A satire of our times, this dastardly tale of plotting and intrigue involving the Holy Roman Empire and Hanseatic League with action sets and stunts, forms the first two episodes of a twelve part streaming series, The Saga of Draxfort. Pied Piper and Musicians of Bremen fame is fully exploited in a much bigger story, hopefully inspiring Spring and Oktoberfest carnival floats.

Based around real events, Rats is a classic tale to be endlessly reimagined like Alexander Dumas' Three Musketeers. It’s a romance of the early years of Blodwyn Draxfort, the founder of Castle Draxfort and the Draxfort Dynasty. Driven by fraud and the minting of guilders, salt is as valuable as gold in this hunt to save Blodwyn's father from the gallows. Culminating in the Great Fire of Hamburg on August 5th 1284, we then learn the fate of Hamelin’s 130 children, who really did go missing forty days earlier on 26th June 1284.

The festival and ballroom scenes, including reverse Cinderella parodies, are not only central to the fun and female appeal, but are written specifically for Brunswick’s Burg Dankwarderode, a terrific 19th century reconstructed palace and the seat of the Welf Dynasty, around which much of the politics revolve. Like the nearby Alte Rathaus (Old Town Hall), the Burgplatz palace square is an excellent location, free of traffic and commercial premises. A movie about Burg Dankwarderode will raise its tourist profile, adding more publicity for Rats. The helpful Lüneburg SaltWorks museum will also greatly benefit.

Prague’s Studio Barrandov’s backlot (above) can provide most of the exterior sets. The Hamburg warehouse set needs a sound stage with a tank, best shot in the UK, along with a model of tiny Hamburg. A number of reproduction thirteenth century cog ships are conveniently available in Hanse ports. The road map takes in many Saxony towns and if a scene is shot in each, it could greatly add to pre-release word of mouth. This is a very doable movie, deeper than a fairytale, as dark and scary as a director wants to make it, hopefully with great costumes and a very special look.