from Scotland on Sunday / by Allan Hunter
IN AN ideal world most Scottish filmmakers would choose to work in Scotland on projects that reflect the national character or illuminate the landscapes and history of their own backyard. An international production like Basic Instinct 2 might be very welcome for the bank balance, but director Michael Caton-Jones has confessed that his dream project is an adaptation of the Alan Warner novel The Sopranos.
Scottish producers Ginnie Atkinson and Bob Last have made valiant, but thus far fruitless, efforts to secure the finance for a screen version of Sunset Song. Ecosse Films supremo Douglas Rae is based in London but has spent the past 10 years quietly nurturing an ambition to film Dick King-Smith’s children’s classic The Water Horse, an imaginative Second World War tale on the origins of the Loch Ness monster. The $40m blockbuster is now to be filmed in Scotland and New Zealand throughout the summer.
Writer/director David Mackenzie has a more substantial track record than most in making the commitment to Scottish filmmaking a reality. He is currently scurrying around the rooftops of central Edinburgh filming Hallam Foe, his fourth feature and the third to be shot in Scotland.
Based on the 2001 novel by Peter Jinks, the