Celebrity Measurements

Twelve UK producers including Damian Jones, Emily Morgan, Nikki Parrott and Tom Wood are heading to Paris later this month for a series of co-production meetings arranged through a partnership between the British Film Institute (BFI) and France’s national film centre, the CNC.

The meetings will take place from April 20-21.

Scroll down for the full list of participants

“After a successful trip of French producers to the BFI London Film Festival (LFF) last October organised by the BFI with Institut francais in the UK and Unifrance, the BFI is delighted to work in partnership with CNC to bring a group of experienced, active UK producers to Paris to meet their peers and seek collaboration and co-production opportunities,” said Agnieszka Moody, head of international and industry policy.

Projects being pitched include Ali, which will reunite Supernova director Harry Macqueen with producer Morgan, and follows two fathers grappling for survival in the middle of the English Channel, with financing from the BFI locked box scheme; the next feature from Rye Lane and Boxing Day producer Jones, Paris For One, about a woman who discovers a new side of herself while on a business trip to Paris; and French road trip revenge drama Kill Em All, produced by Amanda Jenks and directed by Call Me Kate filmmaker Lorna Tucker.

The French production companies that attended LFF were: bathysphere, Beabia Films, CSE Productions, Films Grand Huit, FullDawa Films, June Films, KG Productions, Les Films d’Ici, Melocoton Films, Tita B Productions, Tripode Productions and Wildcats Productions.

BFI CNC co-production meeting participants

Synopses provided by BFI/CNC

Amanda Jenks, Greenacre Films (Been So Long)
Priority project: Kill Em All, dir. Lorna Tucker
Synopsis: When an unexpected revelation leads to a shocking murder, Girl goes on the run and ends up on a road trip like no other, navigating newfound rage, sexual awakening and revenge, while journeying through France to reclaim something that was taken from her a long time ago.
Budget: PS4m

Chris Martin, Indie Movie Company (Good Vibrations)
Priority project: Less Than Human (animation), dir. Chris Kelly
Synopsis: This is the true story of a remarkable mother and her three young children as they flee genocide in Myanmar only to be kidnapped and held ransom on board a vast cargo ship, enduring unimaginable horrors as modern day slaves, before securing their release.
Budget: PS10m

Damian Jones, DJ Films (Rye Lane)
Priority project: Paris For One
Synopsis: A young woman reluctantly takes a business trip to Paris and sees a new side of herself and the city that she never imagined.
Budget: TBC

Derren Lawford, Dare Pictures (Dalton’s Dream)
Priority project: The Porter: The Prequel (TV series), creator/executive producers, Arnold Pinnock and Jennifer Kawaja
Synopsis: This series explores the incredible real-life back story of railway workers from both Canada and the US who joined together to give birth to the world’s first Black union. Their origin story takes the audience to the UK and France in the early 1900s and includes the Kimmel Camp riots, the machinations of media mogul and political player Lord Beaverbrook and the battlefields of France.
Budget: PS2.5m per episode

Emily Morgan, Quiddity Films (Supernova)
Priority project: Ali, dir. Harry Macqueen
Synopsis: When two fathers meet one night in the middle of the English Channel, they must battle to save themselves and the people they love.
Budget: EUR3m

Iain Harvey, The Illuminated Film Company (Christmas Carol: The Movie)
Priority project: Rocket Robbins (TV animation), dir. Sue Tong
Synopsis: Join Rocket, her big brother Jamal, her cat Luna and her friends as they explore their inner city neighbourhood. Each story is full of humor, drama, and action. We see how Rocket thinks her way through life’s little challenges with energy, enthusiasm and by using her own special logic.
Budget: PS6.5m

Isabel Freer, Electric Shadow Company (The Crow)
Priority project: The Week Dad Died, dir. Isabella Wing Davey
Synopsis: Helene, the only daughter of an English middle class family, grapples with her father’s impending death in the week he’s released from hospital for the last time. As the characters come together in Northern France a shocking discovery threatens their final days as a family.
Budget: PS1.5m

Jason Newmark, Newscope Films (Consecration)
Priority project: A Bollywoof Tale (animation), dir. Frederic du Chau
Synopsis: The story of Basil, a young English springer spaniel, who enjoys a perfect life in London until his human family decide to emigrate to India. Basil escapes from London and is then sent to Kolkata by mistake. Basil must now make the 1000-mile journey across India to reunite with his family.
Budget: EUR14m

Nikki Parrott, Tigerlily Productions (Hong Kong Mix Tape)
Priority project: Borders (documentary), dir. Jessi Gutch
Synopsis: We have all been struck by a sense of our island mentality and a creeping realisation of how Bordered off we feel from the rest of the world. This documentary will be creative, experimental, and hybrid. It will explore and question myths of the present, future, and past. Art and poetry connected to the unique landscape and history will provide a core narrative thread, and characters with varying connections to the Channel and this idea of borders, will provide the individual stories.
Budget: PS400,000

Paula Alvarez-Vaccaro, Pinball London (Listen)
Priority project: Revolution School (TV series), dir. Steve Barron
Synopsis: An exclusive British prep school will be changed forever when a new student creates a successful revolution against his rich and powerful bullies; but once at the top, he must come face to face with his desire for power and the other forces at play, including teachers, the school headmistress and his unexpected mentor, Joseph Stalin.
Budget: EUR1.75m per episode

Simon Cornwell, The Ink Factory (The Little Drummer Girl)
Priority project: Templar (TV series), showrunner Nic Pizzolato
Synopsis: An operative in the secretive Y Division of the DGSE is forced to confront that his team may have been betrayed by a fellow operative when a routine mission in Palermo to disrupt a terrorist organisation goes fatally wrong.
Budget: $60m

Tom Wood, Western Edge Pictures (Timestalker)
Priority project: The Peloton, dir. Vaughan Sivell
Synopsis: While on a cycling holiday in France, four young British men inadvertently get on the wrong side of a faceless gang of extreme cyclists and find themselves being relentlessly hunted down, and violently killed one by one.
Budget: PS2.5m

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