Thanks so much for joining us tonight and for scanning the QR code. You’ll find some notes on everything we’re screening below. Enjoy the show.
The Front Room is a special, vital venue for Weston-Super-Mare and you can support it by buying drinks at the bar (G and T for Jim; hipster lager for Jimmy; proper lager for Ross) or by making a donation as you leave this evening via the card-reader near the door.
PART ONE
ZERO SUM
19 mins
Directed by Jimmy Hay
Written by James Gillingham
Produced by Ross Bliss
Zero Sum tells the story of Ruth, a young woman who wakes inside a featureless spaceship in orbit around an alien world. She thinks she’s alone.
Funded by the BFI and starring Aimee-Ffion Edwards (Slow Horses, Peaky Blinders, Skins) and Phil Davis (so many, many things including Slow Horses with Aimee), Zero Sum was shot in a studio in Portishead (DP was Paul Dudbridge) notable for having very noisy seagulls on its roof that caused the sound department (Rich Simms) a literal and metaphorical headache.
The incredible set was built by Simon Birtwistle and Paula Birtwistle and was repurposed after the shoot as a cosy reading pod for a local primary school.
The score was Andrew Fisher’s first for Long Arm Films. It would not be his last.
The film played in festivals around the world and it’s still available to stream on Amazon Prime. An average of 9 people stream it each month, earning us about 2 pence.
MAKING HIGH TIDE (PART ONE)
2 mins
Extracts from the daily video diary we kept on set during the making of High Tide. Some people actually watched these.
NOTHING ECHOES HERE
26 mins
Written and directed by Jimmy Hay
Produced by Ross Bliss
Charting two nights and two days in the life of a woman attempting to navigate the near-aftermath of the death of her husband, and her children's father, whilst in the fog of numbing, directionless grief. Camping in the woods provides some measure of escape for her and her children but when this fragile equilibrium is disturbed she is forced to confront her loss head-on.
The film explores the role that space – interior, exterior, familiar, non-familiar – plays for those grieving a profound loss, whilst utilising formal elements of film language and performance to portray grief in an authentic and empathetic manner, prioritising a sense of experience over story and narrative.
Nothing Echoes Here was the first film we shot entirely in and around Weston-Super-Mare which was sensible choice because a) it looks great on camera and b) we live there. Or at least this was true at the time. It also sees the acting debuts of Charlie Hay and Elsie Hay.
Music is by Matt Harding (more of whom later).
HIGH TIDE DELETED SCENE - “TEA ROSTRA”
2 mins
Starring Julie Barclay and Max Parmentier, this scene that was too long to include in the film but remains an absolute favourite of ours.
MOON PETER
9 mins
Written and directed by James Gillingham and Charlie Mulliner
Produced by James Gillingham and Ross Bliss
Danni, a thirty-something woman who lives on her own, is struggling to make sense of a world in which she's the only person who seems not to know exactly how she should be living her life. Her only solace is "just a kids' book" but maybe in childish things there are adult truths.
Jim and Charlie’s first collaboration as writers resulted in this short film which was a made over a long weekend in Noah Gillingham’s bedroom. Not that he had much choice about it. Written to be made on a small budget, we nonetheless threw all we could at the production including a superb cast and a brilliant DP in Clement Jochem.
Moon Peter also gave Jimmy his first credit as 1st AD, a role that he enjoyed mainly because he got to shout at everyone.
The superb score is once again by composer and friend Andrew Fisher and is proof of his gift for both sublime melody and comic timing.
MAKING HIGH TIDE (PART TWO)
2 mins
Film sets are funny places; strong bonds are quickly formed, people regularly do extraordinary things and sometimes a couple of dickheads from Devon repeatedly rib a national treasure for her (fictional) drinking problem. These are some to-camera moments captured towards the end of the High Tide shoot. You can see how tired we were. But goodness, we were having a great time too.
PART TWO
HIGH TIDE
Certificate 15
93 mins 10 secs (don’t worry, we’re not showing all of it)
Directed by Jimmy Hay and James Gillingham
Written by James Gillingham and Jimmy Hay
Post-production overseen by Ross Bliss
Music by Matt Harding
Song at the final credits is Coming Back by Natalie Holmes
High Tide is the debut feature film from Long Arm Films. It tells the story of Bethan (Melanie Walters) who has a single day to mend the broken relationship with her teenage son Josh (Samuel Davies). After taking him out of school Bethan drives him the short distance to the stunning Gower coastline in South Wales where the pair can talk openly to each other, free from distraction, for perhaps the first time ever. After some troubling revelations that will change both their lives forever, the pair find themselves at a party hosted by Tess (Claire Cage) and her daughter Sophie (Charlotte Mulliner) at which they witness a reality very different from their own. High Tide is a is a moving, powerful and tender portrait of a vital twenty-four hours in two people's lives. It is a story of love, forgiveness and change.
We would not have been able to make the film without the help of some extraordinary and generous people, not least Executive Producers Alexia Parmentier, Max Parmentier and Caroline Boujou as well as Bob Benton and his company Bob and Co. We were also supported by dozens of contributors to our crowdfunding campaign. Our small crew worked stupidly long hours for bad money and the people and places of south Wales could not have been more welcoming and helpful.
Thanks also to the BFI for some more cash when we very much needed it.
A full list of credits is available here.
Jim’s blog entry written just after we wrapped is still available in this very dusty corner of the internet.
The High Tide Party Scene - unused moments from a special day
5 mins
Here are a few fragments, unused scenes, mistakes and curios taken from the huge amount of footage that we shot for the party scene. Scored by Matt Harding’s immaculate music, it’s something of a lovely coda to the whole High Tide adventure. The piece also features Rupert Waring on clapper board duties; Rupert, aside from Jimmy and Jim, was the only member of the crew who remained sober as we raced to shoot the final scenes of a very long day.