‘Evening Analysing & Discussing Films’. 5th January

Mike Sanders, the Surrey Border Movie Makers Chairman, hosted the clubs online January meeting.

He put together an excellent varied selection of films that had been entered in the 2023 BIAFF Film Festival (British International Amateur Film Festival). Eight films were watched and then discussed after each viewing. We were very pleased to be joined on Zoom by two new prospective members one who has some film making experience and one who is involved in amateur dramatics, they both contributed their valued and interesting views on the films they watched during the club evening.

A film by Bradford Movie Makers was the first to be shown and was called ’Through the Years’ an historical archive of some of their many films made since the club was formed back in 1934. Interestingly, they managed to rescue a small cinema which was due to close down and one of their films told the story of this.

 The second film was called ‘Papercut’ made by London Fine Art Studios, this was a superb animation, basic in storyline and conception but with many people contributing to its creation behind the scenes.

The third film was a drama called ‘Distraction’ by Howard Smith, this was a powerful drama about a young girl being taught how to commit a distraction robbery, one of the actors won an award for Best Young Actress.

The fourth film called ‘Flight of the Robin’ was an absorbing animation with accompanying singing and made an excellent children’s film with a Christmas theme.

The fifth film ‘Tech Troubles’ by David Akinyose was an amusing and clever animation which involved a fictional character jumping from a computer screen and being pursued around the room by his captor who manages to trap him in an iPad and return him safely to the computer.

Bristol Film & Video Society’s film ‘Marigolds’ was the sixth film to be shown, this was an absorbing drama with some very good acting and green screen content, it involved two people dealing with different personal issues on a roof top who ended up having a meaningful conversation.

The seventh film involved some wonderful footage and still photography ‘The Power of Water’ by Alan Sinclair explained the use of water for Kinetic Energy via Tidal and Hydro Electric Power, this interesting documentary was very well narrated and filmed by Alan.

The eighth and final film for the evening was called ’The Dream Police’ by Robin Slater, a film set to a Gary Numan song featuring a ghost roaming the streets at night but being watched and followed by CCTV camera operators, a well made and acted slightly spooky film which captured the audience’s attention throughout.