Narrative Features 2008

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AUTOMATONS
Director: James McKenney

Somewhere in the distant future, The Girl is alone. She is the last of her people, the others having died in a generations-long war that The Girl continues to fight with the assistance of a group of antiquated robot helpers and soldiers.

Her only connection to her long-dead people is a collection of recorded journal entries made by the scientist who cared for her as a baby. His is the only friendly human face she’s ever seen. The regular transmissions from her enemy's leader are always filled with threats and taunts. The Girl responds to these invasions by attack of her own, carried out by her mechanical soldiers on the contaminated surface where no human can survive.

Men started this war. The machines will finish it.

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BANE
Director: James Eaves

SCI-FI/HORROR: Katherine awakes in an underground cell with three other women; Jane, Natasha and Elaine. With complete amnesia Katherine and the other women have little time to wonder where they are before the arrival of the sadistic Dr Murdoch and the mysterious Handsome Man. The women soon discover they are part of a gruesome experiment with no obvious purpose. That night, Jane stays awake long enough to witness the first visit to their cell by the terrifying figure of the blood splattered Surgeon. One by one the Surgeon cuts a number into each woman’s skin, a four digit number, the exact time he will return to kill them.

Each woman must piece together the dark secret behind Dr Murdoch’s experiment and survive the Surgeon’s nightly visitations of pain, torture and grisly murder.

Is there any way to escape? What is the purpose of the experiment and who, or what, is screaming every time the lights go out?

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BEN'S PLAN
Director: Jenna Rickman

QUIRKY DRAMA: The last time Ben saw his mother she was going Christmas shopping in Manhattan. That was three weeks ago...but, fourteen-year-old Ben has a plan to bring her home. First, he must enlist the help of his burnt-out half-brother, Gary. With the holiday just a week away, Ben begins his desperate search for a reluctant mother, befriends a latch-key kid from the projects, relies on a drug dealer for street protection, and learns the truth about Gary. Maybe the best Christmas present isn't finding the family we've been given, but discovering the family we need.

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CAPTAIN EAGER AND THE MARK OF VOTH
Director: Simon DaVision

SCI-FI/COMEDY: The surreal adventures of a ray-gun hero battling his way through cardboard sets and space villains in his quest for the Mark of Voth.

Square-chinned Captain Eager, arrives in his wobbly bakelite rocket, brought out of mothballs by the sprawling, hi-tech corporation Macro Space. His mission brief is to investigate a maverick 'client' – the villainous Colonel Regamun who has taken over the Veritan Sector using the 'Mark of Voth'.

Aided by old pals Professor Moon, Scrutty and the lovelorn Jenny, Eager rockets into B Movie adventure.  Along the journey Eager learns to confront his (rubbery) monsters from the past, he triumphs due to understanding that his enemy is human too.

Starring James Vaughan, Tamsin Greig (Green Wing, Love Soup), Mark Heap (Green Wing, Spaced), Rick Leaf (Enigma, Fifth Element) this is a great British sci-fi comedy movie with an excellent British cast. Forget SKY CAPTAIN, this showcases wonderful use of green-screen and computer-generated environments.

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DIAGNOSIS:SUPERSTAR
Director: Michael Thoubouroff

SOCIAL COMEDY: This is a dark comedy feature about a psychiatric hospital closing down and patients and staff staging a sci-fi version of 'Romeo and Juliet' in order to save it.

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JACK SAYS
Director: Simon Phillips

CRIME DRAMA: Jack escapes a bloody crime scene in London, to the un-friendly ex-girlfriend that resides in Paris. A blow to the head means Jack cannot remember details from his London life too well (and principally cannot remember if he actually has killed anyone there). Whilst in Paris, he runs into another British gangster that seems to be taking advantage of a French Cabaret singer in a dingy nightclub. Jack resists the urge to help her... but can he really resist?

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JETSAM
Director: Simon Welsford

ESPIONAGE THRILLER: When the cold North Sea spits out a young woman onto a desolate beach we are thrown into the atmospheric world of JETSAM. This thriller follows the story of the washed up woman as she tries to find out the how and why of her immediate life. Along with a lost memory, to further complicate her situation a man who she discovers washed up on the same beach attacks her. Fighting to stay alive she goes on the run from the stranger, desperately trying to piece her memory back together. Criss-crossing through the savage coastline and a claustrophobic London setting she finds her answers in an unrelenting world where spies, betrayal and obsession are the daily currency and identity is as shifting as the tides.

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KILL KILL FASTER FASTER
Director: Gareth Roberts

CRIME THRILLER: Joe One-Way serves a life stretch for the murder of his teenage bride Kimba. Inspired to write by Clinique, his cellmate and mentor, Joe writes the play `White Man: Black Hole?. NYC film producer Markie Mann pulls strings to have Joe paroled, contracting him to write the screenplay. Fleur is Markie?s wife, a one-time hooker and ex-con, who can?t help but fall for kindred spirit Joe. Their attraction is irresistible. Fleur is Joe?s salvation. Propelled on a journey of obsession, guilt and lust, Joe struggles between the pull of heroin, his violence and the desire to redeem himself in the eyes of his estranged twin daughters. Joe One-Way soon discovers that life on the outside may be too dangerous even for him.

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RUBY BLUE
Director: Jan Dunn

SOCIAL DRAMA: Jack (Bob Hoskins) is consumed by guilt and past regret. His strained relationship with his son is severed on the death of his wife. Jack is lost and alone in his self loathing, abated by goading from local youths. A ray of sunshine arrives in the unlikely form of eight year old, Florrie, when she moves in next door and delights in Jack's neglected racing pigeons, unwittingly rekindling his own love for the birds. When his glamorous French neighbour, Stephanie (Josiane Balasko) takes pity on him, Jack cannot help but fall for her charms. Encouraged by Stephanie, Jack helps give purpose to a local hooligan (Jody Latham) by giving him Ruby, one of his racing pigeons. When gradually his innocent friendship with Florrie is thrown into question when the girl goes missing and Stephanie reveals a well kept secret, Jack's life is thrown into turmoil once again. When his son and Stephanie come to his defence amidst the local mob mentality, Jack finally redeems himself with a heartfelt plea of forgiveness to his son and faces his own prejudices to win back Stephanie's love.
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SUMMER SCARS
Director: Julian Richards

YOUTH THRILLER: In this dark coming-of-age thriller, six fourteen year old kids skip school to play in the woods where a power struggle emerges between the two rival leaders, BINGO and PAUL. Who will be first to ride the stolen moped and who will be first to impress LEANNE, the only girl in the group? After a hit and run incident involving the bike, the kids are befriended by the victim; a drifter named PETER who recruits the boys in a military style game designed to test their endurance. But as Peter's behaviour becomes increasingly aggressive, the kids are forced to settle their differences and embrace the dark side of human nature if they are going to survive the ordeal.

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THE RUN
Director: Tania Meneguzzi

CRIME THRILLER: Amanda and Rowly are a young couple from London. Amanda becomes obsessed with the idea of 'the run' when her old school friends return from Costa Rica and confess the source of their new found wealth. Amanda and Rowly begin the conflicting decision making process of persuasion and justification to carry A-Class drugs into London for ten thousand pounds. They eventually agree they will carry half the drugs each, so if they are caught, they will both suffer the same consequences together. For most mules, once is enough; for Amanda and Rowly, it is just the beginning, until the consequences they both face are far worse than the fear of imprisonment.

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