At the heart of the film and TV series “The Heroes of Halyard” is a war drama, a story inspired by the largest single rescue mission of downed Allied airmen behind enemy lines in aviation history of all time, codenamed “The Halyard Mission”. This action took place in the summer of 1944. It was led by the Yugoslav Army in the Fatherland that was headed by General Dragoljub “Draža” Mihailović. It was at great cost and sacrifice that the Serbian people saved 508 American and other Allied countries’ airmen from certain death, sending them off to safety from the improvised airfield in the Serbian village of Pranjani, at the foot of Mt Suvobor.

The story of the Halyard Mission is about the quintessential charity, lofty ideals, and patriotism. It is a saga of the tragedy of a time, of heroism and hopelessness, family, love and taking the wrong path, the thirst for freedom, divisions and schisms – about the bigwig heavyweights, the power players, deliberately stepping in and imposing a type of future on the Serbian people, and as a consequence, they ended up having no future at all.

Executive producer of the project is Contrast Studios, in cooperation with Telekom Serbia and Serbian Broadcasting Corporation RTS, sustained by Serbian Film Center and the Government of AP of Vojvodina. The project is supported by companies “Dunav osiguranje” and “Banka Poštanska štedionica“ and hosted by Gornji Milanovac Municipality.

The first part of the project was filmed in 2021 at the outskirts of Belgrade, Kragujevac, Mt Rudnik, as well as the military airfields Batajnica and Kovin. It is continued in 2022 when the essential scenes of this war saga will be shot, mainly in western Serbia, at Ravna gora Mt, villages Pranjani, Leušići, Brajići, Družetići where the drama actually took place almost eight decades ago.

Authors and the numerous crew of “The Heroes of Halyard” will revive the Second World War atmosphere in Serbia in this unique story of humanity, kindness, nobility and patriotism, but also about betrayal and fratricide.