The idea for Midgies was, in part, born just over a year ago, when author and screenwriter, Barry Hutchison, jokingly pitched the idea to one of his reader groups. What he thought would be a quickly forgotten bit of internet filler soon took on a life of its own, though, with thousands of reactions amassing on the posts in the first few hours.
People, it seemed, loved the idea.
It was the next day that the BBC News website picked up on the story. Barry was interviewed for an article for the site, then thought no more about it. That, surely, would be the end of it.
It was not.
Within hours of the story going live, people from all over the world were contacting Barry to tell him how much they loved the idea. It went viral on Scottish social media, and journalists across the globe started calling and emailing for interviews.
All this caught the eye of producer and director, Alessio Avezzano, who immediately fell in love with the idea, and saw the potential for turning the joke into an actual movie.
After they bounced some ideas back and forth, Barry locked himself away in a hotel room for a week, and wrote the first draft of the script in 5 days, about a woman and her daughter who get caught up in a mutant midgie swarm, and their desperate battle for survival.
But, you know, with funny bits.
Though it has evolved in subsequent drafts, the core of the script remains the same. It has mother-daughter bonding, heroic sacrifices, heavily armed mercenaries, deranged scientists, laughs, tension, drama, and horror.
And midgies. Lots, and lots, and lots of killer midgies. Flesh-eating swarms of the little buggers, in fact.
And it all began with a silly little social media post, and a handful of AI generated images.
