Rob Morgan is a filmmaker with a twisted and darkly innovative imagination which goes some small to explain how, when asked to make, in 48hrs, a Western called Overtaken he came up with this…

Click below to watch and vote for Overtaken…

Rob is someone who’s work I had previously admired from afar. There is photographic proof that we were previously in the same room because we were both part of Screen International’s Stars of Tomorrow an increasingly long time in the past. We are also both graduates of Film4 and the Film Council’s now defunct Cinema Extreme scheme, through which Rob made the sublime “Monsters”, one of my favourite films made through the programme.

However we’d never really spoken and so I was especially delighted, and frankly rather honoured, when he agreed to take part in the Vauxhall Branchage 48hr Road Movie Challenge… ah yes, Road Movie Challenge. The other part of the genre that Rob was given was Road Movie. A Western Road Movie. Only Rob can get away with being asked to make a Western Road Movie and create instead an intrinsically filthy film about a heartbroken thing from the sea.

Rob came to Jersey with his Director of Photography Marcus Waterloo an experienced and brilliant man who shot most of this film using a handbuilt periscope camera which records the reflection of the image from a piece of dirty glass, which is how he makes the digital picture quite so edible and dirty. I say “most” because apparently the underwater sequences were shot using an iPhone and a plastic bag…

Getting people of the calibre of Rob and Marcus to take part in the Challenge was one of the most exciting things about the event. Since 2002 Jonny Oddball’s original cannonball-run style concept has been much copied and often repeated and though it does throw up gems, more often than not it just shows how very hard it is to make a truly compelling film in 48hrs (or less). It’s also often been been seen as something than appeals more to first-timers than seasoned pros. Our intention with the Branchage event was always to invite people who we knew would bring something special. For us it was not enough that five films were completed, they had to be good films.

Rachel Kirkland and Juliet Valdez

Before they met I had a feeling that actress Nathalie Pownall and director Alex Jacob would click. I had a similar feeling with Rob and Juliet Valdez. Like Rachel, the other actress in both Rob and Alex’s films, I first saw Juliet in the Edinburgh show that my girlfriend directed this summer. On the surface she’s a delightful and capable actress but bubbling beneath is a delicious lunacy which Rob brings out to the full.

Rob and Juliet. Neither look capable of it do they?

They shot this film without any sense of story, Rob just encouraging Juliet and later Rachel to do whatever odd and beautiful thing happened to come into his mind. His claim that the whole thing didn’t really come together until the last few hours of the edit is almost more hysterically terrifying than the film itself, almost. My only memory is of editing in a nearby tent, the wind buffeting the canvas like we were at sea, and my sleep deprived brain being rocked by Rob’s high pitched scream as he tried in vain to record the voice over without laughing too much…

Dark crazy shit is happening in this tent.

That same wind saved us from a slightly tricky situation. The original plan was that all five finished films would be given a premiere at the Branchage Drive-In before a screening of the Wizard of Oz. Due to the nature of the Wizard of Oz, event organiser Carla had insisted that, as well as being Road Movies that made reference to Jersey Cows, each film had to be strictly PG rated. Rob has pointed out that, not only does he mention Jersey Cows much more than we did in our film, but as far as he is concerned, Overtaken is no more terrifying and hallucinatory than the Wizard of Oz and that nothing really bad is actually on screen. However this films oozes sexy wrongness from every frame and it was a relief to me when the high winds forced the closure of Drive-In and saved us from having to veto this sublimely surreal gem.

Can you tell that I like it? I think so. Give Rob six minutes of your time by following the link below and watching this film which is safe for work but possibly not safe for your soul. And tomorrow things will take on an altogether classier air when we turn to Parisian Princess of perfection Gaelle Denis and her film “Morning Mist”.

Watch and Vote for Overtaken here:
http://www.mishorts.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage-comp.tpl&product_id=860&category_id=14&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=13