Principal photography has wrapped on “Think of England,” a satirical WWII drama from BAFTA-nominated writer/director Richard Hawkins (“Theory of Flight, “Everything”).
The newly-announced film is set in the run up to the Allied invasion of France, when two British film projects are commission at the very highest level. For one, Winston Churchill himself insists that Laurence Olivier immediately embark upon a lavish production of Shakespeare’s “Henry V,” securing for him a state-of-the-art, 3-strip Technicolour camera and all of the available film stock.
As the description goes, “Think of England” is the story of the other, following a small and very disparate group of people sent to a remote Orkney island beach and tasked with a top secret mission — the making of pornographic films for the boys at the front. “For who knows how long this war still has to run, and fighting morale — as we learned only too well from the last one — is everything,” reads the synopsis.
The group of would-be pornographic filmmakers include a very war-damaged former movie star; a celebrated German film-director; a munitions-machinist-come-aspiring-actress; an Etonian captain from the Ministry of Information; an aging, alcoholic hair-and-makeup artist; and a young lad, as innocent as can be and right on the very threshold of war’s bloodbath. There’s also a half-starved and very ragged Luftwaffe pilot, watching on from afar.
An ensemble of talent has been cast in the the roles, including Jack Bandeira (“Lockwood & Co”), Natalie Quarry (“Call The Midwife“), John McCrea (“Cruella”), Ronni Ancona (“Big Impression”), Ben Bela Böhm (“Angels & Demons”), Ollie Maddigan (“The Olive Boy”) and Oscar Hoppe (“Munich: The Edge of War”).
“Think of England” is produced by father-daughter duo, Nick O’Hagan (“The Good Liar,” “The Serpent Queen”) and Poppy O’Hagan (“Worm,” “Good Boy”) of Giant Films, which is currently overseeing all sales rights, and is executive produced by Geoffrey Freeman of High Street Films, alongside Andrew Wood and Lucas Wood-Oliván.
The film’s creative team includes cinematographer Sarah Cunningham (“The Banishing”), production designer Chris Richmond (“The Amazing Mr Blunden”), costume designer Nadia Dunn-Hill (“Wimbledon”), hair & make-up Designer Alexis Arenas (“Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan”) with casting by Matt Sheppard (“Boiling Point”).
Shooting recently took place at Shinfield Studios in Reading and on location on Anglesey in North Wales.
“No matter how tough indie filmmaking can get, we would always remind ourselves what a privilege it is to bring such unique stories to life,” said Poppy O’Hagan.
“Very excited to have completed principle photography on ‘Think Of England,’” added Hawkins. “7 extraordinary narratives, 4 cinematic grammars, 3 different media, 2 aspect ratios, 1 entire film! All in the can!”
“Think of England” was made working in collaboration with Amelia Price of Sustainable Film to progress carbon conscious filmmaking.