‘Budget filmmaking at its best’

My son, Nick Loven, and I began in 2013 with an intention of doing something the mark the anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War. Nick Loven is an independent filmmaker, who established his company Crow’s Eye Productions in 2005, and I am a period costumier who also runs a small community film making group dedicated to Lincolnshire’s history and heritage: WAG Screen. After much deliberation, we decided to select a war memorial at random and make a 20-minute documentary – it was supposed to be a small WAG Screen project. But then we found the Crowder family and their remarkable archive of material and memories, which encapsulated so much of what those families went through during the war, and found ourselves making a feature length film as a co-production.

Nick Loven © Jazz Hayer

In ‘Tell Them of Us’ we told the story of Robert Crowder who died at Passchendaele aged just 21. We told his story from the perspective of the family at home and based on his letters. We didn’t however, in the scope of that format, explain what had happened to William when he went missing and what he had done to earn the Distinguished Service Order.

Continuing to tell the Crowder family’s story with a drama-documentary has allowed us to fill in the story of William and Violet and to move forward a little to show how the war years shaped their future attitudes – and to show what Robert had lost. We also wanted to reveal something of the documentation behind the story of Robert, William and Violet. It is also very much thanks to the extended Crowder family that we have been able to continue with this work, their collective enthusiasm and generosity has driven the project forward.

Fortunately, Nick and our lead actors Adam Fox (William Crowder), Victoria Rigby (Grace Crowder) and Tiffany Haynes (Violet Crowder, nee Pearson) were available to continue the work. We also had some unused footage and costumes that could help to defer some of the costs. We brought in a group of undergraduate filmmakers known as Five Specs, as film crew, who graduated during the making of William’s Story, began recording our interviews and started the hunt for yet more red-haired actors.

William and Violet’s three daughters © Nick Loven

We returned to the very ward that Violet Pearson worked in as a Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse throughout the war and dressed it again as the Horncastle Red Cross Auxiliary Hospital (it is now called Stanhope Hall and the ward is a community cinema). We filmed the home that Ann Crowder retired to with Grace at her side and then the home in Dorset that Grace moved to later. We also filmed William and Violet’s children in the early and later 1930’s.

VAD Nurse Violet Pearson © Nick Loven

Our main drama piece however was about William’s war experience. Our budget would again be very modest and location filming is notoriously expensive, but there was a recreated trench system with underground ops room at a site in Surrey which was perfect for our needs. This was initially dismissed as too expensive to use, until we realised that it had a campsite abutting the trench location and Peter Halse offered the Burton Hathow school bus, with himself as a driver, to get all the actors and film crew down at the cost only of the petrol. We had all the tents we needed and my husband kindly offered to do all the catering! So for one hot August weekend we headed down to Surrey. However, only when we got to the site did we realise just how close our location was to the end of Gatwick airport runway; filming sound had to be done in the brief breaks between aircraft take-offs!

William Crowder in the Trench © Nick Loven

We filmed our final and most challenging scene in a field on Sudbrooke in Lincolnshire with the permission of local farmer Steven Wilkinson. As Nick and I stood looking at the field of stubble that we would be turning into No Man’s Land, I wondered how on earth we could achieve the transformation. Nick, however, had no such worries – he had a clear image in his head and a plan. He taped out a small wedge-shaped portion in the field saying ‘this is all the camera will see’.  The farmer, Steven Wilkinson, had left us a digger to use and with Peter Halse operating it they began to put Nick’s plan into action. What Nick created was something akin to a stage set which, when viewed through the eye of his camera, was utterly convincing and quite brilliant. It was a remarkable transformation.

Under Fire! © Nick Loven

On the day of filming, the weather was with us too. It was overcast early on enabling us to recreate the misty dawn light as we recreated the bombardment with a series of explosions. A smoke machine and smoke grenades added to the illusion. Later the sun came out, reflecting the weather on the day as William had recorded it, and matching the conditions we had filmed in back in August. The farmer had also dumped some straw in the field, created a fire break around it, and suggested we burn it to add more smoke to the scene. We would quickly have run out of smoke canisters, but for this and the prevailing wind which kept up a steady flow of smoke across the rear of the ‘set’. Budget filmmaking at its best.

There will be back-to-back screenings of ‘Tell Them of Us’ and ‘William’s Story’ at The National Archives, Kew on Friday 5, Thursday 18 and Friday 26 February. Click here to book your free place.