Projects in genres: Drama

Synopsis

Sanjay and Neetu are not too sure what to make of their two grandfathers. Their father's father - Grandpa Leicester - is a bit of a tyrant and completely westernised. He's always telling them off about their manners and the way they dress. So when they hear their other grandfather is coming from India to spend a month with the family, they fear the worst.

Synopsis

Early 1970's - Morocco.


A moving and original account of what it was like to be a child of the hippie generation. Love, peace, no father but a tough older sister and a beautiful young Mum - the story of Julia's love affair with another culture, as experienced with the clear-eyed vulnerability of her five-year-old daughter Lucy and her older sister Bea. This is the story of an extraordinary year in the life of a family. Julia decides that she has had enough of London and takes off for Morocco with her two little girls.


Lucy and her sister Bea are let loose in Marrakech. From the tourists to the beggars and entertainers in the market, their curiosity is endless. Julia is loving but distracted by money worries and seeking spiritual fulfillment. And then Bilal comes into their lives. The children observe Julia's love affair with a wonderful, magical man, with whom they all share a temporary Paradise. But this degree of freedom has its price and the stresses of their way of life start to be more than the children can bear. Bilal, feckless, charming and irresponsible as he is, understands their need and makes a heroic sacrifice on their behalf to raise enough money for their tickets home. Finally, Julia has to make the hard choice between her lover and her children.
 
Based on the novel 'Hideous Kinky' by Esther Freud.

Synopsis

Rachel is pregnant. Before she has the chance to break the news to her boyfriend Bill, he dumps her. Hurt and confused, Rachel clears out their joint bank account and convinces Bill's best friend Jason, to drive them to her family in Bill's much loved sports car. A furious Bill discovers his car missing and the bank account empty. He sets off in hot pursuit, believing Rachel and Jason have become lovers. Rachel's childhood friend Jack pulls himself up from his alcoholic state, and follows close behind.


That evening Rachel and Jason arrive at the family farmhouse. Her family is in a mess. The apparently crippled mother Olivia, lives apart from her husband Tom. Upon her arrival Rachel makes a naive attempt to reunite her mother and father which ends in chaos and confusion. By bringing her family together she aims to sort out her own life, and untangle the romantic mess developing around her. But Bill is on the warpath. And looking for revenge.

Synopsis

It is 1971 and Francis Bacon is in Paris on the occasion of the triumphant retrospective at the Grand Palais that is to confirm his status as one of the twentieth century's most important artists. At the same time that he is being acclaimed by officials and the press, George Dyer, his model and lover of seven years is in a nearby hotel room swallowing the last of the lethal cocktail of drugs and alcohol that will prove to be his final act in this world. As Dyer disappears into blackness he falls back in time to the moment in 1964 when, in attempting to burgle Bacon's studio, he first encountered the painter who was to absorb him into his life and work.


This tragic love story is set among the bohemian demi-monde of London's Soho where Francis Bacon was a charismatic figure at the centre of a coterie of characters who frequented the infamous Colony Rooms. These include Muriel Belcher, who ran the club, Isabel Rawsthorne, Henrietta Moraes, photographer John Deakin and writer Daniel Farson. Love Is The Devil traces the development of Francis Bacon and George Dyer's ill-fated relationship and, in a series of extraordinary visual sequences, constructs a portrait of an artist that dramatically reveals the needs and desires that motivated his art.

Synopsis

My Life So Far is the tale of a young boy's coming of age in a highly eccentric Scottish household. The spell of childhood is broken when an enchanting French woman joins the family and established relationships are threatened.

Synopsis

A love story full of humour, passion and danger, My Name is Joe was filmed in the heart of one of the poorest and most neglected neighbourhoods of Scotland's biggest city. Two street-wise but vulnerable people struggle to overcome the harsh conditions that weigh them down, leaving few choices in their lives.

Synopsis

In the small hours of the night two shots ring out. Kudjo, a black gangster, lies alone and bleeding on the floor of his deserted nightclub. Through his eyes, we see the climactic events which led up to his shooting. Set in London's clubs, the film tells of a man's battle to escape the hate that he himself set in motion many years before.

Synopsis

On The Edge is a turbulent love story between two tormented characters who desperately try to come to terms with the flaw in their nature. Lorna is a lost and distraught teenage heroin addict, who prostitutes herself to feed her habit. Court is a young man in his early twenties, haunted by the betrayal of his sister, who was sacrificed by his mother to regain her daughter's lost soul.

Synopsis

An animated drama-documentary about Tana, a child holocaust survivor who tells her story for the first time after fifty years and speaks about the reasons for her long silence. The use of mixed styles of animation enabled the film-makers to portray the little girl’s point of view and helps the audience identify with the central character.

Synopsis

A vivid and enthralling account of one man's journey to love, sex and independence. Recounted with wry humour and poignancy, the story follows Brit, a young boy with brittle bones which restrict his growth, among his colourful Parsee family in Bombay. Eccentric anglophile Sera is undaunted by her son's condition, whereas Sam, his dashing father, struggles to come to terms with imperfection. Along with his unconventional sister Dolly, a true ally, Brit is at the centre of a host of vibrant characters. Based on his acclaimed autobiographical novel, Firdaus Kanga makes his acting debut as Brit.

Synopsis

By the side of a road somewhere in the North of England, Sammy stands and waits for the arrival of childhood friends Billy and Ruby. It is twenty years since they all first met, when Sammy was taken by social workers to join an isolated children's home on the dramatic Northumbrian coast. As Sammy gets into Billy and Ruby's car it is immediately clear that, despite the fact that Ruby is recently pregnant, there is violent tension between them and that there is a psychological significance to the mysterious journey that Billy is taking them on.


As the journey progresses, we travel back to the past of their childhood when Sammy, shy and vulnerable and unable to read, joins the home. Billy, confident and charismatic, befriends and guides him through the trials of life in the home and protects him from the violent attentions of the resident bully, Bernie. As Sammy grows in confidence, Billy encourages a romantic attachment with his old girlfriend, the flame-haired Ruby. Using his emotional power over his friends, Billy establishes a ménage a trois that sets them apart from other children in the home. This power is threatened when, in a dramatic incident, Billy tries to defend Sammy from Bernie and gets savagely beaten. The resulting act of revenge is one which will inextricably bind the three friends through the intervening years until the pressure of the past and present combine to force an inevitable resolution.

Synopsis

Such a Long Journey is an intricately layered, wryly humorous novel set in Bombay in 1971, the year India went to war over the fate of what was to become Bangladesh. A hard working bank clerk, Gustad Noble, is a devoted family man who gradually sees his modest life unravelling. His young daughter, Roshan, falls ill in spite of his and his wife's ministrations; his promising son defies reasonable voice amid the ongoing dramas of his habitually quarrelsome neighbours.


One day Gustad receives a letter from an old friend, now working for a CIA-like branch of Indira Gandhi's government asking him to help in what seems like a heroic mission. In his innocence, and with feelings of loyalty to his friend, Gustad uneasily agrees. He soon finds himself over his head and alone in his unwitting complicity as he is drawn deeper into a dangerous network of deception.


Gustad's quiet dignity, his sense of moral order, have luminous presence in the sometimes antique world of his friends and acquaintances including the medicine lady, Miss Kutpitia, who suggests elaborate medical spells; the lame and child-like Tehmul; Dinshawji, Gustad's bumptious co-worker and friend, whose flirtation with the new typist goes too far.


Compassionate, broad in its vision, and rich in details of character and place, this is a mature and rewarding saga that charts the journey of a moral heart in a turbulent world of change.