Year: 2026
Director: Jeanie Finlay
Producers: Charlie Phillips, Jeanie Finlay
Co-Producers: Nadja Lepcevic, Anke Peterson
Executive producers: Julie Parker Benello, Shanida Scotland, Mark Thomas
Production Companies: I Am Charlie Productions, Glimmer Films
Screen Scotland support: The film accessed £100,000 through Screen Scotland's Film Development and Production Fund.
Synopsis
The North-East of England: Fisherman Stan Rennie has worked the same stretch of coastline, where the river meets the sea, for over fifty years; the trade has been in his family for centuries. So when a vast tide of poisoned crabs and lobsters washes ashore like a biblical plague in the wake of a new Brexit-fuelled development along that same coastline, Stan’s world is turned upside-down overnight. Have the sins of the industrial past come back to haunt the present?
Dealing with the devastation of his business and his own failing health, Stan finds himself thrown into a battle for the future. As officials equivocate, he becomes the unlikely figurehead for a grassroots campaign to uncover the truth about the die-off, managing it in the only way he knows how, with heart, determination and a rich strain of gallows humour.
A wry, David and Goliath story about navigating through grief and finding power in community.
A film by Teessider Jeanie Finlay.
More information
Filming locations: Hartlepool and the Teesside coast
Premiere: The film will have its World Premiere at CPH:DOX in March 2026.
Image credits: Still credit Andy Martin