A FILM producer from Brechin has picked up a Scottish BAFTA and had her film bought by one of the world’s biggest global entertainment corporations, despite it being made on a shoestring budget of just over £1 million.

Arabella Page Croft and Kieran Parker, who run Black Camel Pictures, a Glasgow-based film production company, were crowned best first time producers for their work at the BAFTA new talent awards for their film Outpost.

The couple remortgaged the family home to fulfil their dream of making a horror film.

Arabella and Kieran, both 37, gambled their Glasgow house and borrowed from friends and family to raise about £300,000.

But the bet paid off. Outpost attracted major investors and has already proved a hit in the US, where it has come out on DVD ahead of its UK release.

Made in Scotland on a budget of £1.2m, the film was bought by Sony Pictures and is now set to hit UK cinemas on May 16.

The film follows a crack team of mercenaries on a routine mission to protect a mysterious businessman through war-torn eastern Europe.

However, after he leads them to a forgotten underground outpost they unwittingly reawaken a lurking terror that soon changes their mission from one of safe-guarding, to one of survival.

The film’s success has not come as a surprise to those in the industry, however, following the BAFTA nominated Tattoo produced by Arabella and her sisters in their hometown of Brechin a few years ago.

“That was filmed totally in Brechin and we were delighted to be able to kick-off our film-making there,” said Arabella.

“It was then I actually met Kieran.

“He was the production manager and I was the producer and we met arguing about who was going to go to Glasgow to pick up licences for the children who appeared in the film.

“That was the beginning and here we are, seven years later, with two children and a BAFTA for Brechin to boot.”

Of Outpost, she said, “Sony basically picked the film up on the back of a 10-minute clip, which they viewed at Cannes.

“To make a first-time feature film of this magnitude and for a major studio to pick it up for world-wide distribution is really a great coup for all of us.

“It’s been two-and-a- half years from the concept to where we are now.

“Ray Stevenson is the lead actor, who many people will know from his appearances in the BBC’s adaptation of Rome, in which he was also the lead actor.

“It really all has been a bit of a fairytale. But the key to it all is what happens on May 16.

“This is when we really gauge success because ultimately you are only as good as the people who go to see the film.”

The couple are already joining up with the Outpost team for director Steve Barker’s next feature film—Blood Makes Noise, a vampire revenge thriller.