Booted | creative collaboration leads to unexpected places
Booted takes the form of a parent’s message to their child, narrated while remembering the course of their life via the medium of their footwear. You could say that Booted is made for talking, and its low-key poignancy is touching and enlightening. And the way the film came together is inspired by key creative collaborations.
Produced by Tiverton-based Sword and Fiddle Productions, it was filmed in 2024 across various locations in the South West, and rooted further in the region with contributions from Bristol Old Vic Theatre School graduate actor Olivia Edwards.
Music is provided by Exeter singer-songwriters Sound of the Sirens); and there’s the warm tones Devon-based voice-over artist and actor Simon Alison.
“Olivia Edwards was the first on board,” Alyn told D&CFilm. Amy had been in touch with her since seeing her in a Shakespeare comedy put on for schools by Bristol Old Vic Theatre School before Olivia graduated in 2020. They’ve stayed in touch because they knew they wanted to work with her.
“We were really pleased to see her in The Salt Path,” said Alyn.
It was a similar story with Sound of the Sirens. Alyn saw them as the support act to Skinny Lister (another band they really want to work with) at the Exeter Cavern, promoting their The Other Me album.
Humour and honesty
“The track we use in the film was one of the stand-outs of the night. The pair’s harmonies really boost the song’s effects, and the way they approach their gigs with humour and honesty really spoke to us of a group we wanted to hang out with,” said Amy.
A chat or two, and an email or two and they secured and paid for a licence to use the song The Part Where You’re Gone for the film in mid-January 2025.
The last person to join the gang was Simon Alison, although they’d known him for a while, as a graphic designer to produce the logotype for Sword and Fiddle Productions and Amy’s writing tutor persona.
A fantastic fit
“Once the decision to have words spoken in the film had been made in May 2025, we knew Simon would be a fantastic fit for the character passing on a message to their child having by then seen him in a couple of other indie films produced in Devon by the Shooters in the Pub gang,” they said. The final recording was at his own home studio in early February 2026.
“As for how we went about making it, I think ‘in fits and starts’ is an adequate description,” said the filmmakers, as they fitted it in with other projects and ‘life’.
Filming time-scale
The original idea was formed in 2023. The story was fleshed out for a rudimentary storyboard and shot list. The locations were scoped in early 2024, with a shot breakdown worked out by mid-March that year. Then Olivia’s scenes were all her filmed in one day. Alyn decided to shoot hand-held with a strap to keep things moving quickly. Early May they captured all of the scenes using our family actors.
“By late May 2024, we had what amounted to a rough cut of the film sat in the Resolve project library, but we knew it needed a lot of finishing touches, while having less of an idea what they actually were!”
Meeting Abbe and Hannah of Sound of the Sirens was a god-send, they said.
Crystallised
“Having the song in our heads really crystallised for us what we wanted the film to say, and got Amy thinking about how we could add to the images to make the story exist,” said Alyn.
But it wasn’t until very late 2025 that Amy was able to write exactly what she wanted. Having Simon’s voice over really helped pull the whole film together, and final decisions on shot timing and the pacing of the film came together quickly.
Inspiration
Finally, the inspiration: simply, Amy’s family is, and her late father was especially, very keen on walking in the countryside, including long distance paths like the South Downs Way.
“The very earliest starting point for the film was the image of a pair of boots tied to the back of a rucksack,” said the Alyn. “Amy is a natural story-teller, so although it’s taken time, she’s wound the threads of the tale until there’s a decent bit of rope to pull on.”
Watch Booted Sword and Fiddle Productions on the federated video site Spectra
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