Variety's Ten Euro Directors to Watch 2012 / Black Pond / United Kingdom 2011
Made on a shoestring budget, this brittle, sepulchral comedy about a fraying suburban family crossing paths with a disturbed stranger features well-tuned performances, inventive visuals and a script that’s unsettling, funny and poignant by turns. One of the strongest British debuts of 2011.
One of the strongest British debuts of 2011, brittle, sepulchral comedy Black Pond bodes very well for the future careers of co-writing and helming partners Will Sharpe, an actor who appears here, and Tom Kingsley, a director of commercials and music videos. Made on a shoestring budget, this story of a fraying suburban family crossing paths with a disturbed stranger features well-tuned performances, inventive visuals and a script that’s unsettling, funny and poignant by turns. The casting of Chris Langham in the leading role reps a bold choice. Langham, who played a hapless cabinet minister in BBC satire The Thick of It, was convicted in 2007 of downloading child pornography, served three months in prison, and hadn’t worked since. Animation and in-camera effects make for a crudely executed but peculiarly uncanny dream sequence.
83 min / Color, HD CAM
Director Tom Kingsley, Will Sharpe
/ Screenplay Will Sharpe
/ Dir. of Photography Simon Walton
/ Music Arthur Sharpe, Ralegh Long, Nick Sutcliffe, Will Sharpe
/ Editor Tom Kingsley, Will Sharpe
/ Producer Sarah Brocklehurst, Tom Kingsley, Will Sharpe
/ Production Black Pond Films Ltd.
/ Cast Chris Langham, Amanda Hadingue, Colin Hurley, Simon Amstell
/ Contact Black Pond Films Ltd.
www: www.blackpondfilm.com
Tom Kingsley (b. 1985, London) graduated in English from Cambridge University where he became a prominent member of the student comedy group Footlights. There he met Will Sharpe and they began writing a play together that became the source for their feature debut Black Pond. Kingsley also shoots commercials and music videos, and in 2010 he was nominated as one of the best British discoveries of the year. Will Sharpe (b. 1986) lived in Japan until he was eight years old. At Cambridge he read classics, and after graduation he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company as an actor for their 2008/2009 season, also appearing in the BBC series "Sherlock” (2011). Prior to their successful feature debut, the moviemakers codirected the half-hour picture Cockroach (2009).
Black Pond Films Ltd.
5 Thurloe Street, SW7 2SS, London
United Kingdom
Phone: +44 791 615 336 9
E-mail: [email protected]
Tom Kingsley
Film Director
Will Sharpe
Film Director
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