Screening hab-dabs and premiere plans


John puts together the trailer while the producer fights on with head f**k monster that is the Sale & Leaseback deal. It should net us just shy of £40K, so it’s worth the hassle. We also discover the film is a 15 Certificate. There’s another £900 spent we didn’t budget for. We also end up having to pay for some sales estimates from Nexus. Everyone is running scared of the DCMS and not interested. Still you’ve got to speculate to accumulate.

The fund-raising continues and the producer manages to persuade some more friends to part with their hard-earner cash. Sadly a trip to our bankers is less successful for an extension of the overdraft.

Emfoundation sets up our first press screening at Planet Hollywood and Karl (their designer) gets to work on a poster. We don’t have a huge amount of medium format photography, which is probably the only quality good enough for a poster, so Karl is going to have to be creative.

We shoot the ‘Can I Be Your Soldier’ pop vid in the Anson Rooms at the University (thanks Keith). John, never one to shy away from difficult decisions, begins to wish that maybe he sometimes did, after the three scaffold towers we are trying to erect are still not ready by midday. Even the band joins in to fight with these metal monsters. We’ve pulled in some of the old team. If we’d had time it would have been fun to reminisce about the old days.

Eventually we’re ready. Despite hearing it 30 times, the song still sounds good. Nick de Carlo, Ben Leeves and their ace dancer Philippa work their pop socks off. As does John when he discovers he’s the best supermarket trolley spinner in Bristol (watch the video). Nice costumes guys.

Nerves are shredded at the critic’s press screening. There’s a good turn out of about 30 journos. Guy and John spend most of the morning rushing back and forth to M&S to buy sarnies, booze etc, then cutting them up and sticking it all on plates. In between vowing that one day they’ll be making films rather than sandwiches.

Radio 1 DJ Nemone comes to see the film. We’ve just worked with her on a TV show and are praying she might consider playing the music. The screening room is deathly silent throughout the screening. Apparently this is normal. Guy and John crap themselves, easing their pain by consuming most of the beer left over and talking about No, their next film. The press leave as soon as the lights come up, scuttling out without a word. Guy and John drink more. Nemone absolutely loves it and the music and promises she will see what she can do for us. She also says that she will try to get james King, Radio 1’s film buff along.

Bad news comes from Winstone. They are struggling to get us a West End opening. Without West End, we struggle to get national press coverage, without that we struggle to run a PR campaign. As we can’t afford any advertising it’s our only way to tell joe public about the film. Moods darken, but Winstone say they will battle on.

Mark at our local (very cool) arthouse, the Watershed rings to say that he likes the film very much and whn do we want to screen it. There is a stunned silence as we realise someone from a mainstream cinema loves the film and wants to show it. It’s even more exciting when we realise Watershed only has two screens and Living in Hope will be on one of them for a week. It’s a huge boost. If London doesn’t want us, well fuck’em, we’ll prove them wrong and start it in our hometown instead. You can be sure if they see the film making money, they’ll want to know about it.

The critics’ responses leave us mystified. Were these people all watching the same film? Many are great, some are not. It leaves Guy and John feeling somewhat odd.

The news from Winstone is still not good about London, so we decide to have the world premiere at the Watershed. It will happen 28 May. The poster is coming together. Karl has created a symbol of a running man with lit bog roll up his butt. It looks great and makes the boys look very cool.

Guy enters the film into the Cannes Film Festival pre-selection melting pot. Agnes from Cannes comes to see the film. She likes it but doesn’t feel it’s for them. She recommends the Director’s Fortnight (it runs at the same time as Cannes), so it’s entered in to that as well. The trailer is completed and dispatched to Vienna for its blow up. It’s very funny and different. Also blown up at the same time is the BBFC certificate.