The Story Unfolds

This is where I hope to give you an insight into the process of researching, developing and making films about Rome's Forgotten War. Here you'll find interviews with relevant experts, artefacts, documents and locations that seem particularly important or inspiring. Interview excerpts have been cut with experimental images using an AI generator, both as a fun way to illustrate these chats and to begin exploring how we might use this technology in film.

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110

Miles Russell research interview shorts

Dr Miles Russell is the lead archaeologist on one of our other stories - Life and Death in Celtic Britain. But as an authority on the Iron Age, he knows an awful lot about Roman Conquest across Europe and about the cultures the Romans stamped out or claimed as their own. He has a particular interest in Rome's approach to conquest and how they adapted this over time. He has an encyclopaedic knowledge of Roman source material and a gift for bringing this history to life in an engaging way. I particularly love his ideas about women in Iron Age society, and how they were viewed by the Romans.

105

Introducing Dr Jesús Francisco Torres Martinez

Dr Torres Martinez is key to this story and these excavations. They are and will continue to be his life's work. He was born in these mountains and, like the Cantabrians, considers himself a 'highlander'. With a mountaineering background, he is driven by a passion for unearthing the Celtic history of his ancestors. It is his knowledge of the mountains, its volatile climate and difficult terrain, that has allowed him to investigate these locations more thoroughly than ever before. Having briefly come across Dr Torres Martinez on a Sky History series, I was left completely convinced that there was a much bigger story to tell and, when I approached him, thankfully, he agreed with me and got fully behind my plans. So far I haven't asked him a question he hasn't been able to answer; his knowledge of Iron Age history is encyclopaedic. Still, although he is brilliant, for a longer form film I will need to look for other voices to help tell the wider story. Dr Torres Martinez carries out this work under his own company - IMBEAC or the Monte Bernorio Institute of Ancient Studies of the Cantabric. You will often hear me refer to him as Kechu - the shortened version of his forename - as it is a lot easier for me to say than his full name!

100

Dr Daisy Dunn

Dr Daisy Dunn is another brilliant historian I was introduced to by Saul David. Talking to her really helped me to start thinking about Augustus as a real person, how his personal flaws and weaknesses shaped his decisions. As Caesar's heir, he had an awful lot to live up to. It feels like a privilege to be able to put meat on the bones of someone who lived so long ago. To look beyond the statues and the propaganda, as much as we are able to.