Bird's Eye View

She writes, she paints, what doesn’t she do? Days 7 and 8 at BEV 2011

Celia Imrie

Last night saw a star-studded turn-out in support of our She Writes lab for emerging female screenwriters. A celebratory evening at BAFTA commemorated the end of the year-long development project, in association with the Script Factory, with a screenplay reading starring Celia Imrie, Frances Barber, Dudley Sutton and Paula Wilcox among others. The last couple of days also included our Bring A Baby screenings, including British director Emma Lazenby ’s beautifully painted BAFTA-winning animation Mother of Many.

At BAFTA, the stars were out in force to celebrate She Writes, a year-long training and development programme which has seen ten phenomenally talented emerging female screenwriters enhance their skills and contacts and work towards a full feature script. The night included a reading of Grace Banks and Kate Bingham’s comedy Saint Joan as well as a keynote speech by BEV chair and producer Elizabeth Karlsen (Made In Dagenham, Little Voice, The Crying Game), who was also a mentor for one of the She Writers. It made for a fantastic end to the project, and we hope also a fantastic start to some sparkling careers.

Mother of Many

The last couple of days have also seen the return of the Birds Eye View Bring A Baby screenings, with Julie Moggan’s real-life rom-com Guilty Pleasures> at the Rio and Lexi cinemas. The Britdoc Award-winning film was screened alongside BAFTA-winning paint-on-glass animation Mother of Many. Director Emma Lazenby joined us for a Q&A on Monday, where she spoke touchingly about the origins of the film, itself a nine-month labour of love, which was inspired by and dedicated to her mother, who was a midwife for many years and delivered over 3,500 babies!

The last two days have also seen further packed houses for screenings of Susanne Bier’s Golden Globe and Academy Award-winning In A Better World, with barely a dry eye among them after this truly remarkable film.

So, with only two days left to go, it seems that time flies when you’re snowed under! It’s not over yet though – still to come tonight is a special preview of Academy Award-nominee Lucy Walker’s hair-raising nuclear arms doc Countdown to Zero at BFI Southbank. The screening is accompanied by a special Q&A with the filmmaker, who among other plaudits is the only filmmaker to win the Berlin and Sundance Audience Awards in the same year. We can’t wait to see what she’s got in store this time…