Directors Notes

While UK kids were entertained on Saturday afternoons by aged overweight wrestlers, in the US wrestling was a much more glamorous affair thanks to GLOW and the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling. Director Brett Whitcomb and writer Bradford Thomason join us to discuss the role of the writer in documentary filmmaking and how tapping into the […]

Israeli director Adam Bizanski’s live action puppet short Paul, tells the story of an alienated character searching for his stolen fish through the underbelly of Tel Aviv. Adam joins us for our first interview of 2013 to discuss how he and Paul went from lip-sync performances in his room, to a string of well regarded […]

Paul (2011) Still in the aftermath of a tough break up, Paul’s life is slowly deteriorating. A mindless burglary of his rented apartment forces him to push through the underworld of Tel Aviv to investigate.

A combination of portraiture and vérité, mixed with a poetically impressionistic voice over, Alan Spearman’s As I Am is one of the most powerful documentary shorts we’ve featured here on DN. Alan joins us to discuss straddling the line between journalist and filmmaker and how Werner Herzog advice to ‘meet the glory’ has positively impacted […]

As I Am (2012) Chris Dean’s heart stopped when he was two. He died but he came back. When Chris was five, his father was murdered, riddled by more than 20 bullets in a gang shootout. At age 18, Chris gained national attention when he introduced President Barack Obama at his high school graduation. Chris [...]

Adam Wells’ animation Brave New Old breaks free from established narrative conventions by playing out its scenes within the confines of a rotating cube. Adam joins us to discuss his mechanical storytelling approach and how the cube head style of the short enabled a faster production process. The idea of making a 10 minute film [...]

Brave New Old (2012) A character contemplates the nature and honesty of ideas.

Kurtis Hough’s approach to filmmaking may best be described as the ‘patient experimental cinema of nature’. He makes his third appearance on DN today with Warm Earth, Which I’ve Been Told and Cryosphere, a pair of films which both fall into that category whilst expanding the inventive creativity we’ve come to expect from Kurt’s work [...]

Warm Earth, Which I’ve Been Told (2012) A planetary eye on a passing day in the universe.

Stuart Willis’ ridiculously ambitious graduation short Payload, sets relatable characters in a believable future to deliver a compelling story about hard choices and sacrifice. It’s a short which has garnered much praise online and an interview we’ve been looking forward to posting on DN. Stuart takes us through his methods of building an onscreen family [...]

Payload (2011) A family of scavengers. A corrupt spaceport. A callous matriarch. A home in the shadow of a space elevator. After a brutal attack on his father, Simon Carter must sacrifice everything to save his family.

Jonathan Minard and James George’s infinite conversation Clouds is a computational documentary which explores the beauty of code through the new technique of volumetric video. Jonathan and James join us to discuss navigating the bleeding edge where filmmaking and technology meet. What’s been a very exciting thing about this project is actually realising & inventing [...]

Clouds: beta (2012) Clouds is a computational documentary featuring hackers and media artists in dialogue about code, culture and the future of visualization.

Griff’s melancholic short The Gift sees a childless couple’s life disrupted by an unexpected arrival. Griff joins us this week to discuss the aesthetic nature of electricity pylons and how he combined a great cast, improvisation and invisible effects shots to create an unnerving narrative. It was just purely reimagining the legend of a stork [...]

The Gift (2012) A tale of a troubled couple, visited by an ominous stork bearing both hope and tragedy. You can watch the full film below: