FILM

A film that purports to re-create the true story of the kidnapping and hunting of some fox hunters by members of the Real Animal League, ‘Blooded’ is simply dripping with controversy, not least because it's all made up. Erstwhile hunt sab Robin Askew bundles Bathonian director Ed Boase into the back of a Land Rover and demands to know the truth.

Most first-time feature directors dream of getting a bit of publicity to draw attention to their work in an increasingly crowded marketplace. Few, however, would welcome police and armed guards at the premiere, or threats issued against their distributor and the cinema chain showing the film. But that's what happened to Bathonian director Ed Boase a couple of weeks ago when his feature debut, 'Blooded' (Tagline: 'If you hunt, you're fair game'), was premiered at the Bradford International Film Festival.

How come? Well, 'Blooded' is a documentary telling the story behind one of the most explosive internet viral videos of recent years. Back in October 2005, a year after the hunting ban, Britain's youngest and most defiant Master of Foxhounds, Lucas Bell, was kidnapped along with four hunting chums by militant animal rights organisation the Real Animal League (RAL). They were then stripped nearly naked, dumped in the highlands of Scotland and given a taste of their own medicine by being hunted. The RAL's video footage of their action was subsequently released onto the internet, but the activists were never caught. The film comprises a dramatic reconstruction of the 'hunt' alongside interviews with the quarry.

Except it doesn't. All the foregoing is bollocks, apart from the bit about threats at the premiere. There was no such action. The viral videos are fakes. Even the Real Animal League website at www.realanimalleague.com is a fabrication. Furthermore, no such organisation exists. It doesn't take long to work this out, since the whole thing feels like a slightly amateurish attempt to emulate the online publicity campaigns with nests of fake websites deployed by big Hollywood studios. Last week, the Wikipedia page for 'Blooded' was taken down after the ruse was rumbled.

Some people were fooled, however, apparently failing to notice that the film is scheduled for release on April 1. "The Animal Liberation Front bought it hook, line and sinker," says Boase from the safety of his bunker (actually an office in London). "What's been interesting is that we didn't anticipate the strength of feeling in the animal rights world against the film. You're nervous enough when you're showing your first film, but you're doubly nervous when there might be someone in the audience who wants to cause you some sort of harm. I'm not saying that would be the case, but it was certainly something that crossed my mind."

He's eager to distance himself from the online publicity campaign which was dreamed up by the publicity department at creative independent distributor Revolver, who also handled Banksy's 'Exit Through the Gift Shop' and last week's 'Anuvahead'. "I just delivered the film. They're selling it in the way they see fit. I guess we were trying to tailor it a little bit for an online campaign, but we really had no idea how that was all going to happen. Indeed, we had no idea if it was going to work at all. The whole thing was a massive experiment."

'Blooded' has plenty of local connections. Boase grew up in Bath. His first short film with 'Blooded' scriptwriter James Walker, 'One Small Leap', won the HTV Award at the 2002 Brief Encounters film festival in Bristol and was also shown by the regional broadcaster. All of the post-production work on 'Blooded' was done at Films at 59 in Cotham, which has been a longstanding supporter of the duo's work. Today they run two companies in London: the Young Film Academy, which aims to empower young film-makers, and production company Magma Pictures. It had always been their ambition to make a feature film. But why 'Blooded'?

"The way it happened was that James was invited to the Isle of Mull to do private tuition for some kids. The family happened to own this fantastic location. He came back and said, 'I've found this amazing place and I think we could do a great film about people being hunted.' So we retired to Thurso in the north of Scotland just to get away from everything and sat in a house for two weeks and devised the entire concept of the film. We drew up a budget and raised the money through connections and friends - £500 here and £500 there. We didn't go to the Film Council or anything because we didn't think they would get it. We just got on and did it."

With 30 crew and a game cast ("One of the actors became incredibly ill from drinking bog water and developed gastroenteritis. I think the bog had a dead lamb in it."), they decamped to Mull in October 2007, filming the mockumentary interviews two years later after raising some more cash. It certainly looks a million dollars - or £500,000 to be precise, this being the budget - thanks to Kate Reid's outstanding cinematography.

"What we wanted to emulate was 'Touching the Void'," Boase explains. "We wanted to get away from the whole 'because it's reconstruction, it needs to look shit,' Crimestoppers feel. We wanted people to feel that they were watching a proper film - albeit a film in a different format from what you're used to seeing. We wanted to make something that was different, in the sense that it used the landscape in a way that we're used to seeing in North American 'Thelma and Louise'-type films. I like films like 'Deliverance', where the landscape and nature are almost a character. Nature that on the one hand can be picture postcard beautiful but can also turn round and bite you in the arse."

Now then, about the film's content and intent. Boase insists that he is not pro-hunting and that "the backlash is by people who have not seen the film. When they see it, what I hope they will take away from it is that it is neither pro- nor anti-hunting."

Not sure what he'll make of this, I tell him that I watched 'Blooded' in the company of some fellow animal rights loonies and former hunt saboteurs. We all howled with laughter and cheered on the balaclava-clad activists against the terrified tweedy hunters.

"This is it," he laughs. "Some people will look at the film and say, 'Plainly the hunters are meant to be the heroes because they're the main characters'. But I disagree because I think there's a very clear argument that is stressed at the beginning of the film, which is that there's extremism on both sides. Indeed, when the Lucas Bell character says 'We will keep hunting no matter what', that could be perceived as an extremist statement. Equally, you could take the view that the animal rights activists in the film are extremists performing extreme actions. It's a question of attitude and perception. The animal activists have to be faceless because otherwise the whole premise of the film - which is that these people were never caught - is defunct. You can feel that they're baddies or that they're agents of nature. The film is not intended to have a bias either way."

'BLOODED' HAD A VERY LIMITED CINEMA RELEASE ON FRI 1 APR. FROM MON 4 APR IT HAS BEEN AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD AT LOVEFILM, ITUNES AND BLINKBOX, AND IN SHOPS ON DVD. SEE WWW.BLOODEDMOVIE.COM FFI.
 

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