10/11/2006

The UK Film Council has just announced that Duane Hopkins, winner of the MEDIA New Talent Award in Cannes 2004 for his script Better Things, has been awarded £255,000 support from its New Cinema Fund.

Thirty-three year-old Hopkins has won several awards for his short films, including the UIP Best Short Film Award from the European Film Academy in 2004 for Love Me or Leave Me Alone. Together with his production partner Samm Haillay from Third Films (a graduate from the EAVE MEDIA Programme), he is now making the leap to features with Better Things, also co-funded by Film Four.

The film will incorporate the styles and themes of his shorts, using natural lighting and non-professional actors. Set in The Cotswolds, in Southwest England, Better Things chronicles the lives and relationships of a group of young people grappling with boredom, growing drug use, mental health and the development of their sexuality. Their experiences and choices will be juxtaposed against those made by their parents' and grandparents' generations.

Four other films in post-production also received support from the New Cinema Fund. That’s For Me! (awarded £149,800) is a mockumentary about a celebrity-obsessed but talent-less actress and her devoted family, directed by newcomer Claudia Solti. Mrs Ratcliffe’s Revolution (awarded £700,000) is the third film by Bille Eltringham (This Is Not a Love Song). Set in the 1960s, the comedy follows the fortunes of a Communist family who leave Britain to live out their utopian dream in East Germany.

The Allotment, written by Frank Cottrell Boyce, is Richard Laxton’s second film after Life & Lyrics and is the story of an asylum-seeking family who is given an allotment to help rehabilitate their traumatised father. The film (awarded £400,000) is co-financed by BBC Films. Lastly, Peter Greenaway’s Nightwatching [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which has just wrapped filming on location in Wales and Poland, was awarded £300,000. Martin Freeman stars as Rembrandt and Eva Birthistle as his wife.