No Ifs or Buts

Director: Sarah Lewis

Year: 2025

Filmed over a 25-year period, CUTS, NO IFS OR BUTS delivers a vital portrait of the low-key, yet world-famous London barbershop ‘Cuts’ – not just a place to get your hair styled but a space for street fashion and pop innovators. Guided by freewheeling founders James Lebon and Steve Brooks who met when one was a Rockerbilly and the other a New Romantic, the salon moved from early 80s post punk roots to become a communal hub for DJs, photographers and style icons, an influencer in the analogue age. The film allows us to bear witness to the passing of time and the profound and often tragic personal change in the hairdressers' lives within the wider context of change in the UK's political and cultural landscape. It highlights the themes of family and creativity and is an anthem of the promise of youth and the friendships that endure (or not) over a lifetime.

Director: Hannah Berryman

Year: 2024

A landmark feature documentary about astronaut Eileen Collins, the first woman to pilot and command the Space Shuttle.<br /> Eileen’s incredible journey starts with her smalltown beginnings, sees her smash through many glass ceilings, and culminates in four dramatic space shuttle missions, the last being possibly the most dangerous and most important of them all.<br /> At its heart the film is the moving human drama of one family, where a mother’s extraordinary career takes us straight to the big philosophical question of what is the level of acceptable risk in human endeavour? <br /> This film celebrates Commander Collins’ trailblazing NASA career which opened the way for women to become spacecraft pilots and commanders, and proved a perfect riposte to a previous generation of male astronauts who thought there was no place for women to lead the way in space. <br /> Official Selection DOC NYC 2024 - World premiere<br /> Official Selection CPH:DOX 2025 - European premiere

Director: Tristan M Copeland

Year: 2025

WHAT ABOUT GARY is a raw and emotive documentary that delves into the tragic consequences of misinformation, exploring how conspiracy theories led to the death of Gary Matthews from Covid-19. The film intimately portrays the profound grief of Gary's family and friends as they grapple with this senseless loss.<br /> Director Tristan Copeland, Gary's cousin, questions the purveyors of these falsehoods, driven by a need to understand why they ensnared Gary. Through vérité footage, archival materials, and Gary's own paintings, the film explores Gary’s descent into a distorted reality, seeking the root causes of his susceptibility to misinformation.<br /> Shot during the pandemic in Shrewsbury, England, WHAT ABOUT GARY captures the isolation that made many, including Gary, vulnerable to manipulation. With kinetic editing, evocative camera work, and a poignant score, the film examines how society failed to protect its citizens from misinformation.<br /> A potentially controversial yet vital work that questions how conspiracy theorists wield such influence and whether others can be saved from similar fates. A cautionary tale for a world grappling with truth in the digital age, and a tribute to a life tragically cut short, driven by a need to understand why.