IF you spotted a chase in Old Town yesterday, it was nothing to worry about.

A film director and production company was in town shooting a movie – and there are hopes it will make it all the way to Cannes film festival. The Black Spot, written and directed by Ollie Rogers, is a 'sci-fi film noir' and is being shot in black and white.

The plot follows Solider 23 and his attempts to save a girl with telekinetic abilities from an evil organisation. Actors and crew were in Old Town yesterday shooting chase scenes.

Ollie, who studied film at New College, said: “It started off as a short film I made at college called Full Disclosure. It went down quite well and we got to make a second one.

"We then developed it into a web-series and now we’re getting to make it into a whole feature film.”

Ollie said the team had big plans for the movie: “We hope to get it finished in about a month or so and then after that we’re going to hit festivals.

"We’ll aim big and go for ones like Sundance, Moondance or Cannes, but we’ll play smaller festivals as well. As many as we can basically.

“I’ve been directing and writing for about five years. My first film was just me and my mates running around with a camera.

"Then I went to college and studied film and grew and learned from helping out on other people’s films.We’re doing this as a springboard for everyone involved really to prove that we can make a good feature film for next to no money. So hopefully it’ll lead onto to bigger things."

Asked what he thought about filming in Swindon, he said: “There’s lots of friendly people here, there’s a big community that all help each other out with filming. It’s really good for that.”

Producer Doug Kirby agreed. He said: “Swindon is a great place to film. It is a bit confusing to start with because unlike places like Bristol and Bath there’s no film office (which promotes the town as a possible location for films) here.

"But the council has been helpful, certainly the police, the local media, they’ve just been brilliant."

Doug added: “There are other feature films being shot in Swindon right now and people don’t seem to realise that the town does have a great little film industry here.”

Asked whether he thought a film office for Swindon would help he said: “I think it would. The problem is that you would then have to employ people to run the film office and then you’d have to charge film making licence fees to film makers.

“So for our very small, low-budget film makers in Swindon that’s going to be a shock but I think it is definitely the way to go to promote the town as a film making centre. It is half-way between the big studios at Pinewood and other centres in Bristol or Cardiff, so why not?”