Press Release: London Short Film Festival 2017

On 7th December 2017, LSFF announced details of next year’s festival.

Featuring music, comedy, fashion and culture, LGBTQ and international strands, and taking place between 6th – 15th January 2017,  500 UK and international short films will be screened over ten days. Highlights of the press release read as follows:

“Now in its 14^th year, LSFF is recognised as the premiere showcase for cutting-edge UK independent films. Critically lauded for its provocative cross-arts programming, the festival has become synonymous with unique, zeitgeist capturing experiences and events, making it a mecca for creative talent and an important moment in the UK film calendar.”

The festival will show a huge selection of UK short films across music, comedy, LGBTQ, fashion and culture. Highlights of this year’s festival include a programme that tells the story of the birth of riot grrrl, which resonates with today’s disillusioned youth. Using confrontational imagery, a generation of female filmmakers also paved the way alongside their punk counterparts, looking to the scene for inspiration.”

The line-up looks immense, and my personal highlights from the programme include the following snippets:

“This year’s music strand will look at riot grrrl to see how women took hold of the music scene, creating film, zines and other artforms in its wake. The White Trash Girls, Gun Girls and Riot Girls programme brings together riot grrrl influenced film and its directors; attendees will receive a specially commissioned zine, drawing on the content and ethos of the films, putting them in the context of the contemporary DIY scene.”

Club Des Femmes’ Smoulder and Curl…described as “a unique and deeply personal body of 16mm films that explore the emotional ebb and flow of lesbian relationships and sexuality. The screening will be followed by a live Q&A with Annette Kennerley, hosted by Club Des Femme’s Selina Robertson.”

Another is The Sound Of Fashion, which “chronicles the birth of the fashion film, a relatively new arrival to the short film festival scene, described by some commentators as the new music video. Following the screening Leonie Cooper (ex-London College of Fashion student and Senior Staff Writer at NME) will lead a panel discussion with Katie Baron (author of Fashion Creatives Shaping Pop Culture).”

All information about the festival – programme, tickets, dates, etc – can be found by visiting http://shortfilms.org.uk/lsff2017/events 

The Skull (1965)



There was once a prophecy that whoever would drink wine from the skull of the sixteenth century alchemist and soothsayer Nostradamus would acquire his gift of sight. In 1971, two hundred years after his death, when thieves decided to rob Nostradamus’ grave they were greeted with some shocking surprises. The first was a plaque resting on the skeleton’s chest that read ‘May 1971’ – the exact date of the robbery. The second was not the gift of sight but rather the gift of an oncoming bullet. Those very individuals met their end next to the very grave they had plundered.

Having grown up with Nostradamus’ prophecies and predictions – and indeed this story – I  could not help making comparisons to The Skull. In the film Peter Cushing is Dr Maitland, an occult writer and collector with a penchant for the weird, the odd and the macabre, who acquires the skull of the Marquis de Sade. The skull’s previous owner met a horrific end and the same fate awaits Maitland.

What’s not to love about this plot? Throw in Christopher Lee as the voice of reason Sir Matthew Phillips (quite an unusual role for Lee who has become so synonymous in fiendishly delightful roles) and what plays out is a delightfully menacing 1960s horror with all the elements that we have come to expect from the studios of this era: foreboding music, high pitch screams, skulls littering apartments. It is a perfect tale for Halloween.

Director Freddie Francis was originally part of the Hammer Studios who have become so synonymous with the classic horrors of this period. Yet many are unaware of Amicus Productions. Francis made The Skull at this studio – a studio whose name should be as associated with classic British horror as Hammer productions – and the result is every bit the spine-tingler that we expect from studios of this calibre. As Maitland unravels and descends into madness we see why these films continue to be so affecting. They are pre-CGI, pre-slasher, pre-extreme gore. Sometimes the effects are bad, sometimes people laugh, but we cannot deny how psychotically affecting horror was when it was stripped back to the core. A glance, a voice, a hand gesture…they have a normality to them – this tale begins in an auction house – and could happen to anyone. How many times have we bought something from an antique shop or wished to acquire a historically significant object? The repercussions are more extreme than we could ever bargained for.

More topically, as the skull of director F. W. Murnau (Nosferatu, Faust, Sunrise) is still missing – having been robbed in a tasteless grave robbing escapade – let us remember what happened to those who toyed with Nostradamus. One can only wonder what will – or maybe has already – become of those who dared trifle with legacy. We all desire knowledge and power in some capacity or in particular areas of out lives, but some individuals will go to extreme lengths to acquire it. Just be careful what you wish for as you step out on Halloween. And stay away from wine shaped goblets. You can never be too careful.

*The Skull is released for the first time in the UK on 26 October 2015 and available on Dual Format Blu-ray & DVD.  

Grace of My Heart (1996)

Quite why Grace of My Heart (1996) (executive produced by Martin Scorsese) has never had a UK home release before is quite astonishing as it is, quite simply, a gem of a film. Inspired by the life story of Carol King and starring self-styled Indie Queen Ilena Douglas, Allison Ander’s film is the story of a female singer-songwriter finding – and fighting – for her place and striving for success in an industry dominated by men.

Edna Buxton (Douglas) is a wealthy shipping heiress with a passion for song. She wins a local song contest, and a year-long recording contract in New York, where she meets music producer Joel Milner (John Turturro) who takes her under her wing. He suggests she focuses on writing for other musicians rather than performing, and change her name to to the more approachable Denise Waverly. She reluctantly concedes and begrudgingly begins to collaborate with other musicians, first with Howard Caszatt (Eric Stoltz) – who becomes her philandering first husband and father of her two children – and British songwriter Cheryl Steed (Patsy Kensit) who soon becomes a close friend.

She is not immune to the changes of the time, both professionally and personally and begins to see the cut-throat, and fickle, nature of the industry. As the decades pass, and singers begin to write their own material, her skills as a songwriter are no longer needed and her family goes out of business meaning she no longer has her inheritance to fall back on. Seeking a reinvention, she relocates to Malibu and marries Brian Wilson-type Jay Phillips (Matt Dillion), who completely overhauls her song writing. She no longer ‘sounds’ like herself, thus creating a greater distance between Denise and the profession that she has so desperately tried to cling to throughout her live.

What’s great about Grace of My Heart is tenderness and the humour of what is, at times, a rather very bleak film. It could be quite the downer but we do not see it quite this way, largely thanks to Douglas’ injection of enthusiasm and through Anders’ writing. Likewise, the banter between Denise and Cheryl is funny and tender uplifting in a way that belies the life that is otherwise crumbling around her while Tuturro is wonderful as the constant male energy in her life, offering her age advice and championing her at every stage of her career.

With Douglas and Anders currently involved, and fronting, the TCM channel’s Trailblazing Women season on US cable television TCM, and The Carol King playing on the West End stage, Grace of My Heart is now more relevant than ever before. It’s a bittersweet story but one that leaves a very pleasant flavour.

* Grace of My Heart is released on Monday 12 October 2015