Author

About the Author /

Sarah is a true multi-hyphenate within the film industry. Alongside her role as Associate Editor & Head of Outreach for Directors Notes, her extensive festival experience ranges from MC and juror duties to previously serving as Deputy Director of Brighton Rocks, where she helped steer its growth into a BIFA-qualifying event. Sarah also produces for Brighton film collective The Imaginary Project and contributes as a freelance writer for publications including 1.4 and Shots Magazine.

Live Action

Ross O’Donnellan’s Tender Directorial Debut ‘Bedcrumbs’ Sits Inside the Quiet Erosion of a Failing Relationship

Shot on 16mm in sweaty, dreamlike hues, Ross O'Donnellan's queer chamber piece watches non-monogamy fail as a bandage stretched over a broken bone.

Read more

Film Festival, Live Action

Cannes Double-Hitter Vida Skerk Finds Solidarity in the Industrial Sublime in Haunting ‘Left Behind, Still Standing’

Vida Skerk's second consecutive La Cinef Cannes selected short binds a closing British steelworks and the immigrant overseeing it into one haunted reckoning.

Read more

Live Action, Premiere

Ghosts of Empire Bleed Through a Hustler’s Frantic South London Odyssey in Keifer Nyron Taylor’s ‘The Tobacconist’

Keifer Nyron Taylor unpacks how years of photographing Brixton laid the foundation for his 16mm depiction of a vibrant community threatened by gentrification.

Read more

Animation, Film Festival

Fanny Capu Unburdens the Next Generation From the Suffocating Weight of Legacy in Stop-Motion Cannes Short ‘Pickled’

Fanny Capu on engineering a dancing puppet for her grad NFTS Cannes premiering short that asks what each generation is owed and what heritage it can discard.

Read more

Live Action, Premiere

Hector Bell Unmasks the Performatively So Called Enlightened Modern Man in His Body-Horror Short ‘Skin Deep’

Hector Bell discusses crafting a character whose private vice literally erupts across his girlfriend's skin, every visit blooming as her fresh personal hell.

Read more

Live Action, Premiere

Kyle Jon Shephard Mines a Father’s Jealousy of His Missing Son for Awkward Comedy in ‘Proud Dad

"There’s nothing funnier than what’s not said." Kyle Jon Shephard on the high comedy glances in his film about a father whose ego refuses to read the room.

Read more

Live Action

Luigi Sibona Filters a Child’s Personal Apocalypse Through a Magical Realism Lens in ‘Far From the Plains’

An urban stable becomes a sanctuary for a boy carrying his mother's grief as great storms loom in Luigi Sibona's Grey Moth produced South London short.

Read more

Live Action

Devotion Curdles Into Something Far Darker in Elliott Louis McKee’s Seductive Berlin-Set Romance ‘Forever Yours’

Elliott Louis McKee unpacks how they seduced audiences with tender romance before dismantling it, turning unreliable memory into moral disorientation.

Read more

Awards, Film Festival

WeAreDN Awards 2026 – The Winners

Yesterday we marked 20 years of DN at the WeAreDN Awards 2026. For those not in the room, watch the winning films and read our interviews with the awardees.

Read more

Live Action, Premiere

Maya Winkler Explores Boobs, Existential Dread & the Absurdity of Women’s Healthcare in Off-Kilter Comedy ‘Lumps’

A breast lump scare spirals into deadpan chaos as two mid-20s women navigate the absurdities of the medical system with twisted humour and defiant joy.

Read more

Live Action, Premiere

Ruhi Radke Crushes the Sexy Virginity Myth in Her Cringeworthy but Empowering Short for All the Wallflowers ‘Squash’

Ruhi Radke on making the unsexiest sex story ever and a representation of the first time that's funny, shaming, and ultimately a love story with herself.

Read more

Live Action

Amrou Al-Kadhi’s ‘Original Sin’ Stages a Tragic Mother-Son Bloodbath as Hollywood Melodrama in Short Film Form

A Muslim mother and her drag queen son go to war for cinematic immortality in Amrou Al-Kadhi's WePresent commissioned chamber piece.

Read more