Rye and Peacehaven feature in new ghostly thriller The Presence of Snowgood

It comes from Kent-based Neill Mckenzie, of Winchet Hill Publishing, writer and producer for the project, and Heathfield-based director Leigh Tarrant, of Skooch Media. Neill describes it as a classic ghost story, set in 1987, which revolves around the ancient legend of a Saxon crown and those bent on getting their hands on it. A small-budget, independent production, the film features Caroline Munro – an ex-Bond girl, Hammer House of Horror, Sinbad and many other movies – as well as award-winning actress Sarah Maur Ward. “The rest of the cast are top-notch local actors, including some younger cast members,” Neill said. “Working with a professional crew, we also used some very talented students to help us.” It was filmed half in Kent and half in Sussex, Rye featuring for its atmosphere and Peacehaven for the cliff-top location: “There's a fantastic cliff-top scene that we were shooting but I won't tell you too much about it because I don't want to give too much away! "But it was very much towards the end of the film where it is all getting really quite dramatic.” Also featured were Arlington and Hadlow Down. “There was a short film that Leigh did two or three years ago that centred around a legendary Saxon crown and various people trying to find it. This new film is a full-length feature film called The Presence of Snowgood which takes the story on two or three years on from the previous film but there's no need to have watched the previous one. We do a small catch-up. "But the starting point takes us right back to the 1700s and explores this legendary Saxon crown and where it comes from. In the present day what happens is a detective has been sent to try to discover more information about the disappearance of a couple of amateur archaeologists that were looking for this crown. He finds various things going on in the village of Snowgood. The village society is bent on protecting the crown at all costs but also there are supernatural elements that come in that are bent on keeping the crown safe from people trying to find it.” “We started making the film about a year ago and funding initially was from myself and Leigh to help get it started and then we had a very successful crowdfunding campaign. "The filming went very well. We ended up with quite a team. Leigh had his camera team and we had 23 main cast and 32 extras. The filming took a total of about four months and I think we had in total about 30 days’ filming.” Leigh is pleased with the result: “I think it's got quite an epic film quality to it, and we have captured the essence. It is a bit of a Hitchcock film with some other influences coming in from other directors. We have captured a lot of tension and atmosphere. We wanted to make it quite a ghostly story and I do think it's going to be very jumpy for people watching it. If you're in the audience you're going to have quite a roller coaster. The audience is going to experience quite a lot of the nastiness and evil within the human soul.” As for what happens next, Neill said: “In the New Year we will look to see where we can release it officially and on what platforms. In an ideal world we would find an agent that would take it into UK cinemas and perhaps overseas. "The other option is various UK film festivals and worldwide and then we've got the streaming option which is perhaps the last-chance saloon if we have given up on the other options. "It's very easy to put your film on a streaming platform but for us as artists we want to see it in cinemas and at festivals.”