June 2007 - Website
I’ve just made a website. It’s a bit rubbish, but then I am too busy thinking to become a web designer.
June 2007 - Drunken Horsemen.
The film I have been working on for TSi, the Swiss broadcaster, is now finished.
It’s called ‘All the Drunken Horsemen’ and will be broadcast later this year.
See the film’s page here -
June 2007 - What am I doing? Really?
There’s a few things happening that I might be working on with
I’ll put stuff on the website when it’s definite and I have something to show.
July 2007 - An update of sorts.
I’ve been filming stories on Micro-credit in Senegal recently. Youssou N’dour has set up an institute to help small businesses and business ideas with small loans.
I’ll be going back to finish filming soon, and will post some of the films here.
Meanwhile, I’m in the middle of directing a music video for a singer called Fetsum with Emenes, my German friends. It’s for his song ‘Air’ which you can hear a great version of at his Myspace page www.myspace.com/Fetsum1
July 2007 - The full moon and big dog bites.
I’m making a film about how the full moon turns us all a bit funny. How crime rates rise and animal bites become more common at A&E. It’s for Current TV and I’ll let you know when it’s going to be broadcast.
July 2007 - Live Earth Rio.
Century Films just sent me to Rio to film part of a documentary they are making with Participant Pictures (the people behind An Inconvenient Truth) about Live Earth. Brian Hill is directing the film, and I just did a bit. It won’t be out until next year, so I can’t say much more than that.
Here’s the crew on the beach;
August 2007 - New trailer online
The film will be out soon, and will air on RTSi in the next couple of months.
August 2007 - Fetsum & I Am Amazon festivals
The music video for Fetsum is up in the work section, have a look. He launched the single last night (31/8/07) in Berlin, with the music video accompanying him live.
And for those of you in Italy, the ‘I Am Amazon’ series is playing in the Milano Film Festival on 20th Sept.
September 2007 - Interview online
I did an interview for a web TV channel about the Amazon films at the Milano Film Festival last week. If you can understand Italian, you can see them here at Another TV (you can see me there and turn the sound off if you don’t). The films went down pretty well, by the way.
October 2007 - Stills up
Hello. How’s it going? I’ve uploaded some production stills from Drunken Horsemen, Amazon and Beekeeping. I’ll try and do the rest of the films too. The stills are here, here and here.
In the meantime, I am working on a couple of documentaries for charities and a few other things that I’ll put up when they are done.
October 2007 - Screenings
It’s really only worthwhile when people actually watch the films we make, so it helps when there’s a chance to. Luckily...
The I Am Amazon films are screening in competition at Docusur, the International Documentary Festival in Tenerife. There are two screenings - 11th and 16th Nov. If you do go, let me know how it is.
Beekeeping is screening as part of a Pocketvisions violence/politics/resistance season on **November 19th**. It’s at the really quite charming Roxy Bar and Screen, near London Bridge so please do come along. I’ll be doing a Q&A where I expect I will ramble a bit and then sidetracked onto something completely irrelevant.
You can heckle me if you like.
November 2007 - ** Date Change
The Pocketvisions screening of Beekeeping After War has been changed to November 19th. It would still be great to see you down there and I’ll still do a rambling Q&A...
November 2007 - Bullying & new old work
Evening. You busy, or playing about on the internet?
I’ve just put up some of my slightly older work on the website (someone asked for some, so I thought I would put it up). You can see some commercials I did and a micro drama-doc too.
I’m shooting a commercial for Beat Bullying this week. It’s launching for anti-bullying week which starts 19th November, so look out for it. Cheerio.
November 2007 - Ad release
The ad I have been making for the anti-bullying charity Beatbullying is released today.
They’re launching it on Sky, Five and MTV, as well as with a google-backed YouTube channel.
I’ll post details when I have them. In the meantime, hope you like it.
December 2007 - TX date for All the Drunken Horsemen & IDFA
My film ‘All the Drunken Horsemen’ will be broadcast on TSi 1 this Sunday (9th December) at 9pm.
For anyone in Switzerland/ Italy I’d love to know what you think of the film. It’s broadcasting on their series ‘Storie’ where they discuss the film in the studio.
It’s been a while coming, but I’m really pleased that the film is now out there for broadcast. There will be festival screenings and further international broadcast, which I will let you know about here.
In the meantime, you can see the film’s trailer here
I’ve just got back from being at IDFA, the great documentary festival in Amsterdam. I was part of the Academy there this year. I met some really good filmmakers there and saw Werner Herzog give a very entertaining and inspiring talk.
December 2007 - Beekeeping DVD available
A DVD of my documentary ‘Beekeeping After War’ about the beekeepers of the former Yugoslavia is available now... contact me for details: tomas@tomasleach.com.
January 2008 - New Year
Hello and happy new year. 2008 already eh?
Just before Christmas, the Travis Pastrana film was nominated for lots of awards at the International Sports Film Festival in Palermo, Italy. We didn’t win best film, but Leandro and I won best director.
I was also shortlisted for Channel 4’s 4talent awards, but didn’t win. Ah well.
I’m busy working on a set of commercials at the moment - I’ll post news and stills when we finish shooting on the 25th.
January 2008 - Shoot shoot.
I’ve just got back from South America where I’ve been shooting some work for 180 Amsterdam, the rather nice agency. The work will be done soon, so I’ll put it up and you can watch it.
Other than that, there are a few longer docs that are getting deeper into development. Hopefully they’ll be happening in the near future, so when something definite is moving, I’ll put up some pictures of something...
TOMAS LEACH | director
March 2008 - Sign it.
Hi. Sorry about not being in touch. Forgive me?
I’ve been sorting out representation here in the UK. It’s sorted now and soon I’ll be launched with the lovely people I’ve signed to. As soon as it’s public, I’ll put the info up here and more news which seems to be steadily mounting along with the piles of research for 3 new projects...
April 2008 - Home.
Hello.
I’ve just signed up with Home Corp for commercials, which is exciting. They’re a really great company who do a lot of creative, documentary style commercials and are tied with NonFiction spots in the US.
The launch news was featured in Campaign magazine this week (see Campaign article) and Shots too, I think...
We’ll be launching my new reel and so on over the next few weeks.
We can’t show the work I have been doing with BMW for 180 Amsterdam yet (not until it’s launched later in the year), but as soon as we can it will be on my site and Homecorp’s too.
look at all the clever directors I’m with...
May 2008 - Foto8.
Happy, sunny days.
The Amazon films have been chosen as story of the week over at the rather brilliant photographic magazine Foto8. Have a look here.
I’m off to Cambodia in a couple of weeks to do a film with the Cambodia Trust and 400 Million R. I’ll post some images when I’m back.
May 2008 - Podcast.
I recently recorded a rambling interview for the site Directors Notes, which is now up on their site to listen to (you can also download it as a podcast via itunes). It was mainly centred around the Drunken Horsemen film, so there are also a couple of scenes from that film up there too.
May 2008 - BMW Motorrad virals & Cambodia
The website (http://gps.bmw-motorrad.com/) is a really interesting space that I think will grow nicely. The films are embedded within each of the GPS routes. Martin Terhart (the art director on it) did a great job in bringing all the elements together. Go and have a play there. Or watch the films here.
There’s also a good article on the making of the films here that speaks with Martin and Seb, one of our great riders... I’ll post some stills from it soon, too.
I’m shooting in Cambodia at the moment. We are shooting a short promo for a longer film that I very much want to make with 400 Million R. We’re teaching some young people with disabilities how to use an HDV camera and letting them film their own lives. The idea is to give 5 different young people across the world cameras in the year before their 18th birthday and to have them film what matters to them. We’re here filming with some of the potential characters and also some very beautiful material that will frame the material our characters shoot. The extra material we shoot will be used as short case studies for the Cambodia Trust.
Here’s me showing Thavin how to use the camera.
June 2008 - Edits.
The trailer for The Difference Between Us is up now. You can see it here and there’s a copy of the treatment too. Be great to hear what you think of it. Thavin, the girl in the film is such a special young person. She really was captivating and we were really lucky to have found her.
We’ll be pitching the project to various broadcasters over the summer. I’ll try and keep you updated about it. Until then, enjoy the sunshine.
July 2008 - This. And that.
Hi. How’s the summer treating you?
I’m working on a few short documentary pieces at the moment and also losing myself in research on longer projects. When some are more concrete, I’ll show you something.
In the meantime, listen to Bon Iver and enjoy the sun if there is any.
July 2008 - Creative Review and you.
The BMW films (well, the website actually) is in this month’s Creative Review. Here’s a photo I took of it in Borders this morning.
August 2008 - Grierson shortlist.
My film about the beekeepers of Yugoslavia has been shortlisted for a Grierson Award for Best Newcomer, which is a nice surprise. It’s up against some really good films. The Grierson’s are pretty much Britain’s most prestigious documentary awards, so it’s an honour.
August 2008 - Testament.
Goodbye summer.
I’ve been working on a few projects in development over the past month. Here’s one - a film about the last statements of death row prisoners called Testament.
I’ve just cut a short teaser for it and we’re now hoping to make it over the next year.
What do you think?
September 2008 - Newspaper.
Hi. What’s new?
The film I co-directed about Travis Pastrana has just won the best Documentary at the LA Shorts film festival, which is a great privilege. The film has done very well, and that’s the second prize it’s won. ITV have screened it recently and scenes from the film have been featured lots...
I’m currently making a short interview-based piece for the Guardian website. We should be done in a week or so, when I will post it up here. Bet you can’t wait.
October 2008 - A little dance.
Rather wonderfully, the Beekeeping film has been nominated for the Grierson Award for Best Newcomer. So now it’s down to 4 and there’s an award night. It’s a real privilege. Especially when you see who is up for the big awards.... Brian Hill, Nick Broomfield, Morgan Matthews.
October 2008 - Paper cuts.
I haven’t disappeared. I will post some film work soon. I promise. I’m developing a short series with the Guardian. We’ve filmed the first one and will film another I’m sure. When the Guardian release them, I’ll post a link here. And we’ll all be happy...
November 2008 - Erm, maybe not.
Ah. So I am now not doing the series with Firefly. I’ve left the project and am off to do some other projects, which I will put here when it seems like a good moment.
Should be exciting though.
November 2008 - Observer supplement
Hello. I made a very quick turnaround film for the Guardian website this week.
We started shooting on Tuesday and delivered the finished report on Thursday. It’s a short report with science correspondent Alok Jha about legal highs and you can see it here.
November 2008 - Hancock
The first in (hopefully) a series I started with the Guardian is up today. It’s with Sheila Hancock and you can see it here.
I’m shooting a set of commercials tomorrow in London. I’ll post them here when they’re done.
December 2008 - Mighty
Ahoy. All reet?
I’ve just finished a set of Persil Small & Mighty commercials for BBH with Homecorp. They should be airing soon. I’ll post them when they do.
