Brother Scuttle's Reflections

Hello All,

Richard here, focus of 'Brother Scuttle' our resident ghostly, but very friendly and jolly
Heartsfelled Monk... Scuttle is a bit confused by the 21st Century, so I better pass over to him before he gets a bit grumpy! Over to you Brother!

What? Oh yes...  What ever is this Blogging? Sounds more like flogging to me! Those Normans were good at that I can tell you! I saw a few floggings in my time... The old Priory Bell would sound and a crowd would gather, no moving pictures or books then to entertain us!  Then the Normans would severely flog the miscreant outside the Priory gates...

But my beloved Priory has gone! Nothing much left at all now, just noise, hustle and bustle from horseless carts and too many people rushing about... Horrible!!!

I say those Normans... I'm half Norman myself and was two years after the conquest. By the time I entered the Priory King William I was still on the throne and Ivo Tailbois was looking after the interests of Spalding. His wife took much interest in our order and as a result the Priory grew into quite a powerful concern, far outgrowing those dunderheads at Croyland! Ha, they never got over that, and never allowed us to gain status as an Abbey...

As a cleric I was here, there and everywhere, so I was given the nickname 'Scuttle' which has stuck like fresh cow dung to thatch... Oh well, I have certain advantages and am treated very well, so I can't complain.

Then I suddenly find that I'm not only dead, but alive and well as a ghost channelled by this Richard fellow...

And I'm starring in a 'moving picture' called Heartsfelled! Actually I'm pleased. I knew old Heartsfelled back in the day and he can spin a good yarn or two I can tell you. You never know I might be brought back to star in a few more of these things... Who would have thought it?

Here's my role, scuttling into Ayscoughfee Hall with an urgent message...


Anyway I'm off back to the Netherworld to get a bit of sleep... I'll flog, er sorry, blog you again later!


Erm... yes, Thank you Brother Scuttle. More from him soon...


Richard.

Real Treats for our followers and fans . . .

Today I have such exciting news ... alongside all the developments for the film, Heartsfelled himself is really coming to life before my very eyes!
Today I have an extra special treat for history buffs, food fans, fantasy fiction enthusiasts and, indeed, anyone who loves good fun - our historic fabrics and authentic historic recipes expert, Julia Gant, has decided to produce a special book of recipes for you.  The recipes will be Heartsfellled's favourite foods from across the centuries (as you know he is as old as time and as wise as every story).  I'm told that the first recipe will be for "Chocolate Port" as Heartsfelled says that a sensible little nip of this always helps the stories to flow.  Apparently, this week, he is claiming to be responsible for the invention of every good recipe ever written ... !
To give you an idea of just how seriously good Julia is, only four years ago she catered "The Grand Ball at Villa de Molina"  that was in the ground floor of Napoleon's villa on Elba. The recipes were Careme, Glasse, and Raffald, taken from the originals. The structure was based on one that grande cuisine, French Chef Marie-Antoine Careme himself did for Napoleon.
The recipes will be drawn from all eras and will be embellished with stories and pictures of Heartsfelled to explain how or why each became his one of his memorable favourites.
Not only will this book be fun but it will also give you authentic recipes and fascinating historic insights. 

A peek at one of the special 4and20 tables .... 

Heartsfelled can be seen here (and yes, that's Julia)  appreciating L'art de la Cuisine Francais - this photo taken at Elba! 

Sneak preview, designs on a demon

Wowza!  Today I got a sneak preview of one of the bespoke masks for one of our demons. This is the second demon costume to come together (you've seen the preview of the first one modelled by beautiful Amy, in an earlier post).
It's so exciting to see such craftsmanship and to know that your characters are going to come to life and look so good.  The demon battles are going to be amazing, I cannot wait until filming starts this summer.
Don't forget you can pre-order dvd or book or both, or get yourself an exclusive T shirt or sweatshirt and at the same time be supporting this project just go to -  https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/heartsfelled

The Great Thirsty Higghorþ under design
in the workshops of  Barefoot Leather.

The story of a story . . .

Heartsfelled, a man of many guises

Those of you who've visited this blog before will be pretty familiar with our character, Heartsfelled.  
You'll know about him being a storyteller as old as time. And, you maybe know that in the upcoming film, Heartsfelled is telling a story called The Identity Stealer.

However, some folk are not so sure about the story of the Identity Stealer, so settle back and I'll explain:

The story actually began as a lengthy poem that I created when I was a performance poet.  

Patrisha, the Poet

The poem is called The Fyrdwhaet Saga and because I was feeling adventurous, it a few lines in Anglo-Saxon English.  
Based on someone I knew, it's a set of verses about a charismatic warrior who absorbs people's time and attention so much that I call him  Fyrdhwaet, The Identity Stealer.  
Being an academic myself,  but not being at all an expert or knowledgeable about Anglo-Saxon English, I took the poem to some learned experts to verify that I had written them well enough.  To be honest, I expected them to laugh and pat me on the head and that would be the end of that little project ...  so you can imagine how happy I was to be told to think of it as the beginning of a full-length saga and to keep on writing it.  And so it developed!

Patrisha, the scholar

In that first set of verses,  “Fyrdhwæt, The Identity Stealer” (his name meaning brave or warlike), we are told that his mother who bore him and all of his friends, his family, even his wife, find that in his presence their sense of self and identity become thwarted and sucked away.  So people turn away from him.

I spend happy hours researching Anglo-Saxon words and syntax to the best of my capability.

It's tricky, not least because our knowledge of this long-ago language is restricted to the few sagas and documents we have in the original (such as the wonderful Beowulf), but there's Bosworth and Toller's Dictionary and by the time I was writing this there was becoming some pretty good help on the internet too.

Coming back to the story itself, what we find in the tale of Fyrdhwaet is that he is brave and good at heart. So, when I extended his story to build the Saga it seemed right and proper that he become the slayer of his people's demons.

The Green Man is gone!

I thought hard about olde Englyshe customs and mythology and about how peoples seemed to 'worship' many gods and goddesses, each of which had a role to play in daily life such as bringing forth good crops, clean water or good weather or rain as and when needed. Similarly, the people's demons were creatures of nature, or rather of disturbed nature. So I designed my demons to be the bringers of bad times such as crop failure, drought, or scary darkness (eclipse).

Naturally, the people begin to starve and would have died out (apathy seems prevalent) if it weren't for one small, lone voice who manages to call upon Fyrdhwæt.  The sun won't shine so Fyrdhwæt slays the monster in the dark, alone and unrecognized.

In the second set of verses:  “Bealltain” and “The Silken Tretraw”  we are introduced to the first of three demons, the Tretraw. It is a beast which arrives at the beginning of spring, during the spring festival procession, and it commences to eat up all the trees and green growth, positing stones and rock in the place of sacred woods and vital agriculture.

In the third set of verses:  “Alban Heruin” and “The Thirsty Higghorþ” (a demon drank up the oxygen)

This Thirsty Higghorþ [pronounced High-hoarth . . . with a silent 'p' before the 'th' if you can manage it]  makes its living by drinking all the oxygen and goodness from the air. Once again a small, lone voice manages to call our hero Fyrdhwæt.  The sun won't shine on the battle so our hero struggles until he has slain the monster and saved the people.

In the final set of verses: “Samhain” and “The Miserable Maghmaugh” [pron:maw-maw] we witness our hero as he slays his third and final demon.  This one is a dwimor or ghost which dries out all the water supplies and sacred wells by turning the waters to rosin.

Having written all this, and performed it a couple of times, I set the poem aside to gather dust on a shelf somewhere and almost forgot all about it while tide and times shaped and reshaped my days.
. . . Then, during the Christmas break of 2017 while I was idle and supposed to be resting,

Patricia watches Zak of
Zak Wylde Productions

Julia Gant, Costumier and actress
Nigel Gant - Heartsfelled

I suddenly had the idea of taking the Saga to some new friends who just happened to be first class historians, re-enactors, experimental archaeologists and filmmakers . . !  I even discovered that Nigel Gant, who will play Heartsfelled, has actually studied Anglo-Saxon English. There's not so much of it in the film as we wanted the tale to be accessible to everybody, and lovely Nigel has made it perfect! 

Director and special action actor Pete
Holland of Zak Wylde Productions

As a production team, we've talked and we've worked and we've had a great time bringing this project together. 

At time of writing, we've got the opening sequence under our belts and are looking forward to a long summer of filming the three battle sequences as well as Heartsfelled himself in his Museum of Stories.






For the purposes of telling the story well, we have designed and represented the demons in animal

Amy - the beautiful side of the cunning
Miserable Maghmaugh!

form.  I felt this would be close to Anglo-Saxon thinking.    
The Silken Tretraw is a wolf, the  Higghorþ is a wild boar and the Miserable Maghmaugh is a deer.

. . . Oh, and Tretraw,  Higghorþ and Maghmaugh are names I made up! I hope that answers for you. Thanks again for your interest.

If you would like to pre-order your copy of the film, film and book or if you would like to have a special Heartsfelled T-shirt or sweatshirt or even a mug, or perhaps you'd like to come visit us on-set in Lincolnshire . . . then why not show your support and visit  https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/heartsfelled

Thanks
PB

You know a good thing when you see it -

The support we're getting through  https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/heartsfelled is wonderful.
Of course Zak Wylde productions have proven their talent and skills already in the opening sequence for Heartsfelled, The Identity Stealer - so it's not hard to understand why people want to pre-order the dvd or get their T shirt or even get the chance to visit us on site during this summer's filming.  
Clearly you all know a good thing when you see it.
Truly, I am thrilled. 

 

Stunning Action Amy, a very special member of our cast

I don't know about you but I have a feeling Amy is going to be very popular with our followers and viewers. 

She's a talented artist in her own right as you can see if you visit her facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/AmyHobbsArtist/

From her art, you will also see that she is a big fan of J. K Rowling's Harry Potter, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, and G R R Martin's Game of Thrones. She's a bit of Whovian too and loves it when she gets the opportunity to play the role of Amy Pond at BBC public events . . . she has the legs, trust me.

As if being a talented artist, looking gorgeous in her costume and being an excellent high energy actress isn't enough, Amy is also a serious student of English Backswording and other Martial Arts.

And, on top of all that . . . she is at the beginning of her academic sciences career to train as a medical doctor.  She tells me that her greatest achievement so far is earning offers of places in three different universities. 

Oh, and if you're wondering about her skills with that sword or thinking she looks a bit fierce, Amy also tells me that she hates ignorance and olives!

Filming with Amy this summer is going to be high energy fun I'm very sure.

A Secret Location ... somewhere in deepest Bedfordshire

Yesterday I had a wonderful meeting with Pete and Zak - Director and Director of Photography on the Heartsfelled Project.
Script amendments agreed and everybody smiling, soon I shall be working through these with Heartsfelled the Storyteller himself.
Also, my sincere thanks to Mr. Tom Cree for our great news about the possibility of a much more convenient location for the next few rounds of shooting.  Let's hope this one works out, there's more to this secret location than shown here, but  I am very excited by what I know about it so far. Here's a sneak preview of what it looks like when film-makers go location scouting:

Just imagine our hero-warrior slaying the beautiful, tricksy, ghostly demon here . . .

. . . or, here . . .

And think what sneaky battle moves our pack of wolves will try to execute in here . . .

. . . or maybe here . . . 

   

Yikes!  Is that a wicked wolf-demon disguised as a beautiful woman?  Warriors beware.

























Hey . . . wild boar demon battles have been known to happen in places like this -




















 . . . Oh no! What terrible thing is our Director running away from here?  Look, he's calling for help . . .

So, don't forget to "follow" this blog for updates, and visit our youtube channel and click "like on our intro sequence : https://youtu.be/YirA1M6O9MU

Johnny Who?

I am so proud of the crew working with me on the Heartsfelled project.

Of course, they get up to all sorts of professionally, high standard stuff in the big-wide movie industry.  But, for many weekends in the year, they give their time and HUGE amounts of energy to making not-for-profit films for Johnny Who Entertainment.  The skills involved in filming, editing (don't worry, Zak will sort it out in 'Post Edit'), and the dedication and energy that go into these productions are second to none.  The Johnny Who Entertainments films are popular because they are fantastically good fun.

Here on the Heartsfelled project, I am waiting for masks to go with costumes, a meeting to prepare for the summer's shoots and beyond.  Oh, and inspiration for a bit of writing that is not at all related but needs to get done(!)   So whilst there is nothing much new to show from here why don't you have a look at our introduction trailer and also admire the Johnny Who Entertainments / Zak Wylde Productions' work linked below.

Oh, and before you go look, PLEASE, pretty please, click "like" in YouTube - it helps everybody a lot and lets us know that someone paid us a visit. :)

Look and 'like', how gorgeous our introduction, I just can't wait to see how the main body of this film looks:

https://youtu.be/YirA1M6O9MU


Heeeeeeere's Johnny Who?

https://youtu.be/QEDyJrGUIvM

Watch the first sequence of our movie!

Hey - why not click to watch this on YouTube and give us a boost by clicking "like" while you're there?!
Whether you watch it there or here - please do admire the fabulous work or our actors, director and director-of-photography.  It's a wonderful editing job too.  I think we can guarantee that the main body of this work will be real quality.
ENJOY

Exclusive merchandise now available!

Working on this project is such a privilege and it is exciting.
We want to share our love for Heartsfelled, so we've designed a bunch of goodies with our exclusive Heartsfelled logo that you can buy.
ENJOY

SHOP HERE

Mystical, Magical Monsters!

Well, well, well.
It's been a fun week for me gathering costume measurements, designing half-masks for our demons - these are going to be made for us by a master leather worker.
The gorgeous tooled leather masks will really define our three demons.  When I can, of course, I'll show you some images.
It fascinates me to think of times when people couldn't really understand or explain drought, crop failures, eclipses or extremes of weather.   In order to make the difficulties of their lives make sense, I suppose, it was natural for people to put their faith in many deities.   Earth gods and demons could easily be thanked or blamed!
And so, in my original poem and now in our film, it is demons who travel in the guise of wild animals who come, seemingly in friendship, to the village where our hero Fyrdhwaet resides.  The village Chieftan does not recognise the signs of danger and disaster follows, drought, eclipse and crop failure threaten the people's very lives.  Brave Fyrdhwaet slays each wicked demon all on his own.
As Hearsfelled tells us this tale we will get to see the action and adventures played out.  Designing for these mystical, magical events is such fun.
If you want to follow our progress then please like and follow this Blog.
If you haven't already seen our establishing sequence that introduces Heartfelled's existence and The Ghosts of Times Past that have populated his stories for centuries then have a look now.  This is a real showcase of the skills of our film crew and costumier as well as the lovely ghosts themselves.  If you do visit out YouTube clip click 'like' before you leave 😊
Thank you.

https://youtu.be/YirA1M6O9MU