“This film combines beautiful, original photography and animation to create a joyful portrait celebrating one of the world’s best loved design icons.
     “It’s a nostalgic visual poem that conjures up a dreamlike recreation of Concorde’s heyday.
     “The soundtrack is a collage of emotions and memories from passengers and pilots, designers and engineers, together with cultural commentators and artists who were connected to, or have an appreciation of Concorde,” writes visionary UK film producer/director Chris Purcel, who has spent almost every spare moment and more money than he can remember creating an homage to his favorite airplane, Concorde.
     “The film still in production is titled Ode To Concorde.
     “It was a DC9 hiding inside a sleek design.
     “The striking, dagger-like outside gave way inside to a DC-9-sized cabin… lovingly appointed, but in the end, a pretty tiny tube.
     “And yet, when the aircraft made its farewell tours at iconic airports, people came out to gasp and point and laugh and smile and show their grandkids.
     “Somehow, the appearance of Concorde made today's all-too-ordinary airline experience special again,” writes pilot Jim Matthews in Things With Wings.

Love At First Flight

      The first time we saw Concorde was on a drive down to Dulles Airport from New York, where the aircraft had been banned and demonstrators with nothing better to do went out and blocked up the inner roadways at JFK International Airport.
     That was 38 years ago on May 24th, 1976; we got to see two for the price of one, as a pair of supersonic commercial flights was headed west at twice the speed of sound.
     One from Paris and the other from London, both landed at Dulles Airport within three minutes of each other.

Ode To Concorde

     But now, alas, Concorde has disappeared as high flier of the skies, forced into a static display on the Interpid in New York harbor, but Mr. Purcel (whose credits include several projects featured on the Discovery Channel) and an eager volunteer team of first class filmmakers in UK want to create a proper homage to the unique aircraft and are attempting to raise some money. The goal is 5,000 pounds to create a short film titled simply, Ode To Concorde.
     Chris reports work is progressing; it is indeed a work of love, and we heartily endorse it.
     “I’m now busy working on the audio bed. These are the audio interview clips that will form the spine of the film and tell the story in the words of our English and French contributors.”

Great Camera Man

      Chris, it should be said, created an absolutely fabulous five-minute short titled “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?” that watches the Abbey Road crossing made famous by The Beatles.
     Get a coffee or your favorite cuppa and give this one five minutes.

Still At It

      “There are still 2 or 3 interviews I’d like to record.
     “One with an A-list former passenger (TBC) and a flight engineer who can relate some more key technical background.
     “After a great deal of to-ing and fro-ing with Brooklands, we finally have a firm booking for the Simulator filming, when we’ll be able to gather unique close-up photography of Concorde’s flight deck.
     “Our project includes no archive footage or talking heads in this film so, in addition to the Sim, there’s more footage to be filmed of London and Parisian rooftops and sky-line, for example (into which Concorde can be composited).
     “There are also special effects shots and cutaways to film on an airfield, some inflight clouds to be captured, and some Concorde passenger footage to be staged.
     “Quite a bit of progress has been made with flying shots, worked on by a team of compositors using some of our Toulouse footage, and I’m currently working with an animator to create other sections for the piece,” Chris Purcel said.
     Here is a preview and a link if you might want to get on board.