Ellie Maidment looks at two positive signs for makers of shortfilms – the DCMS pressuring the Beeb to support the UK filmindustry and the welcome arrival of a genuinely smart channel.

Article first published: Summer 2005

Television has traditionally neglected the short film – to such an extent that most filmmakers accept that a short film is fundamentally a calling card; an important part of their CV that may at some point aid them in selling a longer, commercially viable project. This is a shame, as many short films are excellently conceived and executed and deserve a far wider audience than the festival circuit.

With the relatively recent arrival of a TV channel that eschews the regular detritus of soap operas and makeover shows, things may be looking up for the short film form. Since joining the BBC family in 2002, BBC FOUR has given viewers something new and exciting to watch. And not before time. Eleanor Roosevelt said that there are three types of people and an easy way of telling them apart: smart people like discussing ideas; regular people like discussing events, and dumb people like discussing personalities (I’m paraphrasing). The vast majority of TV output is event or personality/people related which, until the advent of BBC FOUR, meant that people in the ‘smart’ category had to resort to scratching around for late-night snippets of intelligent output on BBC2 or – decreasingly – Channel 4.

BBC FOUR was launched in March 2002 with the aim of being the most intellectually and culturally enriching channel on TV. Fortunately for them, this wasn’t that much of a challenge. Fitting tidily into a sophisticated niche, it strove from the beginning to offer its audience engaging and contemporary programming, while building all-important alliances with the creative community – thus providing some level of hope for lesser known directors and production companies, despite its derisory slice of the BBC budgetary cake.

The channel’s controller, Janice Hadlow, expressed high hopes for BBC FOUR, describing it as “a new kind of channel, obsessed with capturing the energy and attitude of creative life in today’s Britain.” Two years on and BBC FOUR’s pledge to broadcast a highly eclectic selection of quality programming has been honoured. In the recent review of the new BBC channels by Patrick Barwise, BBC FOUR was highly praised and there was a recommendation that it should receive greater funding from the Beeb. Unfortunately, one line in the report read: “BBC3 and BBC4 need to increase their impact and value for money.” This reflected the Government’s disappointment that digital TV had not expanded as rapidly as it would have liked (there’s a huge pot of gold coming to the Treasury when they can finally sell off the analogue TV bandwidth). National newspaper journalists led their coverage of the report on the “poor value for money” angle. This was a travesty of reporting. Anybody who read the full Barwise report would be aware that BBC FOUR was praised as a near unqualified success.

Shorts on the box

One of the most significant developments for up-and-coming filmmakers is that the channel has also turned its attention to short film. Admittedly, other channels, particularly Channel 4, have paid more than lip-service to the short film form, but even their output has generally been scheduled so as to catch the late-night insomniac market. BBC FOUR first demonstrated its commitment in a serious way in 2003, when it devoted an entire evening to short films. The Shortest Night went out on 21 June – the shortest night of the year. Programme controller at the time, Roly Keating, described The Shortest Night as “an exciting and unique opportunity to showcase the most inventive and exuberant short films by both new and established filmmakers, that often don’t get a window on TV elsewhere.” Absolutely.

The eight-hour marathon included an enormous variety of work from drama to documentary to animation. More than 50 short films were shown over the evening, which became a sort of televised short film festival. Some very high profile filmmakers were included – Nick Park, Lynne Ramsay and Bill Plympton – alongside Stefan Nadelman’s Terminal Bar, awarded best short film at the 2003 Sundance Festival, and Salvador Aguirre’s From Mesmer, With Love, which won the Critics’ Week award at Cannes.

Also on the line up was C’etait Un Rendezvous, a 1967 short made by Claude Lelouch which received its television premiere that night – only 36 years after it was made. Rendezvous has been regarded as an enigma since its first screening – the concept is simple but the result is incredible impressive. The film takes us on a thrilling drive through the streets of Paris to the soundtrack of furious engine noise. No special effects were used in the making of Rendezvous, which only adds to the myth of just how Lelouch managed to capture such a highly acclaimed car chase sequence.

More recently, the channel has run an animation season, featuring short animated films being broadcast at peak viewing time – more good news for indie filmmakers. And there are further potentially positive signs. A recent Government Green Paper underlined the need for the BBC to improve its support for the UK film industry and publish a film investment strategy.

The Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee recommended that, “the BBC publish a strategy for promoting UK films and should do so in concert with the UK Film Council. We further believe that there is a strong case for a substantial increase in BBC funding for both feature films and short films in the exhibition of modern UK films.” A more positive engagement with the UK film industry by the BBC could mean that the previously undervalued avenue of creative expression known as the short film could eventually find a regular place on TV schedules. Since they might in the future be funded by the licence fee, maybe it’s worth forking out for a TV licence after all.

Meanwhile, BBC FOUR has continued with its commitment to creative innovation. The channel is looking to commission new programming and its website provides the relevant guidelines. Originality is essential and the commissioning editors look for qualities that are generally scarce on more mainstream channels – thinking ‘outside the box’, if you will. A strong emphasis is put on a distinctive personal or directorial style, and there is a tendency to look for controversial matters or difficult issues. They require proposals to be heavily ideas-driven and welcome fresh approaches to story telling with a meticulous attention to detail and composed with wit, style, humour and above all intelligence. You can pitch your ideas all year round, and the BBC has recently simplified its commissioning process to make things easier. It now has a number of genre teams that deal with the commissioning of programmes, and all of the necessary details are available online.

The future looks a whole lot more promising for short film makers now that at least one channel is taking them seriously and the DCMS is pushing for a little bit more involvement from the Beeb. There are a lot of long-term measures that can be taken, but the most significant short-term measure would be for the BBC to hike up BBC FOUR’s budget and let the smart people there get on with supporting inventive filmmakers. Wouldn’t it be great if a single airing of a short on BBC FOUR could recoup the costs of production and perhaps start to make short films profitable?

Ellie Maidment Ellie Maidment is a freelance journalist who graduated with a BA (Hons) in Journalism from Surrey Institute of Art & Design University College.