About a year ago, Loyola film studies professor and Army veteran John C.P. Goheen embarked on a quest to honor military veterans by telling stories of war veterans filmed on the historic Veterans Day of 11/11/11.
An internationally acclaimed documentary filmmaker and Army veteran, Goheen put out the call to filmmakers throughout the country to join his endeavor and submit their capture of a veteran made on Nov. 11, 2011. More than 50 stories were received about different veterans of different wars, dating back to the Civil War’s battle of Shiloh.
Fifteen of the submissions were woven into Goheen’s moving feature-length 100-minute doc, “V-DAY 11.11.11,” to tell the collective experience of being a veteran.
The documentary will honor America’s more than 22 million veterans, spanning every age, gender and branch of service at a special, invitation-only screening May 24 at the Pritzger Military Museum. Q&A with Goheen and executive producer associate professor Aaron Greer, Director of Loyola’s new Film and Media Program Loyola, follows the screening.
Goheen shot one of the stories, about the San Antonio family of their young son killed in Afghanistan, who worked in the Army’s Canine Unit. The dog the soldier worked with, who is seen mourning the loss of his master, was given to the soldier’s family. Goheen follows the story of how much the dog means to the family and how canine service is involved in Army duty.
Editor was L.A.-based John Manell.
Goheen joined the School of Communication faculty in fall 2009 after a 30-year career that began with the Armed Forces Radio/Television Network/Europe and went into commercial broadcast and became a freelance shooter and producer in 1999.
His assignments for major networks have taken him around the world, covering such events as the Indonesia tsunami and the earthquake in Haiti.
He is a12-time Emmy winner, three-time winner of the National Press Photographer’s Assn. Television News Photographer of the Year and has won a dozen film festival awards for documentaries.
Loyola plans to host “V-DAY, 11.11.11” screenings throughout the summer at the university and across the U.S. in conjunction with various war and veterans’ organization. The 15 veterans profiled in the doc will appear in their home town screenings to tell their story of what it means to be a veteran.
