Birmingham city centre became one of the stars of an ambitious science fiction film when creative types from all over the country assembled under the guidance of Birmingham-based Rebel Uncut's Julia Higginbottom (producer) for a four-day film shoot.
Written by Mike Sizemore, who also co-directed with Andrew Sykes, and starring Haruka Abe (47 Ronin, About Time, Ideal) & Daniel Ings (Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Psychoville) Merica Adams is a highly ambitious science fiction short film about 15 minutes long.
It tells the tale of a super cool time-travelling assassin, described as a sexy drunk alternative to Doctor Who, who carries a gun instead of a sonic screwdriver and travels through time to complete assignments and who isn't too fussed about messing up time lines to get the job done.
Conceived and born in 48 hours in 2011 for the Sci-Fi-London Film Festival 48-Hour Film Challenge, Merica Adams made her first appearance in a five minute short Precision, written by Mike Atherton , directed by Andrew J Sykes, again with Haruka Abe as Merica.
An ambitious piece, considering the constraints, that was very well received by the sci-fi and film community.
See the short film Precision here
Precision was so well received and the small gang had so much fun creating the character of Merica Adams that it was only a matter of time before they expanded the idea creating an entire back story and world for Merica to exist in.
The original team, rounded off by composer Steve Kilpatrick and artist Dave Kennedy, reunited in Birmingham, which was chosen for its fantastic range of internal and external locations, such as under the Rotunda, Ludgate Hill near the Jewellery Quarter & St Paul's Square.
The city is also the base of operations for production company Rebel Uncut.
Precision was created in 2011 with a cast and crew totalling four people.
To achieve their ambitions this time round, producer Julia Higginbottom took charge of a cast and crew team totalling up to 25 including six special ops chaps, complete with incredibly realistic weapons provided by JD Airsoft in Cannock.
When it came to weaponry though, Merica Adams needed something custom made, something as iconic as Doctor Who's sonic screwdriver, so the team employed cutting edge technology using 3D printing to create a hand gun individually suited to Merica's character.
A one of a kind item, for a one of a kind lady.
"Everything had to be more ambitious this time out and Julia assembled not only a first rate crew, but also found the perfect locations right here in Birmingham," Sizemore said.
The first block of filming is wrapped with a second block to still to come.
Post production for editing and the all important visual effects will follow shortly afterwards, word is though that Merica Adams and Birmingham are looking fantastic already.
Great to see Birmingham attracting top talent to the city, something we will hopefully see more of from Julia and the team at Rebel Uncut in the near future.
Keep up to date with Merica Adams progress on Twitter and Instagram with the hashtag #MericaAdams.
Christian Payne's Twitter account and his on-going Storify follows the behind the scenes making of Merica Adams.
Haruka Abe also starred in the video to the chart-topping single Rather Be by Clean Bandit (below)
