Young blood in tune with the countryside at Borderlines Film Festival
A stirring new documentary rooted firmly in the Herefordshire landscape, Tune for the Blood, will screen for the first time on Sunday 26 February as part of Borderlines Film Festival’s 10th anniversary opening weekend.
Filmed through the seasons in the homeland of the famous white-faced Herefords, and with an evocative sound track written and performed by double bassist and Pentangle founder, Danny Thompson, Tune for the Blood portrays farm life through the eyes of some eternally optimistic young farmers. Or rather Young Farmers.
“The Federation of Young Farmers’ Clubs is the biggest unofficial dating agency in the UK,” explains one of the documentary’s stars as he heads into a Young Farmers’ disco in the film’s opening minutes.
There’s not much romance, however, there is a spot-the-white-sheep sequence on a misty mountainside and a moment when young dairyman Jono Rogers finds out one of his promising heifers is a TB reactor and will have to be destroyed. While his body language briefly betrays his bitter disappointment, Jono, remains upbeat about his farming future. “I just know farming is going to be important,” insists one of his fellow Young Farmers.
And Graham Richards who works on the family farm in remote, upland South West Herefordshire adds “I’m doing what I love. I love farming and I’m doing this job. I want to be doing this in 20 years time.”
Their optimism flies in the face of the fact that only 3% of British farmers are under 35. Or that even a modest farm in Herefordshire would demand a capital start up of a quarter of a million pounds.
The figures come from cameraman Richard Branczik and Anne Cottringer, a freelance director and camerawoman who has worked with C4, the BBC and Al Jazeera English among others.
The husband and wife team, themselves based in the Herefordshire borderlands, began work on Tune for the Blood three years ago, after hearing some of the Young Farmers speak at a Borderlines debate on food, farming and the countryside.
“Film making is a bit like farming: It's a real risk when you set out and it takes quite a while to get to the final product. Even then you're not sure how it will be received,” said Anne after the film was screened as a work in progress at the Hay Festival. Having financed the making of Tune for the Blood, they are seeking sponsors for its distribution.
The title Tune for the Blood comes from an erstwhile neighbour of the young dairy farmer, Jono: the Ledbury poet John Masefield’s Tewskesbury Road. “To feel the beat of the rain, and the homely smell of the earth/ Is a tune for the blood to jig to and a joy past the power of words.”
In characteristic style, Herefordshire Young Farmers are throwing their energies into what promises to be a truly spectacular opening for the documentary at The Courtyard in Hereford, with plans for tractors, a green carpet and even livestock!
Tune for the Blood is part of an impressive line-up of rural features and documentaries at Borderlines and Festival Director David Gillam says, “We’re delighted to be showing a home-grown film of such calibre; it’s a vital part of what we do, to provide a showcase for local issues and local film-making.”
Tickets, which are selling fast, are available online at www.borderlinesfilmfestival.org or from The Courtyard Box Office 01432 340555.