A YOUNG film maker is appealing to cinema buffs to back his first project – a hard-hitting movie inspired by the horrors of Nazi Germany

Benjamin Eeley, 20, a student at the SAE Institute in Littlemore, Oxford, is launching a crowdfunding initiative to support his film, which is based in the dark days of the Second World War.

Set in the 1940s during the Nazi occupation of France, the film’s working title is Die Jagd (The Hunt).

It follows the harrowing story of a group of allied soldiers being held captive by the Nazis.

The soldiers are subjected to a cruel game in which they are given the chance to escape by running for a boat on the nearby coast, but they are hunted like animals and slaughtered.

Mr Eeley, who lives in Witney and is a digital film production student at the private college in Armstrong Road, hopes to start shooting the film early this summer.

The plot is based on a short horror story written by one of his crew members

He said: “The film at this point is now a pure passion project. I’m starting to get lots of people offering their time and skills to the project free of charge, just to see it made.”

He added: “We are looking to shoot in the early summer of 2018 and have a rough version completed for August, in time for my dissertation hand-in, as this will be my dissertation piece.”

Mr Eeley is writing and directing the film, and will also shoot it all himself, with fellow SAE student Joel Rundle co-directing and producing alongside him.

The rest of the crew consists of students Chloe Bond, Christopher Cosby, Aidan Dolan, Lauren Ridgway, Tom Williams, Chloe Smith, Dani Bonventre and Borja Cervera.

The crew have already shot a slightly altered version of the opening scene as what is known as a proof of concept.

An SAE spokesman said: “This truly captures the despair and fear that will run throughout the final film. The scene will be used to show investors how much the team can accomplish with a very small budget.”

The kickstarter campaign is due to go live next month to raise the money needed to bring Die Jagd to life. The minimum budget is £10,000, but the ultimate goal is to reach £20,000, which would pay for quality sets, equipment and hire the cast, all of which are intended to enhance the production and make the film more engaging.

Mr Eeley also hopes to hire and record a full orchestra to provide a musical score in keeping with the film’s 1940s setting.