Save Our Souls: Disaster at Sea

Atlantic (1929)

May 2015 marks the centenary of the most infamous maritime disaster of WWI: the sinking of the Cunard liner RMS Lusitania by a German U-boat with the loss of 1,198 lives. The scale of the civilian death toll – comparable to the Titanic disaster of 1912, and inflicted in contravention of international law – influenced America’s entry into the War. This collection brings together documentary and drama reactions to the sinking of Lusitania, and that of Cunard’s Laconia, torpedoed during WWII. For Titanic buffs there’s an interview with a surviving crewman, rare features (including SOS Titanic, 1979) and remarkable footage of the construction of sister ship Olympic.

Five to try

Anti-German Riots (1915)

Large crowds gather outside vandalised German businesses in London, in one of several newsreels showing Home Front reaction to the Lusitania tragedy.

Lusitania Day (1916)

A march takes place in London on the first anniversary of the sinking of RMS Lusitania. Participants include survivors, and representatives of the Czech community, which was hard hit by the tragedy.

Atlantic (1929)

Among the earliest British talkies (and the first to be filmed in multiple languages), this ‘forgotten Titanic film,’ a thinly-veiled dramatisation of the 1912 disaster, is ripe for rediscovery.

Lusitania: Murder on the Atlantic (1997)

John Hannah stars in this docudrama which unravels conspiracy theories behind the sinking of Cunard’s luxurious RMS Lusitania.

The Sinking of the Laconia (2011)

Alan Bleasdale’s gripping two-part WWII drama, about a Cunard liner attacked by a German U-boat in 1942, stars Brian Cox and Franka Potente.