In a 10 minute tribute to veterans and the wartime generation, at 3pm on 8th May, the big screen at Piccadilly Lights is taken over, as if the events of 1945 were happening again, right in front of us. A three minute film whisks us back through time from 2025 to the VE celebrations of 1945, using archive footage of events and people 80 years ago. Intercut with these scenes, a Second World War soldier walks through the bustle of present day Piccadilly, amazed by the dazzle of modern life. There, he crosses paths with 100 year old Second World War veteran who might be his older, present-day self. In the teeming Circus of modern life, the two salute each other.
The young soldier is played by Harri J Douglas and the veteran, Mervyn Kersh, participated in the Normandy landings and later witnessed the liberation of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.
