Features

Fly Girls is a potential mini-series about an important piece of WWII history, the largely forgotten women pilots. Some people might find it hard to believe, but there were women pilots on active service during the war. However, unlike their male counterparts they were restricted to the transportation of planes, and did not engage in air to air combat.

Films deal with universal emotions such as love, hate, or sadness. Some deal specifically with grief, whether it be a lover moving on, a friendship ending, or the loss of a parent. Two films in recent years, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby (2014) and Meadowland (2015), have dealt with the loss of a young child and the effect on the parents.

Last fall, Women in Film, a non-profit organization based in Los Angeles, launched a new advocacy campaign, 52 Films by Women. Although female directors make up a very low percentage of those directing top grossing films (6.8% in 2014) and only four have received Academy Award nominations for directing, there are many women creating films for us to watch and enjoy.

Elliot Grove’s life should be made into a film, virtual reality’s going to be the next big thing and Sacha Baron Cohen hasn’t always been funny. Those are just three of the things I discovered when I went along to interview Grove, founder of the Raindance Film Festival and the British Independent Film Awards. Discovering Raindance I grabbed the chance to ask Grove for an interview at a recent Raindance Open House event, held to introduce filmmakers to Raindance and what it can do for them.

As 2015 comes to a close, the promises of 2016 in film leave excitement fizzling like the fireworks of New Year amongst Quentin Tarantino fans. We have been treated to an influx of releases ripe from the mind of the divisive director over the past few years, with Inglourious Basterds and Django Unchained providing much controversy and dividing many opinions, but it is The Hateful Eight that is now beginning to incite anticipation about its January release. But, as this excitement grows towards the end of Tarantino’s twenty-fourth year in the filmmaking business, the success he enjoys now has progressed in an initially unexpected way.