ; script, Robert Duncan ; producer, Jonathan Desbarats, Barbara Shearer, Selwyn Jacob ; executive producer, Robert Duncan, Graydon McCrea ; camera, Keith Taylor, Peter Walker, Bill Casey, Fred MacDonald ; sound, Bob McKenzie, Ao Loo, François Proulx ; editing, Janice Brown ; sound editing, Marc Benoit ; music, John Sereda.

Voice, Paul Nash, Rae Hull ; narrator, Jay Brazeau.

Recorded 1998.

The First World War's terrible Second Battle of Ypres has just broken out in Belgium. Canadian troops, stationed along the Yser canal, are under heavy fire... and the number of casualties is mounting. Among the dead is young Alexis Helmer, killed early on the morning of May 2, 1915--the victim of a direct hit from a German shell. Dr. John McCrae, a friend of Helmer's, is there to pick up the pieces of the body and deliver a burial service over the gun blasts. Rocked by the death, McCrae would later pen one of the war's most famous poems, "In Flanders Fields," while looking out over Helmer's grave. Generations of schoolchildren have recited "In Flanders Fields" on Remembrance Day, and most Canadians can still recall a verse or two. But John McCrae and Alexis Helmer have faded from memory. John McCrae's War: In Flanders Fields chronicles McCrae's life from his childhood in Guelph, Ontario to the battlefields of Belgium. It tells the story of his famous poem and pays tribute to the Canadian soldiers who died over a few feet of Belgian soil.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Honorable Mention - Category: Humanities, 1999

Description based on online resource; title from title screen (National Film Board of Canada, viewed 2023-08-10).