Tag Archives: C4

First Cut Returns To C4

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Channel 4 Commissioning Editor Aysha Rafael has commissioned 12 x 30 minute First Cut films which will TX early summer.

The First Cut strand showcases original and bold documentary films by up and coming first time directors as part of Channel 4’s continuous commitment to nurturing new and diverse talent. It first launched in 2007 and now in its sixth year. These forthcoming films chronicle a range of fascinating stories from the world’s first IVF lottery, a finishing school for Chinese students in London, Britain’s oldest stand-up comic – to the moving story of the mother of one of Ian Brady’s victims who is making one last plea to him to reveal where her boy is buried.

First Cut Commissioning Editor, Aysha Rafaele said: ‘First Cut continues to be one of the very few platforms on primetime TV for emerging film making talent in the UK. I am proud that Channel 4 continues to showcase and support distinctive singular documentary films and is always open to introducing fresh new opinions and ideas. This new series of First Cut once again delivers a run of thought-provoking films from a variety of talented first-time directors.’

Films for the 2012 run will include:

The Harry Hunters
Since the marriage between Kate Middleton and Prince William, Prince Harry has been thrust into the spotlight as the most eligible bachelor in Britain. Handsome and third in line to the throne, the remaining Prince has become an object of desire for girls across the globe. The Harry Hunters follows five girls on their quest to snag a royal including Cassie who grew up in rural Iowa watching Disney movies and dreaming she would one day marry Prince Harry. She’s done her background research and has a plan – to hit his favourite haunts – from Polo clubs to exclusive Mayfair nightspots. Production Company: Rare Day; Producer and Director: Emily Hughes; Exec Producers: Emily Renshaw-Smith and Peter Dale.

Dear Mr Brady
This sensitive and poignant film tells the story of Winnie Johnson, and her son Keith Bennett who was horrifically murdered by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley in the 1960s. Out of the five victims of the Moors Murderers, only Keith remains buried on Saddleworth Moor. Almost 50 years after Keith’s disappearance, Ian Brady still refuses to say where he buried the 12-year-old boy. Now 78 years-old and recently diagnosed with cancer, Winnie refuses to give up her quest to find and bring home her eldest son and makes one last plea to Ian Brady to tell her where he buried Keith. Dear Mr Brady examines the extraordinary relationship between Manchester Matron Winnie Johnson and Britain’s most notorious serial killer, Ian Brady, and reveals how Winnie has coped with every mother’s worst nightmare. Production Company: Century Films; Producer and Director: John Coffey; Exec Producer: Liesel Evans.

Fraud Lord
Lord Davenport is the extraordinary tale of ‘Fast Eddie’ Davenport and his spectacular fall from grace. How did this titled London socialite end up sentenced to 7 years behind bars? He was already notorious for a lifestyle that was said to include orgies, fast cars, and dodgy property, even before he hit the front pages following his conviction for a multiple-million pound financial fraud. Davenport has property around the world and who could not be impressed by his website which includes a gallery of photographs showing him at parties that were attended by the likes of Mick Jagger and Paris Hilton. It turned out he used the movie star pseudonym James Stewart to execute his multimillion pound con. Production Company: Ronachan Films; Producer and Director: Ruth Reid, Exec Producer: Helen Littleboy.

Stalked
Stalked is the story of how one man became entangled in the murky waters of 21st century sexual manners; and how easily the word of one person can transform your life, causing you to question your own past, and fear your own innermost thoughts. When a single, thirty-something writer living in London awoke to find a woman he’d met just hours earlier saying she loved him, an alarm bell started to ring. Six months later, his life changed for the worse. Told through dramatized sequences and interviews with friends, family, workmates and neighbours, Stalked reveals how a confident young man ends up as a terrified victim. What are the rules of contemporary sexual politics? How does it feel to be transformed on the say-so of one person, from victim to sexual assault suspect? And why does nearly everyone view the idea of a man being stalked by a woman as a joke? Production Company: ACME Films; Producer and Director: Lottie Gammon; Exec Prod: Jaimie D’Cruz.

A Tale of Two Chinas
China has an increasing impact on the UK. The Peking pound now props up the British housing and education market, Chinese hunger for haute couture accounted for a third of the spending in 2010 London Christmas sales and almost half of London’s Canary Wharf apartments are Chinese owned. The largest number of foreign students in the UK are Chinese, but they can find it hard to comprehend British culture. This is where Anglo-Chinese businesswoman Carrie Waley comes in. Carrie escaped to the UK from Beijing and now runs a strict, straight-talking finishing school for Chinese students studying here, eager to learn British customs and snap up the top international jobs, but also to take on the ‘correct’ etiquette, fashion and business persona. The film follows Carrie back to Beijing as she revisits the places of her childhood and hears her mother talking for the first time, about their family’s humiliation and persecution during the Cultural Revolution and asks if China too can reconcile past and present? Production Company: Keo Films; Producer and Director: Frankie Fathers; Exec Producer: Katie Buchanan.

Britain’s Oldest Stand Up
Chelsea Pensioner, 90-year-old Jack Woodward has a dream: to revive his career as a stand-up comic and perform on stage at the Hammersmith Apollo. This film follows Jack on a heart-warming journey as he attempts to make it in the modern world of stand-up comedy. Jack has grown restless and is looking for a challenge and wants to do one last gig to rival them all. His comedy CV is already impressive – he cut his comedy teeth in working men’s clubs in the North, performed on troop ships during WW2 and was a BBC warm-up comic in the 1960s. He complains that comedians today swear too much, but can they actually teach him a thing or two about modern comedy and help him update his act so he can compete with the best of them? For an old dog learning new tricks, the road to the Apollo will be littered with obstacles, both practical and emotional. But the reward will be the opportunity for Jack to feel the buzz of a live audience once again – and to finally achieve a life-long ambition. Production Co: Testimony Films; Producer and Director: Clair Titley; Exec Producer Steve Humphries.

Win a Baby
Fertility problems affect one in seven couples in the UK so when single mother Camille Strachan announced back in July 2011 that she would be launching the world’s first IVF lottery, it caused both a media storm and provoked a huge ethical debate. The scheme comes at a time when more and more people are citing a ‘postcode lottery’ with regards to receiving IVF treatment on the NHS and promises a monthly chance of winning a luxurious all-inclusive fertility treatment package worth £25,000, all for a £20 ticket online. Win a Baby follows Camille as she prepares and launches the first lottery of its type in Britain and meets the people who are planning on entering in the draw. Production Company: Roast Beef Productions; Producer: Danielle Clark; Director: Joseph Martin; Executive Producers: Mike Lerner and Martin Herring

What’s My Body Worth?
Could selling your hair, fingernails or eggs make you rich? Filmmaker Storm Theunissen examines the reality of the body parts industry and embarks on a hilarious yet painful personal journey; trying to sell every bit of her body she legally can from a lap-dance to her own eggs. Setting her sights on Hollywood – the market leader in egg-brokering for IVF – Storm learns that model looks and intelligence could easily net you $15,000. Egg donation must be altruistic in the UK and What’s My Body Worth is a timely contribution to this moral minefield. In April this year, the UK government is tripling the payment for expenses to £750 in a bid to solve a shortage of these donors. The film also follows Storm as she aims to discover whether her body is worth more dead than alive. Production Company: Ronachan Films; Producer and Director: Storm Theunissen; Executive Producers: Monica Garnsey and Angus Macqueen .

Channel 4 Presenters Champion Current Affairs

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Channel 4 today announces a move to bring together the best of its journalism across the channel by involving the Channel 4 News presenting team in its flagship current and foreign affairs strands.

Whilst maintaining their presence on Channel 4 News, Jon Snow and Krishnan Guru-Murthy will join the highly-respected reporting line-up for Dispatches and Unreported World; going out into the field to report on the issues that matter most to them.

Channel 4’s Head of News & Current Affairs Dorothy Byrne, says: “Channel 4 News presenters are some of the best journalists in this country. They have never just sat in studios reading autocues – this new way of working will enable them to go out in Britain and across the world to investigate and highlight the stories which they really care about, holding those in power to account. This is part of our joined-up approach in maximising our heavyweight journalists across both our news and current affairs output. ”

Jon Snow will be more embedded into the Channel 4’s current affairs team, giving him the journalistic freedom to delve deeper and investigate issues that he is passionate about – such as human rights. As previously announced, Jon will present Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields (tx: Channel 4, Tuesday 14th June 2011 at 11.05pm) an investigation into the civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the secessionist rebels, the Tamil Tigers, featuring devastating new video evidence of war crimes.

Snow will also present a number of Dispatches a year beginning with Landlords From Hell (tx: Channel 4, Monday 4th July at 8pm) – an exposé of rent racketeers who exploit those who can’t afford to buy their own homes as well as those who live and work illegally in the UK.

Jon Snow says: “Dispatches is a jewel in the crown of Channel 4 and has unearthed some revelatory stories and provoked important debate. It’s great to be doing more of these programmes and really getting under the skin of issues like human rights, international affairs and housing issues at home and abroad. There’s such affinity between the News and the rest of the Current Affairs family – and this will just cement that bond. I can’t wait to get stuck in.”

Matt Frei is set to join Channel 4 News and the presenting line-up. As well as his core role of Washington Correspondent, he will also present the News throughout the year and take on a number of Dispatches programmes.

In the autumn Krishnan Guru-Murthy will take up an ambassador role at Unreported World – the UK’s longest-running foreign affairs series which reports from some of the most neglected and toughest places on the planet.

As well as presenting several Unreported Worlds a year, Krishnan will provide seamless links directly from Channel 4 News into the programme. He will also engage with his significant social media following to provoke discussion and debate the issues examined in the programme. This will take the form of live chats on Twitter and regular blogging.

Krishnan Guru Murthy says: “Unreported World consistently shines light on stories that are missed by the mainstream. It finds unheard voices, challenges dominant perspectives on the world and is an essential part of what Channel 4 is for. I look forward to joining the team and discussing the issues and films with our viewers. Now that Unreported World and Channel 4 News can be watched online around the world that is a truly exciting global conversation.”

Increasing the social media engagement with Dispatches and UW, viewers will also be able to suggest story ideas and comment on stories via the programme websites, Facebook pages, or directly with Jon and Krishnan via Twitter. Snowmail – Channel 4 News’ informal free evening news update – will include issues investigated by Dispatches and Unreported World.

Last month Channel 4 News announced that Cathy Newman will join Jon and Krishnan as the third regular presenter. It is expected that she will also present some Dispatches in due course.

Fresh Meat: Channel 4 Announces New Comedy Drama

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From the award-winning creators of Peep Show, Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong, and with a brilliant young cast, Fresh Meat is Channel 4’s latest comedy drama series, currently filming on location in Manchester.

Spanning eight episodes, the series follows a group of six students about to embark on the most exciting period of their lives thus far – University! Away from home for the first time, on the brink of adult life, they are about to discover who they really are. From the moment they ship up as freshers at their shared house, their lives are destined to collide, overlap and run the whole gamut of appalling behaviour and terrible errors of judgment.

They are: JP (Jack Whitehall), public school boy with good teeth and an inflated sense of entitlement; Kingsley (Joe Thomas), charming, loveable and crushingly insecure; Josie (Kimberley Nixon), overly enthusiastic, determined to experience ‘new things’, however bad they are for you. Then there’s socially awkward and know-it-all Howard (Greg McHugh); straight talking, hard-living Vod (Zawe Ashton); and finally Oregon (Charlotte Ritchie), desperate to be cool and terrified of being boring.

C4 Head of Drama, Camilla Campbell, says: ‘I am delighted to be able to announce our exciting cast of the best of today’s talent for a brand-new comedy drama series for Channel 4.

“Sam and Jesse are bringing their customary incisive comedy to the drama output, and the result is a hilarious and painfully truthful series about being a student.”

Fresh Meat will be made by Objective Productions and Lime Pictures, and produced by Rhonda Smith.The series is executive produced by Judy Counihan and Phil Clarke for Objective Productions, and Tony Wood for Lime.

My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding: Alex Knott on Grabbing

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The Channel 4 series My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding has been a great ratings winner for the TV station, bringing in an average of 7.4m viewers – the highest for any programme on the station since the 2008 series of Big Brother. Aside from being a draw for the public, it has brought a bit more insight into the lives of the Roma and Traveller communities, most of whom are of Irish extraction.

On the back of the programme, the deep-rooted cultural tradition of ‘grabbing’ has reached both the public consciousness and jokingly entered our vocabulary, perhaps a bit like ‘bunga bunga’ has in Italy on the back of Silvio Berlusconi’s wild parties. So what exactly is grabbing and are these girls as promiscuous as their outfits suggest?

Grabbing often occurs at pre-arranged gatherings, often in somewhere like a car park on the site where they live. While grabbing looks very malicious, the intention is not to overstep the mark but to simply assess if the female in question has any mutual feelings. It is basically a mating ritual with the girls slightly like bulls on parade. The boys try to tempt the girls away from their friends and attempt to get a kiss. If the gentleman gypsy is successful, then there is ‘something there’. Otherwise he has to forget it.

At these meetings, the girls dress up in very slutty outfits in a way not dissimilar to a prostitute. It suggests they’re very much looking for action – but their actions and morals are very different from the whorish image they portray. Traveller girls are not allowed to as much as approach boys. Their community believes in the ancient and, let’s face it, dying principle of no sexual intercourse before marriage and girls who break this code have to accept that the are considered ‘dirty’ and risk being left on the shelf.

Watching the show, grabbing can look violent and you can tell that the girls don’t necessarily love the art. Instead, they simply accept it as something that is part of their culture and also as something there appears to be no alternative to. Females are subjected to the ritual until they are engaged, which will typically happen in their late teenage years. One reason for them being engaged and married so young is the low life expectancy. Less than half of all travellers make it beyond their 50th birthday.

It is easy to look askance at the Daily Mail’s moral outrage, but it is fairly obvious for all to see that this tradition is pretty upsetting and degrading to see still going on in 2011. The show doesn’t get to the bottom of the complex cultural traditions behind grabbing. What programme that length does? In 2011 it is difficult to understand it, certainly when the young women involved appear to hate it. Perhaps it is a classic example of “outsiders” not understanding traveller culture, but I doubt it.