Bruce Almighty

OUTLAW KING I Hell Or High Water Director David Mackenzie Takes On A Scottish Icon And Braveheart In This Netflix Epic

So what have you seen so far?” asks Aaron Taylor-Johnson. The answer is simple: mud, mud and more mud. Teasers knew it was in for a squelchy experience when the message “bring wellies” was received. But this is something else. His beard, hands and tunic caked in grime, Taylor-Johnson is almost unrecognisable as the star of Kick-Ass. “It’s been a pretty relentless, gruelling journey this one, man,” he says. “It’s been an experience, that’s for sure.”

Well, that’s one way to describe Outlaw King, the new Netflix-produced feature about the life of Robert the Bruce. Starring Chris Pine as the medieval Scottish warrior, it’s directed by David Mackenzie, hot off his indie hit Hell Or High Water. “It’s certainly the biggest film of my career in terms of the scope and scale and budget and period,” the director says, when Teasers finds him conducting a battle scene of epic proportions.

Today, in Mugdock Country Park, some 30 minutes from Glasgow, 400 extras, armed with broadswords and axes, are recreating the famous Battle of Loudoun Hill, in which Robert the Bruce’s forces took on the English troops of Edward I in May 1307. Horse carcasses and corpses (fake, of course) lie everywhere, while smoke and swearing fills the air.

For Pine – reuniting with Mackenzie after Hell Or High Water – it’s a dream come true. “I just wanted to do it because I wanted to swing swords and be a kid,” he grins.