Projects in genres: Drama

Synopsis

At the Station Hotel, Jay doesn't like his guests to mix - and with good reason. They are all damaged in some way, always emotionally and sometimes physically. Jay tries not to be judgemental, but sometimes judgement is called for. Tonight he looks on paralysed as they all sit playing a game of cards. Worse than that, they're playing to see who will sleep in Room 207, a room that's not been slept in for 20 years. A room that should stay locked forever. Soon the strangers will learn a little too much about each other's secrets. Nelson, the vicious womaniser. Jonathan, the defrocked priest struggling with the anguish of his past sins. Susie, the beautiful Chinese girl desperate for a reason to live. Arthur, eaten away by thirst for vengeance, each night handcuffing himself to his bed for fear of what he might do. Finally Greta, who came here to write a suicide note which she couldn't finish and with whom Jay is secretly in love. There is hunger in all of them. Talk of hidden money whets a whole new and desperate menu of appetites. Soon everyone is eyeing one another with deep suspicion, only the darkest of which is founded in truth. Deception, paranoia, back stabbing and manipulation of circum-stances become the order of the day. The fractured lives of all the main characters become entangled in a hilarious and terrifying series of events, that escalate throughout the hotel towards an ultimate and brutally violent climax.

Synopsis

Brighton. Late August. Teenage companions brash Wayne and shy Chris take an awayday to catch the last of the summer girls. After a shaky start they meet two girls on the pier who cause more trouble than the boys could ever have imagined. Chris wanders off to the beach, where he meets the perfect girl who is beyond his reach. The awayday closes prematurely, leaving everyone a little more worldly wise.

Synopsis

A stop-frame animation using re-cycled dolls, toys and found objects. Without dialogue. Baby is a tiny doll who lives in the perpetually dark Niteworld. The only light place left is the theme park Welcomeworld, the hyper-real creation of Baby's long lost father. Baby travels to see him and wreaks havoc with the help of her special powers, a supply of jelly beans and her mysterious friends. Can she destroy the ultra-powerful, mega-rich 'nice-guy-in-a-sweater'?

Synopsis

Anita's got attitude and ambition. She plans to be a DJ, dancehall diva, dropping sweet lyrics to wind up the dancefloor. She has a style to make bodies wind... for she is Princess Neeta... 'Mistress of the Mic'... if it wasn't for.... her two kids, if it wasn't for Byron, the kid's father - a singerman himself, who ain't around that much but thinks his babymother should be at home looking after his children. If it wasn't that her mother loves the church so much and disapproves of the dancehall. Babymother is Anita's story. At first a woman-child, selfish yet naive, street-smart yet vulnerable. A girl as yet unable to face the responsibilities of her children or her life. A girl travelling along the bumpy road to adulthood, through the tough, deeply male world of reggae music. Set against a backdrop of Harlesden's tenement housing, Babymother is a journey into the explosion of colour, passion and style that is the dancehall!

Synopsis

It's Friday night. Joan, an award-winning TV producer, has just been made redundant. The obnoxious and lecherous Fred seems to be losing his touch with the ladies. Fate throws Joan and Fred together. It looks like it's going to be a bumpy ride.

Synopsis

Blue Funnel, a contemporary drama set in the Chinese community in Liverpool, follows Daniel as he tries to send his father's ashes back to his ancestral village. Daniel's father left Hong Kong aged 14 and spent his life as a seaman coming in and out of the Liverpool docks where he married an English girl. The ashes need to return 'home' for his spirit to rest... but Daniel realises he's not sure where 'home' is.

Synopsis

Colour Blind charts the family passions and problems which come to the surface after Bridget McQueen arrives home with a black husband and the growing years of the couple's mixed race daughter, Rose Angela, during the period after the First World War in South Shields. The story, initially told in flashback, then follows the experiences of the adult Rose Angela as she fights to establish her own place in the world.

Synopsis

Get Real is the story of Steven Carter, an ordinary teenager from Basingstoke, Middle England, and his friends. Like most teenagers, they're desperate to fall in love: Steven's neighbour Linda with her driving instructor, his school friend Mark with Wendy, Wendy with Head Boy and all round dreamboat John, John's mate Kevin with Wendy's friend Jessica. But like most teenagers, they are pretty hopeless at it. Steven is in love too, but he knows it is impossible. It's just a dream. It'll never be real. Except it is. But there's a catch: Steven's lover won't acknowledge him in public. Get Real is the comic tale of what happens when the dream becomes an unexpected reality, and forces Steven to choose between being himself and being in love.

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.