DreamWorks Pictures’ London premiere of War Horse, the epic drama based on the bestselling novel by Michael Morpurgo and the Tony Award–winning stage play by Nick Stafford, will benefit the Foundation of Prince William and Prince Harry. The premiere will be held on January 8, 2012 at the Odeon Leicester Square, with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge greeting cast members and director Steven Spielberg before taking in a special screening of War Horse.
Also in attendance will be 600 serving and ex-serving military personnel, their families, and beneficiaries of military charities that the Foundation of Prince William and Prince Harry helps to support. Among the invited servicemen and women are members of the Duke of Cambridge’s regiments, including RAF Search and Rescue, Household Cavalry, Irish Guards, Royal Air Force Coningsby, Scotland Royal Naval Command, and Submarines Royal Naval Command.
The Plot: DreamWorks Pictures’ War Horse, director Steven Spielberg’s epic adventure, is a tale of loyalty, hope, and tenacity set against a sweeping canvas of rural England and Europe during the First World War. War Horse begins with the remarkable friendship between a horse named Joey and a young man called Albert, who tames and trains him.
When they are forcefully parted, the film follows the extraordinary journey of the horse as he moves through the war, changing and inspiring the lives of all those he meets—British cavalry, German soldiers, and a French farmer and his granddaughter—before the story reaches its emotional climax in the heart of No Man’s Land.
The First World War is experienced through the journey of this horse—an odyssey of joy and sorrow, passionate friendship and high adventure. War Horse is one of the great stories of friendship and war— a successful book, it was turned into a hugely successful international theatrical hit that is arriving on Broadway next year. It now comes to screen in an epic adaptation by one of the great directors in film history.
