Custom byline text:
Director Dan Turner has a fighting spirit, finds Alison Rowat
Or at least they will think they are. Isn't that the Squinty Bridge, the riverside flats, the Necropolis, the whole of Glasgow in the frame?
"You're not the first person to say that," laughs Turner. "Peter Mullan said it as well. When he was filming in Newcastle he was saying how Glaswegian it was."
In the drama, Turner's third feature after Experiment and Stormhouse, Mullan plays a grizzled bear of a boxing trainer who gives the benefit of his experience to his young charges. From talking to Turner, it seems the Scots writer-director of the award-winning Orphans and The Magdalene Sisters played the same part off camera as well.
"Before I met him I was reasonably terrified given his credentials. We arranged to meet in Newcastle two weeks before we were due to shoot. Being the sort of guy he is one of the first things that came out of his mouth was, 'It's your film, you've written and directed it, I'm yours.'
"He never said, 'Oh I think we should do this or that'. He would be encouraging to everyone and say, 'Let's push further, see what we can get.' I spent a lot of time with him off camera and I just soaked up all this knowledge. I'd be a fool not to."
Turner, 43, is also grateful to Mullan for sticking by the film while the pre-production process went on. As with many a low-budget picture, The Man Inside was on and off more often than the rain. Just before the shoot was about to start, Mullan was offered another job elsewhere. "The agent said to us the chances are he's going to have to take this, but it's Peter's say."
As it turned out, says Turner, the other film changed its schedule to accommodate The Man Inside because Mullan didn't want to let Turner down. "That's the sort of faith you get from someone like Peter Mullan."
Set in an urban Anytown – honestly, it's not Glasgow – The Man Inside is the story of a talented young boxer, Clayton Murdoch, who escaped a childhood scarred by violence and gang culture, only to find himself being drawn back into that world again because of his siblings. It's a breakthrough role for Ashley "Bashy" Thomas (4321, My Brother the Devil) who plays Clayton the boxer. Michelle Ryan (EastEnders, Bionic Woman) also stars.
It is an intense piece, featuring flashbacks to Clayton's childhood with his bullying father. Turner had directed child actors before, not always an easy job. "I've had to work with some difficult children, who would lay down on the floor and go into a screaming fit and refuse to do anything." In contrast, young Kavern Batchelor, now eight, was a breeze to direct.
"I knew that children have short attention plans and that it's exciting for them initially, then they get bored and switch off. I concentrated on making sure we got all his really important stuff as soon as possible."
"We just tried to make it a bit of a laugh for him. We took great pains to not expose him to seeing anything, or hearing anything, that was inappropriate."
The boxing scenes are key to the film. Though a fight fan himself, Turner also drafted in expert help. "I wanted realistic boxing, I didn't want [it to be] heavily choreographed." Thomas, who had only done martial arts before, had to learn fast. "The trainer was blown away at how quickly he took to boxing. He put him in his top five of new people."
It can be tough enough for a new director to get one feature film going. Now Turner has his third in the can, is it becoming easier?
"I wish that was the case," he laughs. He was trying to get The Man Inside off the ground when 2011's Stormhouse, a supernatural horror set in a military base, had to start filming. "It was a bit of a strange time, very intense, shooting two feature films in the space of 12 months." If anything, he says, it is becoming more difficult to raise money for films as he moves from cult material such as Stormhouse, to more mainstream dramas as The Man Inside.
He found bringing Stormhouse to Edinburgh helped in raising money for The Man Inside. "Edinburgh has a good reputation," he says. To be able to talk about a forthcoming film when the current one, Stormhouse, was playing inspired confidence in backers.
"It was definitely a selling point for raising money, to get people enthused about the project, whether that be crew or whatever."
He's now working on a new film and several theatre projects. Getting the money and people together is the same slugathon it has always been. But now, with The Man Inside his first film to be given UK-wide cinema distribution, and having had Mullan in his corner, Turner sounds up for the fray.
"He pushed me harder to explore characters and scenes and to get to what felt right in every scene. I'd never put that much pressure on myself before. He encouraged me to do that, and to have a laugh while doing it as well."
The Man Inside opens on July 27.
Contextual targeting label:
