A FORMER Penketh student will be screening her first feature film that she starred in, wrote and directed at a festival in London after developing it for the past four years.
Georgia Conlan, who is a former student at Penketh High School, went on to become an actor and, just before Covid, was inspired to turn her talents to behind the camera.
Together with her partner, Martin Hardwick, the 27-year-old developed a script for an original feature length film called Charlotte.
The thriller follows a young girl Charlotte as she runs away from her abusive dad and seeks refuge with a man called Roy, played by Dean Kilbey.
While at first it appears that this may be the best option for Charlotte, it soon becomes clear that Roy is not at all what he first seemed.
Dean Kilbey as Roy and Georgia Conlan as Charlotte (Image: Georgia Conlan and Martin Hardwick)
After four years of developing and filming, the film is now ready to be shown and will premiere at the Odeon Luxe West End in London for the 25th anniversary of horror film festival, Fright Fest, on August 26.
“At the time we sort of aimed to get it done within a year, but then obviously Covid happened and there were so many lockdowns and we struggled to get it filmed,” she said.
“We kept persevering with it, and we’ve finally got it to a point where its ready to share, which is exciting because for the most part we thought it was never going to get completed.
“We’re really excited to see what people think and share it finally.”
Georgia starred in the film, wrote the script and directed it (Image: Georgia Conlan and Martin Hardwick)
Taking on this project was no small feat for the couple, who undertook around 40 different production roles in order to complete the film.
Martin, who makes television advertisements for a living, utilised his skills as a cinematographer, while also recording sound and organising the lighting on set.
Georgia, who is an actor by trade, starred as the titular role, Charlotte, developed the script, organised the casting and directed.
Martin was the cinematographer for the project, amongst a variety of other roles (Image: Supplied)
“It was quite stressful at times,” she said.
“Because I’m an actor mainly, I have always sort of wanted to write and direct – but I never thought I’d be doing all three at once.”
Two rounds of fundraising were carried out to help fund the project, which is the couples first feature film.
Looking ahead to the next project, Georgia feels that they have learnt a lot from the experience and hope to expand their crew.
“It’s not the most conventional way of making a film, but in a way, we’ve learnt more than we possibly could ever learn by doing almost every role because now we feel ready for next time.
“We know the dos and the don’ts because we covered everything.
“It was quite a lot of pressure, but it was a big learning curve.
“I’m grateful that we saw it through to the end despite all the setbacks we had.”
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