Acting

Two brothers become estranged after the passing of their father, setting the stage for an inevitable war between them.

Bleed was always meant to be a feature. Sree created the story and made the short as its proof of concept, distilling the story into a single night. It follows the night their father dies, when Benji, a fighter raised to chase a dream that was never his, tells his brother he wants out and a new life with Olivia.

The role asked Sree to hold a lifetime of resentment and guilt in check, let it out in a fight with his own brother, and carry the film’s final choice almost without words. He trained for six months alongside co-star Jack Spangler, who had never boxed, under an active amateur boxer and Muay Thai fighter, and choreographed the final fight. Before a punch was thrown on camera, he ran the cast through three table reads and six rehearsals so the brothers’ history would read on screen.

Now he’s developing Bleed into the feature it was always meant to be.

Key scenes

• 6:15Benji v Gabriel
• 9:55The ring confrontation
• 11:45The final fight

How it got made