Director's Statement

Out From Under Us is a 90-minute observational feature documentary, with an investigative edge, about the plight of the Acholi people, in northern Uganda.

In 1986, when President Museveni's regime seized power, after a five year bush war, his National Resistance Army forces massacred Acholi civilians, starting the first of three rebellions that culminated in Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army. During 20 years of civil war the entire rural Acholi population was forced into internal displacement, or "concentration" camps, where more died from starvation and maltreatment than the fighting – more than 1,000 a week by 2005, more than in Darfur or Iraq at the time. After 2006 peace talks the LRA agreed to leave Uganda. Acholi farmers returned to their land, only to have government forces tell them this is no longer their land.

We follow the land grabs by government forces from 2012 and show these communities suffering and trying to resist two land grabs, helped by their present and former members of Parliament, local and regional politicians, religious and traditional leaders. This is in the face of armed police, troops and wildlife rangers, hostile government ministers, attacks with spears, machetes and poison arrows and the might of a militarised, authoritarian regime that claims to be democratic.

We show the local MPs facing off armed police, soldiers, arrest, court appearances, jail and a government that ignores Parliament. We give voice to communities forced into camps, tear-gassed, maimed, shot at and beaten and show their progress over time. We also cover the history of why the Acholi fear a genocidal campaign against them by their government.

Mood Board

Project Team

Shooting Producer Director

Marcus Relton is a former newspaper reporter, shortlisted for his investigative work and exclusives, who has produced, directed, shot and helped produce documentaries and current affairs programmes and films.

His main focus is social issues but he has directed short and hour-long documentaries on lighter subjects. His previous work includes directing an hour-long documentary on anti-war protesters trying to stop the 2003 Iraq War, or shield civilians, two half-hour investigations for the BBC, into North Sea oil-rig deaths and how using the Private Finance Initiative to build NHS hospitals causes cuts elsewhere. He has filmed in the UK, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Uganda and continues to develop documentary and current affairs programmes for film and TV, in the UK and internationally.

Executive Producer

Christopher Hird, founder and managing director of Dartmouth Films, is a leading figure in UK independent documentary. He has pioneered new ways of funding, producing and distributing documentaries in the UK and promoting the work of new and emerging filmmakers.

Dartmouth's films have been shown at international festivals like Sundance, IDFA and BFI London and sold to broadcasters and platforms globally. It has produced films funded by private investors, foundation grants, broadcast pre-sales, crowdfunding via the web and TV commissions. It has distributed  its films via cinemas, semi-theatric screenings, on-line, DVD and on TV.

Its greatest success has been the End of the Line, which revealed that the world will run out of fish by mid-century without urgent action. This has been shown all over the world. It had a major impact on UK government policy and pushed supermarkets to source more fish sustainably. It was largely foundation-funded and distributed with a broad alliance of supporters – from supermarket Waitrose to Greenpeace to Surfers Against Sewage.

Associate Producer

Sam Lawino is a newspaper and TV journalist and filmmaker based in Gulu, in northern Uganda. He works with Nation Television Uganda, as NTV Northern Correspondent and is a former news reporter for The Monitor. He covered the civil war in northern Uganda and has been documenting human-rights violations in Acholi sub-region for more than a decade, in relation to the land conflict in Apaa and Lakang, in Amuru district.

Sam lectures at the United Media Consultant and Trainers school of journalism and teaches at the East African Institute of Management Science and Social Science Department of Journalism and mass communication in Gulu.

Rest of Team

We have employed a professional editor with four decades experience in UK television documentaries and current affairs and a production manager who has produced and production-managed feature documentaries. We also have two translators to turn the Lwo language spoken by the Acholi into English. The composer specialises in music from different cultures and ethnicities and Acholi musicians and singers have performed traditional songs for the soundtrack.

Budget 

£10,000 editing (50%), £5,000 contracts rights, legal and accounts (25%) and £5,000 salaries, hardware and software (25%)