LOOKING BACK

When Revolution came to Dartmoor

- CHRIS ROBINSON

Donald Sutherland (aka Sgt Major Peasy) inspects the troops on DARTMOOR

(CHRIS ROBINSON)

WHILE a good few local people were recruited to appear as extras in the film Remembrance, notably in some of the Union Street scenes, the numbers were nothing like those associated with another cinematic production that pulled into Plymouth in April 1985.

The film was Hugh Hudson's Revolution, and it was set around the American War of Independence. It starred Al Pacino, Donald Sutherland, Nastasia Kinski, Joan Plowright and Annie Lennox.

Filming mainly took place in King's Lynn but a number of scenes were shot in Devon, at Kingston, on the south coast, and Deancombe - a valley just above Burrator.

Unfortunately, the dam often came into view, so a line of scaffolding was set up along its northern length and vegetation draped over it to disguise the structure.

As Chips Barber and David Fitzgerald record in their book Made In Devon a few years later (1988), the number of extras signed up for the battle scenes included... "118 British Infantry, 50 British Light Infantry, 48 British Grenadiers, 29 British Artillery, 7 British Foot Officers, 4 British Mounted Soldiers/Officers, 10 British Drum and Fife Boys, 150 American soldiers, and 6 American Drum and Fife Boys, a staggering total of more than 400 people.