Considering he has directed more than 80 short films in the past decade, you might think that Shane Meadows would be sick to his back teeth of the blessed things. But no. In the run-up to Nokia Shorts, a competition for 15-second epics that forms part of this year’s Raindance film festival — the man they call the Midlands Scorsese is still adamant that shorts are a vital part of the aspiring film-maker’s armoury.
“My own track record is heavily based in short films,” Meadows says. “In 1994 I got chucked out of a photography course, went on the dole and started making shorts with a video camera. I came up against a very big wall of snobbery at first — back then it was virtually impossible to get people to show video shorts in any kind of public arena. But in the space of ten years the landscape has changed dramatically.”
That’s thanks to both short film internet sites and festivals such as Raindance, which Elliot Grove set up in 1993 as a showcase and breeding ground for independent film-making. In 1996, Meadows went to Raindance with what he describes as “seven or eight quite poor video shorts”. Grove, of course, begs to differ: “They stood out head and shoulders. I watched Where’s the Money, Ronnie? (a stylish monochrome tale of a heist gone awry) and I thought, ‘Bingo! There’s someone who’s going to go places.’ Shane’s stories were far from what you’d expect from the next Loach or Spielberg, but he had this passionate energy and a talent for storytelling.”
On the back of that warm reception, Meadows secured the funding to make the 60-minute Small Time and, in 1997, his full-length debut, Twenty Four Seven. Now, with a string of gritty provincial dramas including A Room for Romeo Brass and Dead Man’s Shoes under his belt, he is one of Britain’s leading directorial lights.
But if his feature successes were based on a baptism in short films, that period of experimentation would not have been possible without easily portable, relatively cheap equipment. “The digital camcorder was the equivalent of an acoustic guitar for a film-maker,” says Meadows. “It’s only in the past ten years that people without access to expensive equipment have been able to go out and make films.”
Guerrilla film-making is now even easier, of course, with the advent of mobile phones with built-in video cameras. It’s an innovation that the Nokia Shorts organisers have addressed this year with a new category for films shot on phones. “Mobile phone technology has got to the stage where it can be all things to all men,” says Meadows. “You could lower a phone out of a window to get a crane shot, or go into a studio with it to do some animation. I’ve had numerous discussions with people about when the first mobile phone feature film is going to arrive. I don’t think it’s that far away.”
It certainly sounds like a more constructive outlet for mobile technology than the youthful vogue for happy slapping, in which gangs film themselves duffing up their victims. “It’s an antidote to that kind of behaviour,” says Meadows, who has met — and cast — plenty of wayward tykes during his film-making career. He believes the cruelty of happy slapping might mask more creative instincts: “I’m not saying that there’s a Spielberg among the happy slapping lot, but it shows that people are not just thinking of their phone as a calling device.”
Random urban violence also haunts The Stairwell, the phone-film that Meadows made to show alongside the Nokia Shorts entrants. The competition bills itself as “the world’s shortest film festival”, and his greatest challenge proved to be the 15- second time limit. “The shortest film I had made was about 90 seconds, so to go to 15 seconds seemed like a gnat’s whisker,” he laughs. “I’m sure in Romeo Brass there is a pause that’s about 20 seconds . . .” Nevertheless, the result (which can be viewed at www.nokiashorts.co.uk) is a typically Meadowsian piece that wrings impressive tension from its piffling running time.
Most of this year’s entrants lack the picture quality of The Stairwell, which was shot on a state-of-the-art Nokia N90. But many are surprisingly striking, such as Della Tobias’s Ragtime, a dynamic tale of unrequited love shot in the lobby of Claridge’s hotel. As Grove stresses, aesthetic sophistication and subject matter are less important than storytelling ability.
At the heart of the project, according to Meadows, is a sense of accessibility and inclusivity. “Short films have always been difficult to place, but at this sort of length they’re the kind of thing you can send to someone on a train via Bluetooth. The public can decide what’s great and what isn’t, and I think there will be some favourite films that are passed around between people.” That democracy extends to film-makers, too. “People try to fit in waves or fashions, but it’s really about finding out what you’re good at saying. There are thousands of stories out there.”
The winning entries will be screened at the Raindance Film Festival (Sep 28-Oct 9 www.raindance.co.uk). To view Shane Meadows’s The Stairwell, go to www.nokiashorts.co.uk
Short film festivals
BITE THE MANGO
Backed by the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, this festival includes Slices of Mango, a selection of shorts from as far afield as Iran and the Philippines. Various venues in Bradford, until Sep 29 (www.nmpft.org.uk 0870-701 0200)
RESFEST
The nomadic display of digital shorts, animations and videos that kicked off in New York this month will visit six UK cities during autumn. Includes a Jonathan Glazer retrospective and political shorts. Various venues in London, Sep 27-Oct 2; Glasgow, Oct 13- 16; Dublin, Oct 20-23; Bristol, Oct 26-30; Belfast, Nov 4-6; Sheffield, Nov 11-13; Nottingham, Nov 18-20 (www.resfest.com)
THE TIMES BFI LONDON FILM FESTIVAL
More than 80 shorts spread over 11 strands, and special events such as Future Cinema, in which the touring shorts platform, www.futureshorts.co.uk, presents shorts from around the world alongside live music, re-scored classics and theatre. Various venues in London, Oct 19-Nov 3 (www.lff.org.uk 020-7928 3232)
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS
The largest and, many think, best show of shorts in the UK. They include Mini Masterpices, four three-minute films shot and edited during the festival. Various venues in Bristol, Nov 23- 27 (www.brief-encounters.org.uk 0117-915 0185)
FLATPACK FILM FESTIVAL
The festival that aims to bring you everything that the others leave out, “from experimental animation to achive oddities”. Various venues in Birmingham, Jan 12-15 (www.7inch.org.uk 0121-449 7432)
KINOFILM
Manchester’s International Short Film Festival marks its tenth birthday with strands devoted to regional, black, Asian and Chinese film-making. Kino Extreme is a “taboo-busting tour of the darker reaches of contemporary cinema”. Various venues in Manchester, Feb 27-Mar 6 (www.kinofilm.org.uk 0161-288 2494)
