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.

Is There Anybody Out There? director Ella Glendining is a disabled white woman in her twenties with long blonde hair, short, unusual looking legs, and a few tattoos on her arm. Ella sunbathes on a sandy beach. She looks blissful, basking in the sunshine. A sliver of sparkling blue ocean can be seen in distance.

Awards, Documentary

Ella Glendining’s Debut ‘Is There Anybody Out There?’ Is a Captivating Battle Cry for the Disabled Community

Ella Glendining speaks about bringing together the patchwork elements of her empowering documentary about her search for someone else with the same disability.

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Live Action

Savanah Leaf’s Blistering ‘Earth Mama’ Lays Bare the Struggles of Marginalized Motherhood in a Flawed Care System

Savanah Leaf details how shooting 16mm benefited her gritty, surreal debut feature which shines a unique authorial lens on motherhood, race and class.

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Live Action

Kerry O’Neill’s Euphoric Dark Comedy ‘Walk Out Nice and Smooth’ Explores the Moral Ambiguity of a Mother’s Love.

Kerry O’Neill discusses building an atmosphere of chaotic adventure in her short about a mother & her adolescent child's mission to sell a stolen laptop.

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Live Action, Premiere

Emily Lucienne’s ‘Immaculate Deception’ Explores the Desperate Actions a Woman Takes As Her Options Narrow

Emily Lucienne details building the cloistered claustrophobic atmosphere of her short exploring the desperate measures dwindling options can push us to.

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Live Action, Premiere

Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz Explores the Nuanced Complexity of Female Group Power Dynamics in ‘Scotty’s Vag’

Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz discusses capturing the subtleties of shifting female power dynamics within a college sorority in her gritty veracious short.

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Live Action, Premiere

A Strange Noise in the Night Leads to a Spooky Encounter in Ben S. Hyland’s Comedy Horror ‘Bleep’

Ben S. Hyland reveals how he used misdirection to great comic effect in his short about a bickering couple investigating a strange unidentifiable noise.

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Live Action, Premiere

A Mother’s Love for Her Son Is Tested by Radicalisation in Robin Summon’s Unsettling Drama ‘Victim’

Robin Summons talks to DN about portraying the worrying pernicious mundanity of Incel radicalisation on young men in his unsettling drama short.

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Art & Fashion

Sergii Shevtsov Takes a Metaphorical Ride of Whimsy With ‘the list of stupid questions i ask myself when i’m

Sergii Shevtsov breaks down the considered staging of the surreal compositions for his self-reflective visual poem about life, career and relationships.

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Live Action

A Young Man Grapples With His Newly Found Independence in Sam Davis’ ‘You Know Where to Find Me’

Sam Davis discusses his naturalistic use of documentary filming techniques in the making of his slice-of-life drama about a young man flying the nest.

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Live Action, Premiere

Tamsin Topolski Lays Bare the Dire Consequences of Toxic Positivity in Satirical Short ‘I’m a Good Person’

Tamsin Topolski details how she represented her protagonist's mental and physical demise through all aspects of her darkly comic satire's colour palette.

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Live Action, Premiere

Max Lincoln’s Comedy-Horror ‘Rhyme or Die’ Subversively Critiques the Merciless Nature of the Creative Industries

Director Max Lincoln talks about devising imaginative kills and being inspired by the ruthless nature of the creative industries for his bloody comedy-horror.

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Live Action

Yanghuixiao Gao’s ‘What If’ Delicately Explores Notions of Motherhood From an Intergenerational Vantage

Yanghuixiao Gao describes using natural light to ground her drama short exploration of the complexities of mother-daughter relationships in authentic realism.

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