John Dower, above, is directing the three part series for Sky Documentaries, produced by Mindhouse Productions. It is scheduled to air late next year.
Yesterday he told this paper he aims to make a programme that is “careful, considerate and thoughtful”.
Explaining why he feels there’s room for another take on the 1988 tragedy in which 270 people died, John said: “We do not think there’s been a comprehensive 360 degree telling of the story.
“There have been lots of documentaries before but it’s still an important story and there is a whole generation that do not know this story.
“I totally understand the ‘oh not again’ and am sympathetic to that, but we come in good faith.
“It’s not an investigative piece. We are setting out to tell a story, a very large story.
“Our intention and ambitions are to attempt to capture the complexity of this story which I feel has not entirely been done.”
Mindhouse, which was founded by TV presenter Louis Theroux, has been developing the idea for two years and John said it was actually Louis’ concept as he thought it was “an important story and felt it had to be told in depth.”
John was chosen to direct it as the pair had worked together before but he is also of Scottish descent and said: “I remember it vividly. I grew up in a Scottish household and my mother had a colleague on the flight that she’d been with two days previously.
“So I knew the story or I thought I knew it, but when I revisited it 34 years on I realised how little I knew about it.
“It’s very complex.”
His show will cover the whole event, from December 21 1988 right up to the current day.
“We are experienced filmmakers and want to do this very complicated story justice and tell it properly but are very, very mindful of families on both sides of the Atlantic,” he said.
“We will put the families of the victims at the heart of the film.
“I hope that we might bring a bit of further clarity to what’s happening contemporaneously.
“I hope to unearth something new, but I’m not going to promise.”
Production is now in the third week of a 12 month timetable. As well as visits to Lockerbie, the crew will go to Malta and the USA and hope to get to Libya as well.
Having now been to Lockerbie for the first time, John shared his thoughts on the area: “It’s a small Scottish town and some of it is very beautiful. Tundergarth Church and the remembrance room are very peaceful and serene places and it’s hard to imagine what happened across the road and over the wall,” he said.
“I have spoken to a couple of American families who mentioned the fact it happened here in a beautiful place and that there was a beautiful reaction from the people of that town.
“I do find that element of the bond beautiful and heartwarming.”
And it’s the relationships that have developed between both sides of the Atlantic that he’s keen to capture, saying: “What has struck me talking to people in Lockerbie is this is still an ongoing story for a lot of people, they still visit families in America and I think that’s an important part of the story.
“What struck me most is this ongoing bond, which I think is kind of extraordinary that it continues and I have been quite humbled hearing some of the stories.
“At one level it’s a horrific story, there’s no getting away from it, but one of the elements that remains is the compassion and kindness and that’s something we will be covering.”
Stressing again their ‘honorable intentions’, John added: “We are not going to doorstep people, this is a very considered piece of filming.
“There will be two or three more trips to the town, at least. If anyone sees us, feel free to come up and say hello and ask questions.
“I stress, you do not have anything to fear. I feel a real sense of responsibility with this story.”
