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A Statement Of Intent.

I have a habit of making silly oaths that cause me problems down the line.

A while ago I left my last full-time paid job at The Cruet Company to finally become a full-time film director alongside brother Ben. At the time my hair was a grade 4 cut, and I made an oath to myself that I would not cut my hair again until we started making our first feature film. After all, we were just about to make Death Of The Revolution, which we promised all our crew would be the very last short film we'd ever make. Feature films were the next logical step. We had even had our feature script 'Helicopter Land' optioned the previous year, so it couldn't be far to go.

That was five years ago. Since then we made Death Of The Revolution and then Hallo Panda for Film4 and the UKFC and swore again not to make another short film - until we did another 48hr challenge short film in Jersey last year. We made another dozen or so music videos and swore never to make another one. We saw our optioned script come back to us when the producer lost all his money thanks to the biggest film on his slate falling apart at the last minute. We made a bunch of music EPKs for record labels, a bunch of corporate videos for trains, drinks and mobile phone companies, a few online ads, an online teen drama and the trailers that go up before the feature films at Somerset House on their Film 4 Summer Screen. We have also written two more feature film scripts that are ready to go, along with another eight or so drafts of other feature film scripts which aren't there yet and a whole bunch of treatments.

And we still haven't made our first feature film yet. My hair has gone from buzzcut to cherub to Mick Hucknall to ZZ Top and I've downgraded my oath from making our first film to starting pre-production to just signing another option. None of which has happened yet. But that was ok. I was quite happy to keep going with it, but then, last year, the hair simply stopped growing. Which would have been fine, if that had happened three or so inches before it actually did. Instead I was left with a huge and cumbersome barnet that didn't even want to come out to play any more. And like my hair, the momentum we had started to regain towards making the first feature film seemed to stall.

Which brings us to today. And this. Which is pretty much a statement of intent. Because we don't need to wait until we sign an option or until we find the right company to give us a ton of money to make our first feature any more. With the camera we're shooting this on we can make a feature film that looks like a feature film. And we're already two-thirds of the way through writing it. And so we'll be making it this year. So by cutting off the hair now, I'm saying fuck it, let's just get on with it. No more waiting and hoping. It's time for the first feature.

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Charlie Productions believe passionately in doing things and always trying to stop in time for tea.

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