Projects in categories: Fiction

Synopsis

A pivotal day in the life of headteacher Steve and his students at a last-chance reform college amidst a world that has forsaken them. As Steve fights to protect the college’s integrity and impending closure, we witness him grappling with his own mental health. In parallel to Steve’s struggles, we meet Shy, a troubled teen caught between his past and what lies ahead as he tries to reconcile his inner fragility with his impulse for self-destruction and violence. A reimagining of Max Porter’s best selling novel 'Shy'. Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere

Synopsis

Yorkshire, 1916. A choral society's male members enlist in World War I, leaving the demanding Dr. Guthrie to recruit teenagers. Together, they experience the joy of singing while the young boys grapple with their impending conscription into the army. Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2025 - European premiere

Synopsis

Charles Blakey, an African American man living in Sag Harbor, is stuck in a rut, out of luck and about to lose his ancestral home when a peculiar white businessman with a European accent offers to rent his basement for the summer. Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere

Synopsis

Jonah, charismatically ADHD and dyslexically created, is a man-child who keeps on slipping. At the same time, his best mate, Lee, nimbly climbs every ladder. After hitting yet another bump and under pressure to see his great-aunt, who is lost to dementia, Jonah contrives that he and Lee visit, hoping it might also offer respite from himself and the mess he’s creating. Though the Northeast coast of Scotland wasn’t quite what Lee envisioned, it holds a certain wildness and wonder. They meet Charlie, who is profoundly Deaf and attempting to clean up after his shady twin brother. Through a developing friendship, the three boys form a connection that ultimately brings Jonah to discover the courage to be vulnerable and that joy is possible despite loss. THE SON AND THE SEA brings personal experience and threads of familial history together to ask: how will boys become men if there’s no one to show them the way? Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere Official Selection San Sebastián International Film Festival 2025 - European premiere Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2025

Synopsis

Parolee Taylor's hopes of a fresh start are jeopardised by the arrival of dominant cellmate Dee. As Taylor finds solace and protection in Dee’s shadow, their bond is tested when Dee becomes the target of a vicious attack, leading to an ultimatum that threatens Taylor’s chance at parole and his survival. Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2025 - European premiere

Synopsis

Warsaw, December 13th 1981. Martial law shuts down the country. Overnight, a country turns into a prison. Taxis have been replaced by tanks. Citizens are treated like criminals. And visiting British Professor Joan Andrews finds herself trapped. After witnessing the murder of a young student by the secret police (the "Crows"), Joan herself becomes the target. The Professor runs like a rat through the maze-like streets of Soviet-era Warsaw until she is forced to stop and take a stand. Official Selection Toronto International Film Festival 2025 - World premiere

Synopsis

Amy reluctantly returns home to the windy clifftop in North Cornwall where she grew up, after a break-up with her partner Jess has left her homeless. She hopes her mum, Sue, will be pleasantly surprised at the chance for them to reconnect. But Sue isn't good with surprises, and has other things on her mind. She is preparing to plant a bare root hedge, her final act of resistance against the second home development that will surround her home, concreting over her memories and erasing her past. They start early: digging in the hedge is backbreaking work.                                    When Amy finally manages to tell Sue about her loss, Sue is lost for words. They doggedly continue planting, gradually finding a rhythm together in the silence. As night falls, and exhaustion sets in, Sue returns to the house, and Amy is left in the field, digging the last trench for the remaining plants. Alone, they each find a way to reach out across the silence, the years of separation, and their losses, towards each other.

Synopsis

In Brighton, on the South coast of England, sharpened by the sting of sea spray, and mellowed by numinous light, a tight-knit community of oddballs and heart-felts live together in a tatty old mansion, the Fletcher Apartments. When a golden feather, the priceless antique mascot of the building, unexpectedly disappears, the residents have a mystery to solve. Will they find the talisman that previously bound them together, or will their community, now divided against itself, irrevocably unravel?

Synopsis

Two conspiracy-obsessed young men kidnap the high-powered CEO of a major company, convinced that she is an alien intent on destroying planet Earth. Official Selection Venice Film Festival 2025 - World premiere Official Selection Telluride Film Festival 2025 Official Selection San Sebastián International Film Festival 2025 Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2025

Synopsis

Burnt Toast is a contemporary ghost story that resurrects legendary British comedian Tommy Cooper, who famously died mid-performance in 1984. Blending machine learning, VHS footage, archival materials, and a trained impersonator, the film follows Phil, an unemployed magician trapped in the decaying home of the director’s late schizophrenic uncle. Phil’s hallucinatory act navigates the alienation of late capitalism, touching on social class, identity, mental health, and delusion—all punctuated by his trademark jokes and failed magic tricks.

Synopsis

When a Swiss woman and a British man reunite on the streets of London, what starts as a pleasant reunion gradually descends into an elliptical journey that challenges the accuracy of their memory through obsessive repetition in an attempt to reconcile their failed relationship.

Synopsis

A coming-of-age drama following Cat, a wide-eyed freshman, while she attempts to navigate university. The abrupt ending of her situationship with laid-back Noah leads her to a desperate search for validation. Cat searches for fleeting replacements until she hits a low point. She attempts to build herself up from scratch, only to come face-to-face with Noah again.