Borneo, the world’s oldest rainforest, a culture near extinction. All destroyed by a sporting event viewed by billions. Three brothers from the forest, a film crew and their activist friends become undercover investigators, following the stolen wood to its final stop: Tokyo’s new Olympic Stadium.
TOUCH WOOD plays out in the build-up to the approaching Olympic spectacle, the camera following a group of friends across oceans, through a spectrum of cultures, to reveal an honest tale of a peoples’ attempt to understand the forces behind the destruction of their home. This journey, however, is not without dangers. Spying on illegal companies has obvious risks but the alienating world they discover on the way has more sinister perils.
In this character-driven documentary, the brothers are a symbol of the exploited. The Tokyo Olympics in contrast typifies the insatiable consumer society validating this type of profiteering. Whilst highlighting these clear injustices, TOUCH WOOD provides a window into how indigenous peoples view the world that is driving so much change within their own communities. In doing so, exploring the costs of humanity’s addiction to progress and the effect it is having on the globe’s most vulnerable peoples and the ecosystems they inhabit.
The story of Sigga, a 17 year-old girl trying to leave home in Iceland, and make her way to California.
Sigga lives in a remote Icelandic fishing village. When she announces to her parents she is going to live in California to be a poet. They are distraught: why can't she live next door and write poetry there?
Her best friends begin the journey to drive her to the airport. Outside the village, they give a lift to Nikki, an American poet who has just returned from California. Nikki falls for Sigga, and despite her wishes, he is intenet that she stays in Iceland.
The KLF (the “Kopyright Liberation Front”) was one of the biggest British music acts of the 90s, and for a period, the biggest selling singles act in the world. Bizarrely, they achieved global success from a damp squat in south London, and ultimately burnt most of their profits (1 million quid) in a legendary act of nihilism on a remote Scottish island. The explosive artistic partnership of Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty is utterly unique in the history of music and art and continues to inspire artists and audiences the world over. But due to their secrecy and distaste for the press, the story of the KLF’s meteoric rise, epic self-destruction and dark exile, has never been told in their own words. Until now.
Do you believe in psychics? What if there really was someone who could see into the future, read people's thoughts and move things with their mind? What kind of person would they be and how would they reveal themselves to the world? Psimon is just such a man, a real and genuine psychic. But Psimon has a problem. In five days time he is going to die at the hands of a serial killer known only as Lucifer. His only hope is to enlist the services of former SAS soldier, Steve Brennus, a man whose family life and business have just collapsed in ruins. Psimon knows he is going to die. He has seen it. But could a former SAS soldier have the strength to overcome the visions of the world's first psychic?
Based on the best-selling novel 'First and Only' by Peter Flannery
A world that exists beneath our own, beneath the day to day, the restraint and the order. For every life there is a death, and for every person there is an itch that only the few scratch; the dark voice that tells us to blow out the flame of another’s life. You might walk down a street and brush shoulders with a stranger and exchange a polite smile, completely unaware that stranger is picturing themselves stood above your bleeding body as you draw your final breath. There is a place for those people. They have all killed, they all think about killing, some want to stop, some want to talk and some just need to listen.
Meetings are held regularly by an understanding leader who nurtures and guides the group through their shared experiences and temptations. They receive a message, telling them where and when, and there within the trust of the circle, they share. But on this particular night, the city has been rocked by the failed assassination of a Senator, and the brutal and professional demise of his attempted assassin. A chain of events is already in motion as the group congregates for their late-night session and the very fabric of the group begins to unravel as one layer of betrayal leads to another.
Set in a riotous 18th Century London and Dublin, the farce follows the drink-sodden and cantankerous Handel who is a forgotten man to all but his whip-smart valet. Worse still, he has lost his inspiration to compose. However, when he overhears the singing of famous actress Susannah Cibber, the composer is moved to write once again and King George II tasks him to create an oratorio to celebrate the new Irish Viceroy in Dublin. Yet, when Handel approaches Susannah with the news, he is shocked to learn that not only does she have a fear of singing in public, she’s also on the run from her vengeful husband. The motley crew travels to Dublin only to realize that London’s gin-soaked alleys are no match for the competing, sectarian politics of Dublin’s choirs, the stupidity of English overlords, and the hypocritical morals of the day. Confronted with these odds, Handel has no choice but to defy his critics and keep going. The shown must go on.
Fashion designer Alexander McQueen experienced a spectacular but tragic rise and fall. The working class son of a taxi driver, McQueen rose rapidly from an apprentice on London’s prestigious Savile Row, where his clients included Prince Charles and Mikhael Gorbachev, where he soon developed a reputation for his immaculate tailoring skills. He would go on to design the wardrobe for David Bowie’s 1996-1997 tours, including the Union Jack coat worn by Bowie on the 'Earthling' album cover. As he developed another reputation as the fashion world’s enfant terrible, he would go on to become head designer at Givenchy, before launching his own self-named label. He was famous for his unconventional, highly stylised and theatrical fashion shows. Openly gay, McQueen’s growing fame and fortune also witnessed an increase in drug dependence as well as a slew of failed relationships. He committed suicide in 2010, nine days after his mother Joyce had died of cancer.
Based on Andrew Wilson's biography 'Blood Beneath the Skin', the film follows McQueen and his creative process in the months leading up to his 2009 show where he stunningly re-worked his greatest designs from the past 15 years, providing an intimate portrait of the man behind the brand and a celebration of the genius whose designs were just as much art as fashion.
Summertime, 1994. In a quiet mining village just outside Doncaster, a rumour stirs about the legend of a giant carp in the nearby decoy ponds. Trevor takes watch one night at the water’s edge. The following night, he decides to lead a brigade of young friends and neighbours on a fishing expedition. In a world of broken families, cassette tapes and rumbling political fever, these friends, each with their own struggles to bear, share a moment of harmony as they witness the carp for themselves that they will never forget.
Joseph and Celice Adkins first fell in love as zoology students on a field trip to Baritone Bay. Thirty years later, on a nostalgic trip back to the dunes where they first made love, they’re brutally murdered. With the crime scene undiscovered for days, we shift back and forth in time, travelling through their lives from their early romance, to the day their bodies are finally found caught in one final embrace.
A bittersweet look at loss, the way fate shapes our lives and a mesmerising vision of the power of love to endure.
Glasgow, Scotland. 1980s. Middle class Rosanna is 17 years-old. Her parents made their money in the mining industry which is now beginning to decline with the rise of Thatcherism. When Rosanna falls in love with a boy from a working class family, they bond over their shared taste of music and realise they're more similar than they expected.
