Sean Flynn (photographer)

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Sean Leslie Flynn (born May 31, 1941 in Los Angeles , † April 6, 1970 (missing) in Cambodia ) was an American actor and freelance photojournalist , best known as a war photographer. He is the son of the film legend Errol Flynn and not to be confused with his nephew Sean Flynn (* 1989), actor and son of his half-sister Rory.

Life

Sean Flynn was born to film legend Errol Flynn and his first wife, actress Lili Damita . After his parents separated, he grew up with his mother, who had a long-term custody battle with his father. After graduating from high school, Flynn first enrolled at Duke University , but soon dropped out to try his hand at acting like his father. He made Il Figlio del capitano Blood , a sequel to Errol Flynn's hit film Captain Blood , as well as several other films in Europe, but remained largely unsuccessful. He gave up acting and went to Kenya as a gamekeeper in 1965 .

When the Vietnam War intensified in 1966 , Flynn decided to go to Vietnam as a photojournalist. He worked for Paris Match , but was wounded in the knee and had to leave Vietnam for a short time. During this time he made his last films and then reported on the Six Day War as a war photographer . In 1968 he returned to Vietnam.

On April 6, 1970 Flynn and his colleague Dana Stone set out on motorcycles from Phnom Penh to get to the front in Cambodia. The two men were stopped at a checkpoint in Svay Rieng Province and taken away by Viet Cong units . Both journalists have been missing since then. According to some sources, they were executed in Kompong Cham Province in mid-1971 . Other sources claim that they survived and - long-haired and bearded - were seen as imprisoned "imperialist journalists" near Minot . Over the years there have been isolated rumors that a "movie star" is being held captive by the Khmer Rouge in a small, isolated village .

Flynn's mother, Lili Damita, spent large sums of money looking for her son, but Sean Flynn was never found and was officially declared dead in 1984. He is one of 22 international journalists who are missing in Southeast Asia .

The punk band The Clash dedicated the song Sean Flynn to him on their album Combat Rock . Flynn is also one of the main characters in Michael Herr's widely acclaimed war memoir Dispatches (Eng. Betrayed to hell ). Herr, himself a Vietnam correspondent, had met Flynn during the war and was close friends with him.

Filmography

literature

  • Jeffrey Meyers: Inherited Risk: Errol Flynn and Sean Flynn in Hollywood and Vietnam , Simon & Schuster (2002)

Web links