Stirling will have a big studio<\/a> with big sound stages and everything 30 years after I made Braveheart. I certainly hope they\u2019ll have decent incentives there.\u201d<\/p>\nThe legendary star, who played William Wallace, premiered the film at Stirling\u2019s Macroberts Arts Centre in September 1995.<\/p>\n
This month has seen a series of events in Stirling celebrating the film.<\/p>\n
Built on former MoD land, Stirling Studios spans 210,000 square feet, which will make it one of the biggest film studio campuses in Scotland.<\/p>\n
![\"Stirling](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_KMR_SOW_160424STUDIOS_13_result.jpg\")
Stirling Council expects the studios to pave the way for thousands of high-skilled jobs as well as major economic benefits(Image: Christopher Jackson Drone Videography & Photography.)<\/p>\n
It could pave the way for thousands of high-skilled jobs.<\/p>\n
Thrilled over the news that he has helped inspire the studio and the boost to tourism in the area, Gibson says the studio could help Scotland capitalise on Hollywood’s decline.<\/p>\n
The actor and director, who is currently in Italy for the making of his latest epic, The Resurrection of The Christ, said: \u201cYou think, what\u2019s Hollywood? Where is it? Who are they? I mean it\u2019s nothing anymore. You go there and it’s not happening. That industry is atrophying.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat once was the mecca of filmdom is now a shambles.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe incentives to work there are not good.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe workforce has left for greener pastures. They’ve taken their talents elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe economy is terrible after those fires and everything. It really messed things up too.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s a confluence of all sorts of horrors.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s now up to the rest of the world to make good art, cinematically.”<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1_Braveheart.jpg\")
Stirling which has served as a filming location for several iconic films including Braveheart has now been named among the UK\u2019s most popular filming locations(Image: Sunset Boulevard\/Corbis via Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Stirling Council Leader Gerry McGarvey said: “It’s astonishing, that 30 years on, Braveheart remains a key driver for visitor numbers to the National Wallace Monument, Stirling and Scotland.<\/p>\n
“As we celebrate this milestone, it’s fitting that we are progressing with the exciting and transformational Stirling Studios project.<\/p>\n
“This means in the future we will be able to host high-end productions such as Braveheart here in Stirling, delivering significant economic benefits in another key sector of the Scottish economy.”<\/p>\n
Gibson added: \u201cWe made a film in Vegas and needed a day of reshoots and I thought, we’ll do it in LA, but it was cheaper to take the whole crew and fly them all to Bulgaria.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe housed and fed them for three days and nights and flew them all back. It was less expensive to do that than to shoot for one day in LA. That tells you something.\u201d<\/p>\n
His latest film, a sequel to 2004\u2019s blockbuster The Passion of the Christ, is<\/p>\n
being made at Rome\u2019s Cinecitta Studios.<\/p>\n
Dubbed Hollywood on the Tiber, Cinecitta is where over 3,000 movies have been made by the likes of Federico Fellini, Sergio Leone and Martin Scorsese.<\/p>\n
Gibson said: \u201cThis is a big one. It\u2019s a monster, but I’m up for it.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to see demons and angels and everything else. I don’t think I’ll ever get this big again. I’ll stick to drawing room comedies after this.\u201d<\/p>\n
The story, spread over two films, will take eight months to complete.<\/p>\n
He said: \u201cIt\u2019s a kick in the pants, but that’s good. Go big or get out, right?\u201d<\/p>\n
Unlike Braveheart, he’ll remain behind the camera.<\/p>\n
Gibson said: \u201cI would never do that again because Braveheart damn near killed me.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was 38 years old and I said, \u2018I’m not doing that again\u2019. It gave me grey hair.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also ruled out a sequel to Braveheart.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don’t think so because I kind of did it,\u201d he said. \u201cBut it’s an interesting and complicated history.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom what I read in history books it was a real clusterf***k.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was every degree of allegiance and they were all out for themselves, almost like mafia.\u201d<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_JS39573266.jpg\")
BRAVEHEART MEL GIBSON <\/p>\n
On playing Wallace, he added: \u201cHe\u2019s an archetype. I liked the place and the time and the conflict and the people.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody had gone there as far as filmmaking went<\/p>\n
\u201cI’d never seen anything like that kind of story in that part of the world at that time. I thought it was an interesting area to go into.\u201d<\/p>\n
The film earned him five Oscars including Best Director and Best Picture, but Gibson says he fell victim to Hollywood rivalries.<\/p>\n
He said: \u201cIt was very strange. The screenplay was at MGM\/UA and I\u2019d read it about two years before. I couldn\u2019t get it out of my head.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt evolved to the point where I thought, \u2018I have to shoot this\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlan Ladd, Jr, who was the executive in charge of that script, got the golden handshake from MGM UA.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe took off with three scripts. Braveheart, the Brady Bunch, and some other B-title and he got an indie production deal at Paramount precisely at the point when I decided I wanted to do it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI asked to direct it and MGM\/UA heard about it and they got pissed off.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey said to their guys, \u2018Get in the vault and find me some Scottish movie and we\u2019ll do it real cheap and nasty. We’ll do it before Braveheart comes out\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody was doing anything in that area of Scottish history. All of a sudden there was Rob Roy, which was this real piece of garbage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was an ordinary film. They started filming after us, even used some of our sets and bought some of our stone. It was crazy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey started a month after us, they finished a month before us, and they released a month before us. It was a real play.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey even had articles in the LA newspapers where people who hadn’t seen our film were trashing it and saying, \u2018This is better\u2019.<\/p>\n
![\"Mel](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_The-Premiere-of-Braveheart.jpg\")
Mel Gibson attends the premiere of Braveheart in Stirling on September 3, 1995(Image: Mirrorpix)<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was an agenda because somebody’s nose was out of joint.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause Rob Roy wasn’t very good it killed our box office a bit in the cinemas in the US.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt should have done better because it was released on Memorial Day. It did all of $75 million at the box office in the US, and that fell short of where I thought it should have been.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it did okay in the rest of the world. It did about $230 million or something, which was respectable.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfterwards, it was a record-selling VHS.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cWe spent about six weeks filming Braveheart in Fort William. I really loved it there. I was in a B&B eating haggis and eggs for breakfast.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember waking up one morning and there was somebody on the pipes out there in the fog and there were deer running around and stuff.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, it was kind of a magical time.<\/p>\n
![\"Mel](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_braveheart-scene.jpg\")
In the film, Wallace sets out to battle King Edward I of England, who killed his bride a day after their marriage(Image: Getty)<\/p>\n
\u201cI enjoyed making the film immensely. It was hard work, but the Scottish portion of the filming was at the beginning of the shoot when I had more energy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s usually about eight weeks before you start to really feel it. After about eight seven-day weeks and getting hung, drawn and quartered.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I have good memories. I just remember that it was a monumental thing.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt felt like being dropped in the middle of the ocean, taking a stroke at a time until you hit land, and that’s when you’re finished.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome days we had 3000 people on the set with the crew and all the extras. Everybody had to get fed.<\/p>\n
Join the <\/strong>Daily Record’s WhatsApp community here <\/strong><\/a>and get the latest news sent straight to your messages.<\/strong><\/p>\n\u201cI knew it was a big thing. I was so involved and immersed in it that I didn’t see the forest for the trees sometimes. And it took a while. The Stirling battle scene alone was half-a-million feet of film.<\/p>\n
“Fortunately, I had a good editor when we crawled out of the slime.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Hollywood icon reacted positively to the news that his iconic Braveheart film has inspired the building of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":437703,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5009],"tags":[119519,748,148278,4884,712,2269,148276,16,15,148277],"class_list":{"0":"post-437702","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scotland","8":"tag-braveheart","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-fort-william","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-scotland","13":"tag-stirling","14":"tag-stirling-council","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-william-wallace"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115234713969745684","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=437702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/437703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=437702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=437702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=437702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"LONDON,](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_GettyImages-875009554.jpg\")
Actor Mel Gibson(Image: Getty)<\/p>\n