In 2058, two apathetic friends run the night shift in a 24-hour convenience store. Robert likes the Japanese girl who works the day shift, but in spite of encouraging signs from her, he won't - or can't - act. Instead, Robert and Steve discuss their views on life.
Winner of Gold Hugo for best short film at the 2005 Chicago International Film Festival.
One of Life's Players is an experimental short which I shot on Super8, a format that has intrigued me for a long time, it is based around a prose I wrote a few years ago. Written in the prose are a number of quite upfront and powerful statements. 'in the circle of life we co-exist with an assemblage of unadulterated attractions and fascinations'. Through the diverse and haunting beauty of film I wanted to depict images that an audience can relate to events in there lives and the surrounding world we live in. It has not plot and perhaps to some it might be hard to understand.
One of Life's Players will be reminiscent of films such as Baraka (Ron Fricke, 1992), Koyaanisqatsi (Godfrey Reggio, 1983) and Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929), which don't really have a traditional narrative drive. These experimental masterpieces rely on the use of stunning cinematography to allow the audience to create their own story. One of Life's Players portrays images such as an empty room with just a fireplace, and a photograph spattered with blood to depict how life can often take a turn for the worst. Sometimes a lifetime can often feel like the blink of any eye, One of Life's Players depicts this by using images like a young woman's eye, which transforms into an old woman's eye and other similar juxtapositions. Although some of the imagery isn't always blatantly obvious. I'm hoping perhaps One of Life's Players will fuel thoughts about how at times we as a fast moving species tend to take the planet and its abundant fascinations for granted.
On the Greek island of Patmos, St John the Divine had a vision and wrote The Apocalypse. The cave in which he lived and worked still stands, and archaeologists from all over the world have explored these hills and valleys for 2,000 years in search of great historical treasure.
Now on this sun-splashed island Katerina careens her bicycle down a steep hill while her nine-year-old daughter, Agapoula, exhilarated, hangs on for dear life. Katerina is unmarried, owns the village taverna, and lives a fulfilled if simple life. The last thing she needs is an unsettling romance, but that's exactly what she's about to get.
Down in the harbour, the ferry pulls in to the docks. Tourists, shoppers, locals returning home stream into the village - and one stranger, Eric, an American archeologist who has come to the island in search of a lost biblical artefact that his father had searched for in vain. Tierney, the resident archeologist and local character, shows Eric the ropes. When Eric and Katerina meet - Opa!
But the course of true love is never straight, and soon Eric determines that the ancient chalice he seeks is most likely buried right under Katerina's beloved taverna. The Mayor and the townspeople want the acclaim and tourists that the chalice will bring - Tierney needs further funding to keep his ongoing project alive - and Eric wants to fulfill his (and his late father's) life-long quest.
In November 2004, British police began an international drug trafficking and money laundering 'sting', codenamed Operation Neon Sky.
Two undercover agents Elizabeth Robbins and Mathew Blake are sent to Istanbul to target drug kingpin Refet Ilahi, considered one of the most powerful traffickers of heroin in Europe and whose drugs empire is being used to fund powerful international terrorist groups. A month into the investigation, Blake's dead body is found in a lake, two miles from Istanbul, and Elizabeth Robbins is missing. During Turkish investigations into the cause of Blake's death, 72 hours of undercover spy footage is discovered. Permission has been granted by national crime organisations to release this footage.
Dealing with the loss of his father, eight-year-old Louie is taken on a mysterious journey in his dreams, far from the safety of his home, into a dark and scary old forest. Desperately searching for a way out he becomes impossibly lost, drawn in deeper and deeper, until he is discovered by the forests immortal guardian, Ordan.
Orpheus the greatest musician ever. A Rock star like no other he has gone into hiding. However, stirred into a search for his wife Eurydice. He embarks on a quest that will take him to and through the land of death itself.
An actor from the East Midlands is starring in a Panto down in Croydon. He is sacked from the production in suspicous circumstances.
Sensing his theatrical career is over, he hires a z-list video director and his crew to make a showreel about him - as he wishes to reinvent himself as an action movie hero for the millenium.
As the action unfolds we see that the movie industry is an industry of egos, tears, tantrums and poverty.
