Principle Filming
The most important project of my life.
It’s hard to sum up in a post on social media, but I’m going to try.
This film started in January 2022, I just didn’t know it until this spring. It’s been a rollercoaster of emotion and stress, but the good kind. The kind of stress that I’m happy to have, the kind that means you’re probably doing something good, meaning we hopefully have impact and that we can all grow.
I didn’t know going into this project just how much it meant to me, and just how important it was for my own personal reasons or how connected I was to the story. I just wanted to do right by veterans and show a side of them only a veteran could get remotely close to. I reconnected with people I hadn’t spoken to in years and it was as if no time had passed at all.
The team I could lean on included two former marines called Marty Williams and Rolf Andreason who funded us, and gave us their everything when it came to production support. Ferrying us from the UK to France, around the alps, and cooking nearly every meal, preparing every cheese and ham baguette and doing everything else in between, even my laundry. Even some seriously difficult personal and business circumstances did not deter them from task and they didn’t falter.
Our sound recordist had no previous affiliation to the military and made every to literally speak their language, have empathy and just give people 5 minutes of her time, even after a 15 hour day. It will be hard to look past Laura Izzard for any other job, especially when watching team America is the go to team chill out activity.
Charles Clare our DOP earned his stripes when skiing in any direction at 70kmh with £15k worth of camera equipment in his hands and managed to put the shot before himself on about 20 different occasions. You really have to see it to believe it.
Ciaran Carney pushed our storytelling to the max and shone a light on the gaps whilst my head was in the snow ten days into production. It changed the direction of what we thought we had and pulled other characters in and without doubt has made for a more compelling story.
Dorota Bankowska can do attitude and local knowledge saved some of our (my) shoot days and her disarming nature uncovered a character we had previously overlooked. It’s these happy accidents that make a film special and remind me why I got into it in the first place.
And finally to the characters who showed us so much more than we ever could have predicted. Who revealed all (sometimes too much, don’t leave your camera loafing) and gave us some of the most spine tingling and compelling stories that literally brought tears to our eyes, of joy, and of sadness.
We’re assembling the clips, data and will begin to edit our film. A lengthy process, but one we will endeavour to make the best we can.
Thank you to our sponsors and the RMA for your support and access.
Cervus AD Construction Group Digi2al Ltd ThruDark Nick Clare HS Infra Limited Mick Cataldo
