The Film Premiere of the Hull Freedom Trail film 'Hull of a drive' took place at the Vue Cinema at the top of the Princes Quay Complex on Tuesday 15th April, 2008.  The Lord Mayor and her escort were in attendance to see the film and to meet the 24 trekkers at the reception which followed the film.  The drivers of the Rotary sponsored vehicle, Bas Blackbourn, Chrissy Moog and Dr. Isobel Fleming were on hand to explain Rotary's patronage of the event.

The instigator of the Trail, Jonathan Richards, gave a short lead-in to the film, in which he introduced Rita from one of the benefitting charities in Sierra Leone.  She said how much she appreciated what the team had done and how useful the 4 X 4 would be to the orphanage.  Jonathan then praised the work of the producer of the film; Claudio explained a few of the difficulties that he had overcome to make the film and also what fun it had been to work with a bunch of ordinary people completing an extraordinary task.  He praised the film editors who had had the difficult job of selecting ninety minutes out of the 80 Hours of film that he had shot.

Jonathan thanked the Lord Mayor for coming to the Premier and asked her if she would like to say a few words.  The Lord Mayor said that her term was drawing to a close and she could say with certainty that the day in October that she sent off the team to Sierra Leone was the most moving and memorable of her year in office.

The film, although a documentary telling of the journey in chronological order, explored some of the events that befell the team in enough detail for us all to appreciate the anguish that the trekkers went through.  There had been many emotions that they had all felt, as the journey had not been straight forward after Morocco.  The passage through the borders had generated the most stress.  The officials had had to be bribed, but much time was waisted too, so that the trek was always behind the schedule necessary to meet the flights out of Freetown to take team members back home to England.  The episodic treatment of the film and the climax of the handover of the vehicles in Freedom worked very well.  Jonathan hoped that we would see it again on national TV soon.

A reception followed in a vacant shop in the complex, which was decorated with 8' x 4' photos of the Trail and had a counter, where a glossy book of Mark Kensett's and Justine McMillan's photos of the trip was on sale at £25.  We were also asked to put our names down for a DVD of the film, which would be £15.  The team were very ready to talk to the audience about their experiences and more photos were taken.