Station Zero

Last year Sarah Reeve and I embarked on our third film project, Invisible Pictures . I was aiming for something smaller and quieter than Gwenevere or Prairie Rascals , and we wanted to work in black and white for a change. I also fancied adapting someone else's story rather than coming up with my own.  I'd always thought Stefan Zweig 's short story The Invisible Collection would make a good film. It's set in Germany in the 1920s (around the time it was written) but I assumed it could be updated and relocated. However, when I reread it, I realised that the runaway inflation of the Weimar era was a load-bearing element for which I could think of no good modern substitute. So we found ourselves with another period piece on our hands.  Luckily, our local steam railway, the South Devon Railway , were very helpful and let us film on one of their regular Buckfastleigh-Totnes services, and parts of Totnes served well enough for a German town. (Excellent Totnes booksellers The...