RICHARD ARMITAGE AWARDS INTERVIEW
LATEST NEWS & FEATURES
The inaugural Forward Film & Television Festival makes its debut and will be spotlighting bold new voices and positioning Birmingham as a major player in the screen industries.
Returning for its third and biggest year yet, the Mansfield Town Film Festival (MTFF) runs from Friday 25th to Sunday 27th July 2025 ay Mansfield Palace Theatre.
Forty years later, a witness returns to Wirksworth in Derbyshire to seek closure in a new documentary called The Wirksworth UFO Incident.
With a number of acclaimed films under his belt including Cosmo, Gone Fishing and The Morgue Party, Jonathan Hawes now launches his latest short film, Sorry We're Closed, a quirky comedy-drama centred around fish and chips. Midlands Movies Mike Sales speaks to the writer/director about his latest project, his influences and his next plans for the film.
LATEST MIDLANDS REVIEWS
The sound of a noisy hoover is the unlikely beginning of a new film from first-time filmmaker Nicholas Georghiou. A short about domestic help, the film explores a strange situation in a hotel room where all is not what it seems.
Naphat Boonyaprapa previously directed the excellent – if niche – documentary Red Black Green about local table tennis star Connor Green. Now, turning his attention to fiction, his latest short is a tender examination of loneliness and friendship.
Not judging a book by its cover. That’s the premise for this snappy period comedy from writer directors Michael and Rafe Bird. It opens on a bard (Joseph Emms) who is on the run from law in the 16th or 17th century (various bits of press around the film can’t seem to decide on which) when a supposed wood nymph interrupts proceedings.
Local Midlands animator James Pyle enters 2025 with a selection of three new films and Midlands Movies takes a look at this collection of comedy shorts from the filmmaker.
LATEST CINEMA & HOME RELEASES
Released in 1975 at the height of their fame, Wolverhampton band Slade decided that despite their joyous glam rock stylings, a fun playful knockaround film musical romp in the style of A Hard Day’s Night was not what they were looking for creatively.
Shane Black has written his fair share of witty dialogue, buddy-cop movies and his trademark flourishes are on full show in a new special edition release of this 1977-set noir comedy about private detectives investigating a missing girl.
Well, bi-Adolf Hitler BDSM is not something (a) I thought I’d ever see 5 minutes into a movie and (b) ever expected to write in my lifetime to be fair but this spicy start is pretty standard for the work of exploitation filmmaker Russ Meyer.
Ti West’s The House of the Devil makes a wonderful companion piece to his film The Innkeepers. Both maintain the director’s referential approach to horror, incapsulating it in a slow burning 90 minutes that manages to build and maintain tension while cheekily winking to the audience and showing the mechanisms behind the scares.
Watch the new teaser trailer for Midlands short THE CAGE
Leicestershire filmmaker Tom Botterill has just launched a brand new teaser trailer for his latest short The Cage. Telling the story of Theo, a reserved and introspective university student, the film follows him as he returns to his quiet home town for the funeral of his childhood best friend.
For more information follow Tom Botterill on
his Instagram for all the updates on the film.
