Films: The Line
Director: Sharon Williams
Writer: Sharon Williams
Actors: TBC
Synopsis: This gritty and moving short film is about a group of friends caught up in a county lines gang and the impact this has on family and friends
With The Southend-on-Sea Film Festival will be returning once again from Thursday 8th June to Sunday 11th June, I got an opportunity to ask Writer/Director Sharon Williams a few questions about the film ‘The Line‘ which has been selected to play at the festival on Saturday 10th June at 6.30pm
Q. What can we expect from the film The Line?
A. The Line shows us how easy it is to be groomed into joining a gang, and how knife crime impacted on the family and friends of those involved. We see the story through the eyes of one of those who was there – but we don’t learn who he is talking to until much later…
Q. How did the idea for the film come about?
A. The touring theatre work of N-Act Theatre company is designed to help young people make the right choices to keep physically safe and mentally healthy. The youth services team at Thurrock Council saw one of our performances and commissioned us to write a film to be used in schools to compliment the aims of our live theatre work.
Q. What were some of the influences for the look and style of the film?
A. N-Act are still developing as film makers – we are more used to live performance! But I knew that I wanted it to be hard-hitting, realistic and true to life, so I relied on our DOP to use his influences to create the right mood and style for this film while I worked with the young actors to help them present the story in a believable and moving way.
Q. Where there any elements of the original script which were adapted during filming?
A. Once we started editing, we moved some of the scenes round to make them flow in a more understandable way for the audience to follow the thread.
Q. What were some of your favourite moments whilst making the Film?
A. Working with the young cast, they never failed to impress me both in their work ethic and their performances. None of them had ever been in a film before, but listened, watched and took direction without a fault!
Q. Did you experience any issues whilst making the film?
A. One of the outside spaces was causing a lot of issues with traffic sound. As soon as we decided to move to a different space in the park – we were faced with the start of a thunderstorm! It was our final day, so we had to make it work. Well done to the sound editor for resolving this!
Q. What do you hope people will take away from the film
A. I hope they will be moved by the story enough to make them think about the circumstances which our young people find themselves in more and more. But I also hope they can recognise and admire the raw talent of some of our young actors.
Q. Do you have any other projects which you are working on?
A. We are currently working on our next theatre production called SHADOW. There may be an element of film as part of this – watch this space!
Q. If someone is looking to direct their first film, what advice would you give them?
A.
* Make sure you have a good DOP, PRODUCER and SOUND who know what they are doing!
* Don’t be afraid to ask questions
* Listen to advice
* Know what you want it to look like – and keep coming back to that vision at the start of each day!
Website – www.n-acttheatre.co.uk
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/NActTheatre
Instagram – https://instagram.com/nacttheatreco
The Southend Film Festival will run from Thursday 8th June to Sunday 11th June
You can find out more about the films and purchase tickets for the Southend Film Festival here
Published in various websites, Philip is a reviewer who is best known for his interviews and media coverage of independent projects including; films, books, theatre and live events. Always on the lookout for something different to cover!
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