A historic submarine moored in a murky Kentish river may be dark, dingy and smell of diesel, but it’s provided the perfect setting for a brand new A-list movie, as Dan Wright found out.

A suspenseful adventure thriller starring Jude Law hits our cinema screens this weekend.
But if you think the A-list actor and his Oscar-winning director enjoyed filming amid the glitz and glamour of Hollywood or in a warm and cosy studio, you’d be wise to think again.

Because the cast of Black Sea, an underwater treasure hunt drama directed by Scotsman Kevin Macdonald, spent a large part of production inside an old Russian nuclear submarine moored on the River Medway in Strood. Glamour may have been lacking in the Medway’s murky waters, but the 1960s-built Soviet sub provided the most realistic of settings.

The screenplay follows a submarine captain, played by Law, who tries to make good with his former employers by taking a job with a shadowy backer to search the depths of the Black Sea for a sub rumoured to be full of gold. Packed with tension, its director strived for authenticity and, after searching online for locations to film at, the Russian sub in Kent fitted the bill.

“We went down thereto have a look and it was the most incredible thing,” Kevin said. “From the outside it looked in poor condition but inside it was perfect. It was like a museum piece.
“I wanted the audience to feel like it really is underwater and, by having a real Black Widow sub, it did just that.”

After his first visit Kevin was instantly attached, and in the summer brought his cast and crew down to Strood. While filming underwater on an aging machine wasn’t easy, the Black Widow sub – previously used to patrol the Baltic Sea – provided the perfect environment.

Kevin added: “I said, ‘We’ve got to film there, you can’t make a set that great.’
“Sometimes you look at a place and it would cost five or 10 million pounds for a set if you wanted to build it. This smelt of diesel and we had to put a pontoon all around it for the cast, but it was worth it. It was expensive, difficult, but so worth it.”

The crew spent a fortnight in Kent before returning to Pinewood Studios to complete filming on a model sub, and the actors enjoyed getting to grips with the true environment for the film, which is released in cinemas on Friday, December 5.

“Actors love being in real places,” Kevin said. “It’s authentic and it couldn’t be any better. All the actors got really used to how you would walk when on a real sub and how to go through the hatches. Then when we went to Pinewood it changed how they worked – it was really worthwhile being on the proper thing.”

No stranger to filming in Medway after his work on Sherlock Holmes at Historic Dockyard Chatham, Jude Law and the cast were ferried to the sub on a boat for shooting everyday.

“It was an operation,” Kevin added. “The pontoon had a little series of platforms we could go on, and it had changing rooms for all of the actors. We had gorgeous weather. We were down in the dark smelling of diesel and then could come up for lunch and it was lovely. The sub was perfect for our story."

He added: “It’s been a long time since there’s been a really good sub movie. Being in a sub is suspenseful – it’s edge-of-your-seat stuff. I love the stuff that goes with it: the ‘ping, ping, ping’ noise and when water starts flooding in. It’s been really fun to make but hard work on the real sub.”

BLACK WIDOW HISTORY
The Russian U-475 – or The Black Widow – is now sat in choppy waters next to Rochester Bridge, on the Strood side. Built in 1967 and remaining in active service until April 1994, foreign submariners from Libya, Cuba and India used it for training.

Black Sea director Kevin says: “It’s pretty unbelievable but it was bought by a local businessman who wanted to turn it into a tourist attraction – the Russian navy was selling its assets. They were bringing it over but it sank in the English Channel. But they had 12 more so they brought another one over – and he got that one.”

Black Widow opened as a tourist attraction at London’s Thames Barrier until 1998 before moving to Folkestone and opening to the public for five years.

Arriving in Medway in 2003, it has remained largely untouched, except for filming purposes.
Black Sea is the second movie to be filmed on the sub. The Fitzroy, a black comedy, was shot there last year.

EXTRA TIME - KEVIN MACDONALD
- Director and producer Kevin Macdonald was born in Glasgow in 1967.
- The 47-year-old won an Academy Award as director of One Day in September, which was voted Best Documentary Feature in 2000.
- He has made manynon-fiction films, both shorts and features, exploring subjects from silent film star Eric Campbell to rock star Mick Jagger.
- His 2003 feature Touching the Void became the highest-grossing British documentary in UK box office history, before he made his first non-documentary feature with The Last King of Scotland.
- Russell Crowe and Ben Affleck starred in his Washington-set thriller State of Play in 2009.

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