Projects in categories: Fiction

Synopsis

Set mid/late 19th century, this is the story of a troubled and downtrodden youth. He lives with his father, a bed-ridden invalid, who embittered forces Samuel to wait on him, hand and foot. After years of this, Samuel tends to indulge in morbid and violent fantasies about his father. During a fantasy Samuel falls into the clutches of evil, manipulating nemesis, Reuben Wise. Under his influence Samuel's fantasies become reality.

Synopsis

A young woman stuck in limbo looks to do a deal with God.

Synopsis

Dogz, an angst-ridden Asian lad, strikes out at the turbulance of urban teenage life. Traditional Indian family culture clashes with the British Asian way of life and Dogz seeks comfort in football, crime and solitude.

Synopsis

Saving Grace is a feel-good romp which gives a modern spin on Ealing Studios-style comedy. Widowed and penniless after her husband's suicide, Grace (Brenda Blethyn) is left with massive debts and no obvious salvation, until her dope-smoking gardener Craig Ferguson (the film's co-writer) asks for the use of her green fingers to nurse his marijuana plant back to life. Sweeping aside any moral qualms and attracted to the swift return on investment, a desperate Grace launches into mass production, which brings her into conflict with the conservative local community, drug lords in London and the police.



The film was the brainchild of Mark Crowdy, the writer-producer whose credits include The Mystery Of Edwin Drood and the recently-completed Sorted. He was introduced to comic actor Craig Ferguson by Cat Villiers, who became executive producer. They spent almost four years re-writing the screenplay, during which time the film's financing fell through a couple of times. A medley of European players eventually provided backing.



Director Nigel Cole, best known for the television series Cold Feet, says the challenge was finding the right tone: "The script screamed Ealing comedy so much, it was my job to play against that. I felt that if I made it as modern as possible, the traditional British comedy in the script would come through."



The film won the audience award at this year's Sundance Film Festival, grossed £1.9m in the UK and was released in the US in August by Fine Line.

Synopsis

Grace Trevethan's idyllic life on the Cornish coast is turning upside down.





Faced with her husband's untimely death, a mountain of debt, a former mistress and the prospect of losing her beautiful manor house - Grace decides to put her greenfingers to work.





Desperate times call for desperate measures and with a little prompting from her now under-employed gardener Matthew, Grace swaps her price orchids for marijuana. Together they convert her state-of-the-art greenhouse into what she hopes will be their goldmine and salvation.





Valuable as marijuana is, it's not a currency the bank recognises! So Grace leaves the safety of her Cornish village to sell her produce to the menacing underworld of London's Notting Hill.





The pressures of her new found enterprise begin to catch up with her, with gangsters, debt collectors and the police now in hot pursuit.





Will Grace Trevethan, fine upstanding member of the local community turn drug dealer - surely not?





Nigel cole's hilarious, heart-warming comedy drama Saving Grace, is an ensemble film based around a wonderful central performance from Brenda Blethyn and set against a backdrop of some of Britain's most spectacular scenery.

Synopsis

Joe finds himself in a field in the middle of nowhere. His mobile phone rings and a voice tells him to look in the back of his car. What he finds there is the beginning of a nightmare from which he'll never escape.

Synopsis

Season Ticket is a tale of two Geordie juveniles, Gerry and Sewell, who set out on a seemingly impossible mission to find the £1000 required for two season tickets to their beloved football club. Sometimes, as short of good planning and common sense as they are of cash, their main enterprises becomes more hilarious than profitable - and the further away their goal seems to be, the more desperate they are to reach it. The story follows a year's changing seasons in the lives of the two boys.

Synopsis

The story is set in London in the present day. A young Chinese girl (Lili) runs away from an arranged marriage in Hong Kong and comes to London in search of rock-idol Bobby Gillespie.


She finds his flat but he's recently moved. An Indian commercials director (Jamal) answers the door and seeing the lost look on Lili's face, invites her up for coffee. He takes a liking to Lili, casting her in a tampon commercial and adopts her as his muse - until his Muslim family finds out.


Drawn in by the music and fashion of London's Asian subculture but with no experience of living abroad, Lili stumbles from one cultural faux pas to another until a young, inexperienced Japanese detective living in London (Go) is assigned by her father to track her down.


Her short attention-span and inability to stick to one style or boyfriend for more than ten minutes leave him weaving in and out of London's East End searching for clues.


The longer he looks for her, the more he falls under her spell until finally, he must choose between turning her in and keeping his business or falling in love.


Ravi, the middle-aged owner of a popular Muslim tea-shop in the area, becomes a central figure in bringing the lost souls together in this deadpan detective comedy celebrating the youthful energy of multi-cultural London.

Synopsis

Gary Dove is an ex-villain who has served his time and is now blissfully retired to a Spanish villa with the wife he adores. His idyll is threatened by the arrival of his gangster nemesis, Don Logan, who is intent on dragging him back to London for daring heist. Desperate not to endanger his carefully constructed paradise. Gal is drawn into an explosive battle of wills, risking everything to protect the woman he loves.

Synopsis

A poetic look at the suicide of a young Asian-Briton doctor. It challenges the way young doctors are perceived and conveys the reality of their experiences.

Synopsis

Loosely inspired by one of the racing world's biggest mysteries, Shergar is the story of the daring rescue of the eponymous thoroughbred, which, since its disappearance in 1983, has been the source of countless tales and myths. Newcomer Tom Walsh stars as a teenage stablehand who by chance recognises the stolen horse and, realising the danger it is in, leads it away to freedom. Chased by the ruthless splinter group of the IRA who organised the kidnapping, he enlists the help of a traveller (Ian Holm) and his young granddaughter (Laura Murphy).
Veteran cinematographer and life-long racing enthusiast Denis C Lewiston makes his directorial debut with the film. "Shergar has become a legend, he has entered into folklore as a mythical figure and in the film he inspires the young boy who saves him to look forward to the future. The horse and the greatness within him gives the boy hope and a sense of freedom." Lewiston teamed up with Jeff Geoffrey and Walter Josten of Los Angeles-based independent production company Blue Rider Pictures and the film went into production in the Isle of Man in the spring of 1998.
"This story was too good to pass over," says Geoffrey. "It's a classic, but Denis has really pulled it out of the traditional family genre. There's an edge and a depth to the film thanks to the complexity of the characters, the exhilarating pace of the narrative and the emotional pay-off of the climax."

Synopsis

After his Academy Award-winning performance as a New England doctor in The Cider House Rules, Michael Caine is back on British turf for this thriller set in the boxing world. In Shiner, the actor's fourth collaboration with producer Geoffrey Reeve, he really does feel as if he's come home. "I've been preparing for Shiner all my life," says Caine. "I grew up in the Elephant & Castle area [in south-east London] and I know exactly who I'm playing - but I daren't give you his name because he'd come and kill me!"



Caine's character, Billy 'Shiner' Simpson, is a boxing promoter who has invested all his hopes in his son Eddie (UK TV star Matthew Marsden). But when Eddie is knocked out in the second round of a crucial bout, then shot dead soon afterwards, Billy's life falls apart. He sets out to discover who killed his son, but his efforts are hampered by police pursuing him for running unlicensed fights.



Playing opposite Caine, as rival promoter Frank Spedding, is a suitably heavyweight talent in the shape of Martin Landau, himself an Oscar winner for 1994's Ed Wood.



Shiner also marks a return to the UK for British director Irvin, whose most recent work is NBC & Hallmark's Noah's Ark. The film is the feature debut of writer Scott Cherry, who has extensive credits writing for British television and radio. It is also the first film from fledgling UK production and finance company Wisecroft Ltd.



Shiner is set to premiere at this year's San Sebastian Film Festival.