About The Filmmaker

Finlay Pretsell

Finlay started working for the Scottish Documentary Institute in 2005, during which time he has acted as Production Assistant and Production Manager on a number of short films. Finlay has gone on to co-produce and co-direct with Adrian McDowall Standing Start, Slice and One Track Mind a series of sport related docs. Standing Start was shortlisted for the Grierson Best Newcomer 2008 and was big hit on the festival circuit.

He’s currently developing Kill the Mink! Along with a number of other documentary and fiction projects with Imagine Pictures (the film production company he co-owns with Adrian). Finlay also oversees the distribution and production of Bridging the Gap films.

Adrian McDowall

Over the past ten years, writer, director and producer, Adrian McDowall has amassed over 50 national and international awards and nominations for his short films, documentaries, TV dramas, commercials and promos; including two BAFTA Awards, an RTS Award, an XFM Music Video of The Year Nomination and a Grierson Best Newcomer 2008.

Adrian was selected by Lars Von Trier’s Zentropa and Sigma Films, as one of eight award winning first-time feature film-makers for the new feature film collective Advance Party II. The films will be produced over the next two years.

In June 2009, Adrian was included on Screen International's prestigious "Stars of Tomorrow" list.

Summary

Bench Pressing isn’t a hobby for 73 year old Bill McFadyen – it’s a way of life. Stranraer’s very own bench press champion is on a quest to be the best in the world...

Questionaire

What did you shoot and edit on?

A mixture of DVCAM / Mini DV on a Sony Z1 / Canon XL2 and edited on Avid. We used a 35mm adapter on the Z1 which gave us the great depth of field we wanted for some of it.

How did you find your contributors?

The film is mostly funded by Dumfries and Galloway council, we were given a list of hundreds of athletes in the area and asked to make 3 profiles of local athletes for the opening of a state of the art sports centre in Dumfries (SW Scotland). We looked down the list and saw Bill McFadyen, powerlifter and we thought this could be interesting, then we saw his age! We had to meet him and when we did we knew instantly that there had to be a film made about him, he was a bundle of energy and so warm. We hung out with him for quite a while and showed him other films we’d made and what we intended to do with him before filming. He’s a bit of a natural though on screen and I think mostly enjoyed the experience.

Where has the film been seen and how did it get there?

So many places around the world and it’s thanks to the Scottish Documentary Institute’s festival distribution strategy. Sundance really put the film on the map though in terms of exposure nationally and internationally. We appeared on BBC news twice, ITV made a 15min ‘Making of Ma Bar’ which aired prime time 4 times and we appeared in a few newspapers too all off the back of a 12minute film!

What’s been the best thing about having made the film?

Showing so many people what an extraordinary man can do at such an age…hopefully inspiring people to get off their arses too! Also exposing us as filmmakers, hopefully making it slightly easier to access funding to make more.

What are you doing now?

Finlay is making a film called Kill the Mink! About a mink eradication project in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland and Adrian is working with Zentropa and Sigma Films on his fiction feature debut.