Choir Girl is on a roll lately, winning Best Feature Film, Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best Production at the Golden Harvest Film Festival, plus Outstanding Achievement Awards at both the L'Age d'Or International Arthouse Film Festival and the Tagore International Film Festival.
If you haven't seen the film, check it out on iTunes.
We found ourselves stuck in Portugal during the first half of 2021 as our flights home to Malta kept being cancelled during the pandemic. Naturally, we needed to film something. So we came up with the concept for Encontro (meaning meeting in Portuguese), put out a call for actors, and quickly cast two talented Lisbon locals in Rachel-Hannah Strong and Denise Santos. Just over a week later we were on set using the new Ronin RS2 gimbal we had purchased, and with only a two-person crew we walked through Lisbon capturing various stunning sites on a sunny Saturday afternoon.
“With the lockdown lifted, life goes somewhat back to normal. Inés seizes the chance and invites her friend Joanna to catch up, but as they walk through Lisbon, there’s something troubling Inés.”
Enjoy Life Improvised: Encontro below.
We had a blast on Zoom this week talking indie micro-budget filmmaking with some really enthusiastic people in the UK who wanted to know how we make our micro-budget feature films. Presenting “How to Male a Quality Feature Film on a Micro-Budget saw had us online for two nights of talking about what we love to do - make micro-budget films!
We hope to do more of this teaching online through webinars in the future. Since the pandemic hit our interactive workshops have moved online and we are ok with this shift. and look to do more of it.
Take one of our online masterclasses today through Udemy, Skillshare, Ribbon Experience or IFHA here and if you want to book us for a webinar get in touch.
We shot this Life Improvised film titled Encentro on our last weekend in Lisbon in early May, we can’t wait to bring this story about two friends who are keeping a certain matter from each other in order to save their relationship. It was a pleasure to work with Lisbon locals on this one, which will be released in a weeks time through our newsletter. Join our Creatively Connected monthly Newsletter to see Encontro first or subscribe to our YouTube channel for a notification.
“After a pandemic, lockdown lifts and life goes somewhat back to normal. Ines seizes the moment and invites her friend Joanna to catch up on life as they walk through Lisbon, but there’s something troubling Ines.”
It’s exciting to learn that the demand to stream our latest release In Corpore online has been so steady since we released the film on Boxing Day during a pandemic. We are always on the look out for new platforms and distribution options for the sex-positive relationship drama, even though initially we were unsure about what the response would be when we released this feature film, which deals with unconventional women and their equally unconventional choices for work, partner and lifestyles.
In Corpore is shown through a female gaze and is lead by three female protagonists, so it’s fitting that now the sensual look into modern coupledom has been picked up by Reel Women’s Network - an online streaming service for content made by women.
As a bonus, director Sarah Jayne is also featured on the Reel Woman’s Network filmmakers page for all to see.
Back in 2011 NPG director Ivan Malekin directed the gross-out comedy film Dace Decklan: Private Eye. The B-grade movie just hit a 10-year milestone and to celebrate Tom Vogel, who starred as Dace reflected on the making the film, playing Dace and just how wrong the film was (and still is). Late month in our monthly newsletter, Creatively Connected we shared the article, which sits within our blog section on this website. However, the article has now been picked up by Film Ink and published for reading by their indie film widespread audience - check out here.
Our latest educational class, How To Become an Art Department Dynamo, is finally released. The course is presented by Sarah Jayne, who has fifteen years of experience working in various art department roles in Australia and internationally. You can take the course through Ribbon Experiences, Udemy or Skillshare through our referral link. The latter allows you to watch and sign up to Skillshare for free (for the first 14 days) and not only view our course but watch thousands of others on all sorts of topics.
If you watch on any platform we ask you to please leave a short review and share it with others who will benefit from taking that class. If Art Department is not your thing, you can view our other masterclasses here.
Popular Maltese news outlet Lovin’ Malta did an extensive interview with co-director Sarah Jayne about our latest film In Corpore. The article focuses on love and sex and how our international, sex-positive relationship drama tackles these complex topics from the perspective of the female gaze. We are very grateful to Lovin’ Malta for the terrific write-up. Read the article here and choose a platform to watch In Corpore here.
It is always wonderful news when you learn that your feature film has landed on a new platform. In Corpore, is now streaming through Uk Film Channel, not just in the UK, but in other regions too - US, the rest of Europe and Oceania. Enjoy and don’t forget to leave an IMDb review, plus some stars afterwards.
It was a welcomed surprise to receive an email from our Machination poster photographer Fran Stivala last week. Fran was writing an article for WHAM Malta detailing how she photographed and created our attention-grabbing poster, and it’s now live. The poster image, starring Maltese talent Steffi Thake is perfect, it oozes the tension we needed and pops with the coloured lights. You can read the article here and look at the poster.
The link to the article can also be found in our PRESS section.
How to Become An Art Department Dynamo, presented by Sarah Jayne is a masterclass that was in the works early this year as we travelled through Portugal. Finally, we can say that we have launched the class.
You can take part in the masterclass across the following educational sites - Skillshare, Ribbon Experiences, and really soon, Udemy.
Remember that we also run other masterclasses, and they can be found in our SHOP under Masterclasses. We hope you learn something new (we guarantee you will) and that you find these classes as enjoyable as we found them to create for you!
An air date for Daughter in the US has just been announced by ShortsTV.
A little while back we announced that our educational short film Daughter was sold to ShortsTV in the US. Now we have a date for the first time it will air. If you are in the US you can watch Daughter on the 29th of April 2021, 20.00 ET. After its television premiere, Daughter will rotate through the program schedule throughout the year. ShortsTV is available in the US on the following services:
DirecTV – Channel 573
AT&T U-Verse – Channel 1789
Google Fiber – Channel 603
Frontier Communications – Ch 789
Hotwire – Channel 560
Our favourite New Year's Eve female-led friendship drama Friends, Foes & Fireworks is now streaming through TUBI TV in the US and Australia.
That’s huge news which we will happily drink too! Check it out on TubiTV here.
Another bit of news for our American readers. Ivan's 2011 gross-out comedy Dace Decklan: Private Eye is now freaking audiences out on AVOD platform Tubi. You have been warned. If you still dare to see what all the mayhem is about, watch on Tubi here or stream online worldwide though other platforms here.
Daughter, our 2016 educational film about violence against women and victim-blaming (starring Katherine Langford), was purchased by ShortsTV, a cable and satellite television channel dedicated to short film. Daughter will be soon screening across television screens in North America and Europe, and we couldn't be happier. So to our friends and readers who live in the States and Europe, look out for it and let us know when you spot it.
Just before the end of 2020, Clara Francesca was again taking part in press interviews to discuss her role as an actor and producer on In Corpore, our sex-positive film that looks at the grey areas of relationships.
This time around Clara spoke with The Fan Carpet's Marc Jason Ali EXCLUSIVELY and the video is now up on YouTube. You can watch it here, or find it on our MEDIA section. with all the other In Corpore media bites.
New year, new course - or new courses in our case as we have a couple coming out this year.
Here is news of the first course we are so excited to share.
Our biggest achievement and news from the last couple of months is here - we have once again joined forces with Alex Ferrari, author and filmtrepreneur behind Indie Film Hustle to bring our fellow creatives a new masterclass - "The Art of Improv Indie Filmmaking".
The masterclass is presented by Indie Film Hustle Academy, which is Alex's boutique platform for specialised masterclasses with industry and independent professionals. To be selected by Alex to have our masterclass upon this niche platform, which is taking off around the United States, is a real honour.
Suitable for aspiring filmmakers or more experienced artists looking for a new approach to film, this course will inspire you through the creative freedom improvisation fosters, and how putting away the script can lead to new discoveries, making your own work, behind and in front of the camera, fresh and exciting.
This masterclass "The Art of Improv Indie Filmmaking" will go deep into the following areas:
Directing Improvisation - Learn how to direct actors and stage the camera in improvisational scenes.
The Scriptment - Learn how to develop your story idea into an outline scriptment you can shoot from.
Working with Actors - Learn how to build your characters with your actors in a collaborative environment.
You can check out the masterclass "The Art of Improv Indie Filmmaking" right here through this link: https://www.ifhacademy.com/course-Improv-indie-filmmaking
If you have any questions, please get in touch via email.
Our first improvised feature, Friends, Foes and Fireworks, which was filmed in a single night on New Year's Eve, has just been released on TubiTV. Could the timing be any better? Tubi is one of the most popular ad-supported streaming platforms in the world where you can watch free movies and TV shows online in HD on any device. With many of our American friends still in lockdown, you can safely stay in this New Year's Eve with Friends, Foes & Fireworks. Watch here (US only). For worldwide options, click here.
Watch worldwide now, including TubiTV.
With In Corpore being released worldwide this week, on Boxing Day no less (yay, happy holidays!) our New York based producer Clara Francesca has been snowed under with an influx of reviews, both written and through Zoom.
Back in Malta, it has been a task in itself for us to create a list of all the interviews Clara has and will take on leading up to Christmas and well into 2021 in order to market them all through all the social media sites for the relationship drama film.
It’s a super way to celebrate the film, which is about looking inwards towards one’s goals, desires of the body and soul and personal aspirations. This makes it very much a film for the holidays as we reflect back on a hard year and the fresh one ahead, while also trying to cultivate self-love and also keeping communications in a relationship open when we are doing so during a pandemic.
We thank our PR company October Coast for the hard work in spreading the word and Clara for taking this task on like a true creative champion.
All the reviews and press interviews will be posted on our Media section so check back regularly.
Happy holidays
Press for one of Clara’s Interviews in the US. on the 30th of December 2020
Aussie underground indie website Pure Shit: Australian Cinema interviewed us about filming In Corpore in four countries / cities and our feelings and perspectives as filmmakers now that we live and breathe film in Europe. They were great questions from Bill Mousoulis and we really enjoyed answering them. Check out the interview here.
