Six Films Commissioned for the 2018 Scottish Shorts Programme

Scottish Film Talent Network is delighted to announce the six short films commissioned for the New Talent Scottish Shorts 2018 programme.

Supported by the National Lottery through Creative Scotland and the BFI (awarding funds from the National Lottery), this talent development programme targets Scottish based writers, directors and producers with bold and exciting stories to tell to international audiences.
The following six shorts will receive individual budgets of £15,000 and go into production later this year:

1. DARK ROAD (Drama)
Writer/Director: Rory Gibson; Producer: Douglas Cox

2. DUCK DAZE (Black Comedy/Drama)
Writer: Julia Taudevin; Director: Alison Piper; Producers: James Heath & Tom Gentle

3. EXPENSIVE SHIT (Drama)
Writer/Director: Adura Onashile; Producers: Ciara Barry, Rosie Crerar & Alia Ghafar

4. ONCE UPON A TIME IN NORTH GLASGOW (Drama)
Writer/Director: James Price; Producer: Dave Gilles

5. LUCKY STAR (Drama)
Writer/Director: Russell Davidson; Producer: David Neilson

6. THE FABRIC OF YOU (Animation)
Writer/Director: Josephine Self; Producer: Calum Hart

The six shorts were selected from 13 filmmaking teams who undertook a series of development workshops and masterclasses throughout June and July focussing on story, script and production led by producer Paul Welsh, DigiCult, and supported by producer Carolynne Sinclair Kidd,Hopscotch Films. The 13 teams pitched their projects to an industry panel comprising of representatives from Scottish Film Talent Network and Creative Scotland.

Two of this year’s selected filmmakers are graduates of last year’s SFTN Write4Film programme. Adura Onashile and Julia Taudevin, both award winning playwrights and theatre-makers, participated in the inaugural year that helped introduce to screenwriting six established writers from other artforms.  Adura’s short will be produced by Rosie Crerar and Ciara Barry, BFI Vision Award Producers who are supported for their work with new and emerging filmmakers.  James Ley, another playwright from the 2017 edition of Write4Film, is also developing his first feature film with SFTN.

Holly Daniel, Executive at Scottish Film Talent Network, said: “This is the fourth edition of the SFTN Scottish Shorts programme and we continue to be amazed and excited by the high level of talent that submit to take part. As always it was a difficult decision but we feel the range and mix of voices being supported this year are outstanding and will produce a fantastic selection of short films. Having two SFTN Write4Film alumni in the selection is a brilliant example how of how professional development can help talented Scottish writers from other mediums bring their skills and voices to film..”

Ross Mckenzie, Screen Officer at Creative Scotland, said: “Again this year we were presented with a range of high quality projects that have benefited from intensive development over the course of the Scottish Shorts workshops. The six projects commissioned for production demonstrate great depth and deal with a range of issues that we expect will resonate with audiences at home and internationally. We’re delighted to be offering these teams the opportunity to realise their vision and make high quality films that will showcase Scotland’s creativity to the world, and support the selected filmmakers in making the important next step in their careers. ”

This is the fourth edition of the Scottish Shorts programme under SFTN. Previous participants have benefitted from the production of their first funded work to help progress their careers.

The full press release can be found on the SFTN website.

Stop All the Clocks: W.H. Auden in Age of Anxiety shortlisted for a Grierson documentary Award

We're delighted to announce that a Hopscotch production Stop All the Clocks: W.H. Auden in Age of Anxiety has been shortlisted for a Grierson documentary Award in Best Arts or Music Documentary category. Congratulations to everyone else on the shortlist!

See the full shortlist

Arcadia released in UK cinemas on 21st of June

The critically-acclaimed Hopscotch production Arcadia is coming to UK cinemas on the 21st of June! 

Scouring 100 years of archive footage, BAFTA-winner Paul Wright constructs an exhilarating study of the British people’s shifting — and contradictory — relationship to the land. The film goes on a sensory, visceral journey through the contrasting seasons, taking in folk carnivals and fetes, masked parades, water divining and harvesting. Set to a grand, expressive new score from Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Will Gregory (Goldfrapp) alongside folk music from the likes of Anne Briggs, Wright’s captivating film essay captures the beauty and brutality, and the magic and madness of rural Britain.

“Arcadia is a revolutionary document” — Paul Kingsnorth, author

“An exhilarating audio-visual journey” — Sight & Sound

“There is magic in this film. 9/10” —  Uncut

FIND SCREENINGS NEAR YOU

Village of Dreams

A recent Hopscotch production, Village of Dreams, premiered last week on BBC Two Scotland to great reception. You can catch this inspiring story of an inclusive Aberdeenshire community on BBC iPlayer now: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0b6sthr/village-of-dreams

Make Me Up update

A message from the producers regarding EIFF 2018

"We had been working, excitedly, towards Edinburgh International Film Festival screenings of Make Me Up on the 21st and 24th of June, but unfortunately the film is not going to be completed for those dates. We considered presenting a work in progress, but we would much rather audiences see it for the first time complete and in all its glory, as it's intended to be.

Our post production team, with Rachel, are all working full pelt on the animation, VFX, composition, and sound design and it's looking absolutely incredible.  We know that you will be blown away when you see the world that Rachel has created!

Dates for when Make Me Up will be shown on the BBC will be released soon and there will be additional screenings at cinemas and galleries in the Autumn. 

We would like to thank everyone involved, including EIFF for their continued support and their interest in screening Make Me Up as part of the 2018 Festival."

Make Me Up is co-commissioned by 14-18 NOW: WW1 Centenary Art Commissions as part of Represent, and BBC Arts. It is produced by Hopscotch Films and NVA and supported by the Jerwood Charitable Foundation, and Creative Scotland.

Two wins for Hopscotch at RTS Scotland Awards!

We are delighted to have been recognised in three categories by the Royal Television Society Scotland!

Stop All Clocks: WH Auden and the Age of Anxiety (nominated)

Accidental Anarchist
Professional Excellence: Sound (WINNER)

Brian Cox's Russia
Specialist Factual: History (WINNER)

Big thank you to everyone who helped make this happen and congratulations to all the other winners and nominees!

Long Night at Blackstone catch up on iplayer

Easter may be over but there's still time to catch up on Long Night at Blackstone! Find it on the iplayer here.

Reviews are in...

"From McIntosh’s natural comedy chops – where you have been all my life? – to Wilson Nimmo’s on the money telly luvvie, Blackstone was a hoot and a half. As for John Gordon Sinclair, it should be the law that he is cast in every BBC Scotland comedy." Alison Rowat - The Herald

"...some funny lines and delightful comedic twists: there's a neat spin on the traditional motif of strangers entering a bar-room full of locals, while Michie enjoyably plays on the laird's well-heeled arrogance." Brian Donaldson, The List

Sneak Peek: Long Night at Blackstone coming soon!

Following the success of West Skerra Light, Greg Hemphill is back with another hilarious spooktacular Long Night at Blackstone. Along with co-writer Donald Mcleary, Hemphill reunites with his comedy/horror cast members John Gordon Sinclair, Lorraine McIntosh, John Michie, Julie Wilson Nimmo, and a special guest star, who will remain, for now, a Scooby Doo mystery.

Long Night at Blackstone will broadcast on Easter Monday 2nd April 9pm on BBC1 Scotland. It is also available on the iplayer across the UK. 

The story

Faye Bowers is the host of a low rent paranormal activity show, a master of trickery and pretence, but she is desperate to be taken seriously as a journalist.  When she learns that the show is to be axed, she is determined to go out with a bang.  The venue for the final show is the mysterious Blackstone Manor, a huge dilapidated pile inhabited by the Laird of Blackstone, and full of stories of past horrors. Though the filming day starts normally enough, it soon becomes apparent that all is not right, and for the very first time in the show's history the ghosts may in fact be real, and very dangerous. Battling backstabbing colleagues as well as the terrors in the house, Faye finds herself making a show that could catapult her career into the big league - if she can survive the night.

John Michie as the Laird of Blackstone

John Gordon Sinclair as Pat Tomorrow

Lorraine McIntosh as Faye Bowers

The Ghost Haunt team: Producer Dom (Wilson Nimmo) Faye Bowers (McIntosh) Pat Tomorrow (Gordon Sinclair)

Watch Accidental Anarchist online now

“In life, if you change reality in one single space, you’re changing the world.”

The BAFTA nominated feature length documentary Accidental Anarchist is now available to watch online.

Carne Ross was a government highflyer. A career diplomat who believed Western Democracy could save us all. But working inside the system he came to see its failures, deceits and ulterior motives. He felt at first hand the corruption of power. After the Iraq war Carne became disillusioned, quit his job and started searching for answers. This film traces his journey across the globe as he tries to find an answer to the question so many people today are asking themselves – isn’t there a better way? 
For Carne there is. Anarchism offers a solution to the brutalities of Capitalism and the dishonesties of Democracy.

Glasgow Film Festival screens Arcadia

Coming to cinema screens in Glasgow, Paul Wright's Arcadia- a poetic and provocative journey into British rural lands.   Created from 100 years of archive footage from the British Film Institute, and scored by Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Will Gregory (Goldfrapp) Arcadia is set to mesmerise audiences. 

See it on the big screen:

Sunday 25th February 20:55 GFT

Monday 26th February 10:45 GFT

Tickets here

Arcadia screens at BFI London Film Festival

Scouring 100 years of footage from the BFI National Archive, BAFTA®-winner Paul Wright constructs an exhilarating study of Britain’s shifting – and contradictory – relationship to the land. Wright (For Those in Peril) crafts a dense poetic essay of wonder, hope, horror and decay – drawing on inspiration from The Wicker Man to Winstanley. Through an intoxicating array of material, we follow an unnamed protagonist from the future as she travels through the metaphorical ‘seasons’: Spring’s romantic agricultural idyll long gone; Summer’s innocence of a village fête side-by-side with dark earthy folk rituals and eruptions of Britain’s Pagan past; Autumn’s abandonment of the land, the emergence of urbanisation and the creation of new towns; and Winter’s political turmoil, extremism and division, as nature reacts with violent storms. Set to a grand, expressive score from Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Will Gregory (Goldfrapp), Wright’s captivating film essay was conceived before Brexit, but it’s impossible not to see the film through the prism of it.

Arcadia will screen on Sunday 8th and Wednesday 11th of October.

Tickets available here 

Stop All the Clocks...

Cut off the telephone...

And tune into a fascinating hour with the poet of our times WH Auden.  

Saturday 30th September 2017, BBC2 9pm

Thirty years after his BBC film The Auden Landscape, director Adam Low returns to the poet and his work.

Following surges of popularity - from featuring in Four Weddings And A Funeral to being the poet New Yorkers turned to after 9/11 - Low reveals how Auden’s poetry helps us to better understand the 21st century and the tumultuous political climate in which we now live.

Why does the poet - who began as the golden boy of the 1930s and ended up as the craggy-faced laureate we never had - have a greater hold on our imaginations than ever before? Writers Alan Bennett, Polly Clark, Alexander McCall Smith and Richard Curtis and poets James Fenton and Paul Muldoon share their passion for Auden, and celebrate the potent, moving impact of his work.

During his lifetime, Auden was often an outsider. A gay man at a time when homosexuality was illegal in Britain, he became an American citizen from 1946 and his reputation in Britain suffered disastrously from his decision to leave England in 1939 and to stay in America throughout the Second World War.

However, the popularity of Auden’s work has increased. A poet who coupled technical skill and emotional honesty and was able to engage simultaneously with the everyday and the universal; perhaps this is the reason he has remained relevant.

His particular combination of humanity and scepticism seems to appeal more and more to this generation, one surrounded by political uncertainty and assailed by anxiety about the future. This film probes the peculiar hold that this angry young man of the 1930s still has on our individual psyches.