Drama Production 'Guilt' Wins 'Best Local Film' With All-Female Crew

Four  Media Production  students created an award-winning short film in an all-female crew. Lucy, Shenali, Annabelle and Abbie all took the Drama Production unit 'Imagining Reality - Video Production' led by Roy Hanney in their second year at Solent. The video unit teaches the students how to make a short film, from pre-production all the way through to post-production. The group decided to create a production company name, 'SAAL Productions', with each letter representing the first letter of their names.

We caught up with the Director,  Shenali Karunatilake, to discuss where the unique idea of the film originated.

"The compelling story sprouted from a personal life issue my uncle went through as a child. He was forced to grow up after losing his mother to cancer, his sister was bitten by a poisonous snake at the age of 14 and she sadly died in his arms, his father couldn’t bear the guilt and as a result, he died of a stroke due to the stress. My uncle was left to fend for himself and ended up joined the military. After my own mum and dad moved to the UK in 1994, they spent two years working hard and asked my uncle to come and live with them.  The most heart warming and symbolic part of this story is that when my uncle arrived, my mother gave him a statue of buddha and he felt as though he rekindled with his religion. He no longer felt the need to be so careless with his life and is doing incredibly well now, after overcoming the hurt of losing his family."

Understandably, with this incredibly emotive story, the film was shortlisted in a few film festivals. Firstly, SAAL Productions was shortlisted at the New Forest Film Festival 2019  as a finalist in two different categories and semi-finalists in another.  The festival aims to celebrate the amazing local creative talent and the diverse filming locations the New Forest offers.

When speaking about what it is like to attend film festivals, the films Lighting Technician,  Abbie Jones,  explained:

"Attending the film festivals is great as it’s an opportunity to network with other filmmakers as well as to see the other amazing talent that is out there."

SAAL Productions attended the awards ceremony in June 2019.  The judges  for their chosen  categories were: Jen Lyon (Zero Budget Category), Tyger Drew-Honey (Student Narrative Short) and Keith English (Best New Forest University Student Short).  Unfortunately, they didn't win but it meant the group gained recognition for their work.

The crew continued to enter their film into other festivals and the most recent was Making Waves Film Festival. They were finalists in the category for Best Local Short Film and this time they took home the trophy!

"Winning the Best Local Short Film at the Making Waves Film Festival was a huge achievement for all of us and something that we all are extremely proud of. It was an incredible experience and something that I would definitely recommend to other aspiring filmmakers as it gives the opportunity to network with others and get your work known."  - Annabel Bryant, Director

The Producer,  Lucy Goodyear, spoke of the production, "The whole process of making the film was very exciting. We shot the whole film in a 19 hour day which was very intense but the outcome was so worth it. To win an award for something we worked so hard on and to have it stem from a University project just made the experience even better!"

SAAL Productions all mentioned the role that their course leader Roy Hanney, had in encouraging them to submit their project. We wanted to know how Roy felt now the crew have won:

"To see a group of second-year students winning awards for their short films is a real benchmark of success. It shows just what can be achieved when students believe in themselves and work hard!

We are so proud of the quality of the  work the students produce on this course, but right now we are exceptionally impressed with SAAL Productions and their successes. Not only did SAAL Productions create a beautifully intelligent piece of work, but they also took the initiative to submit it to different film festivals and had faith that their film would get the recognition it deserved."

A big congratulations to the whole crew! You can watch 'Guilt' here:

Written by Chloe Farrier-Ledden

Edited and Published by Chloe Webb

BA(Hons) Media Production

Solent Media