The Boxer from Somewhere Else is a feature documentary film 15 years in the making which is about the life and career of Ken Buchanan. The concept came from Jamie Steedman, a film professional from the same city as Buchanan, Edinburgh. Jamie was talking to his father one day who was telling a story about his friend who owned an infamous pub in Edinburgh. Through this story he learned he was an amateur boxer who fought Ken Buchanan in the 1950’s.

Jamie became intrigued who Ken Buchanan was so he bought his autobiography and read it from cover to cover very quickly. He was captivated by Buchanan’s story and managed to persuade his father to set up a meeting with Ken. There was no intention to make a film initially but after meeting Buchanan where he relayed tales from his life, the idea came to capture this yet untold story on film in a cinematic, feature film format.

Buchanan agreed to do it and later on that year, after Jamie structured a feature length interview, the shooting began. Over the following year Jamie filmed Ken fly-on-the-wall documentary style taking him to places from throughout his childhood and capturing his emotional reactions to it. In 2012 the film was complete and a private, red carpet event was organised, sponsored and arrange at the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh in March 2012 to which Ken Buchanan came along and did a talk.

From here, the film was unable to go on general release due to production costs including certain archive footage licences which Jamie Steedman was unable to secure enough interest from investors or film partners to take the project forward.

After many years of trying, Jamie Steedman eventually put the film into the background but never gave up hope. Then one day in the summer of 2022 his world was rocked by the sudden death of his father from a stroke. Jamie’s father Ricky had been his biggest supporter of the film and this was a major blow to know that he would never see the film released. Then a year later, a month before Jamie’s wedding, his older brother who he looked up to in a huge way suddenly passed away after going out for a run on a Saturday morning at the young age of 46.

Jamie started to think that if you want to do something in life you should just do it because tomorrow could be the last day of your life. He set about removing the archive footage that was unobtainable and replacing it with his own illustrations and animation and then in 2023 after many years, finally a distributor, AJAMAX Productions saw the film and believed in the project as much as Jamie did all along. The film is finally set for release in Vue Cinemas from June 2025.