Ward 105B2 - Reel 06

Ward 105B2 was a delicate operation to put to film, Josh, Indy and Joseph had been working on their Vietnam war veteran characters for more than 12 months to prepare for this film and it was a great challenge to make their constant in-jokes relatable to the uninitiated viewer.

We decided to focus heavily on an old 1970s documentary film style with crude visuals, bad quality sound, terrible cuts and a feeling that you've missed some terribly important information that you can't seem to work out. It was definitely a challenge to make a film that looked broken, amateurish, un-complete and forgotten, but that was the joy in the project. There is a liberation in destroying the rules you've worked so hard to learn.

When the boys are in character their performances are so complete that you can easily mistake them for another person. the timid shyness of their normal selves is transformed into a brazen rudeness that pervades their toxic masculine environment. Any challenge that I threw at them was embraced effortlessly and they made it fit the film as if it was always meant to be that way. The guided meditation scene is a striking example of this.

As we've been spreading the film to war veteran communities and we've started to get feedback on the film it has been heartbreaking to hear that the troubles that we talk about in our film are plaguing generations of war veterans around the world. Disillusionment with society, discomfort with home life, misunderstandings of friends and loved ones, a deep fear of triggers that can open bad wounds and a distrust of other people because of the feeling of being deeply lied to.

There is a sequel in the works that will go deeper into these themes, because we have only just opened Pandora's box, and there is a lot more inside to talk about.