Independent filmmakers, meeting each other through - and working together as a result of - a little-known film cell called Team Works (formerly Concerted Efforts), have been responsible for getting ten short 16mm and broadcast-quality video films in the can in just the past two years. The last two to complete 'principal photography', Underground and Fragments, in April and May this year, are currently in post-production, with Underground's premiere - a cast & crew screening - to be held at the Museum of the Moving Image Cinema on the Southbank.

Of the other eight films, Blah Blah Blah Blah (from Chance Remark Films), Indecisive (Sahara Productions Limited), Andy Candy (from Terra Firma Productions), Dirty Money (Asian Eye Films), Cool Notes (from Noh Budget Films), and Loving Couples were completed in 1997; with Forbidden Fires, one half of it shot in September last year, still languishing sadly uncompleted, and Praying For Pay, the second film from Sahara Productions Limited, completed in January of this year.

Most, although not all, have been screened at independent film clubs, industry showcases, or - in the case of Dirty Money - on regional cable TV.

Concerted Efforts was conceived five years ago by its founder Simon Ponsonby as a practical self-help support structure to encourage and enable filmmakers to overcome some of the logistical, creative and financial obstacles inherent in independent filmmaking.

Simon first broached the idea in February of 1994, to an audience of 40+ 'wanna-be'/'gonna-be' filmmakers at the film social & network club Peeping Tom's during its early days in Gerrard Street, when it was still run by its founder Kaprice Kea.

The group of filmmakers who subsequently pooled their resources through Concerted Efforts didn't immediately start making films together but, by the end of October 1994, they had organised the first night of The Independent Film Showcase, at The Jermyn Street Theatre in Piccadilly Circus. A variety of film companies and organisations lent their support to the Showcase, including Oasis Film Distribution, The Halloween Society, The Hamburg Short Film Agency, and The National Film and Television School. S-T-A-G-E (The Society of Theatrical Artists and General Entertainers) provided the venue; the film critic and presenter of BBC TV's "Moving Pictures" Howard Schuman attended as guest of honour; and Concerted Efforts, billing the Showcase as a forum for the best that new and independent filmmaking had to offer, screened eight outstanding examples of short film from around the world, including Aardman Animation's Adam; Phone directed by Tim Pope of The Cure-music video fame; the award-winning Australian animated film Sunday and Nonstop, a Finnish surrealist black comedy.

A few months later, in February '95, on broadcast-quality Beta SP, filmmakers in Concerted Efforts test-shot their first film together, a short entitled Chris' Story, adapted from an actor's audition piece...

Team Works Films
c/o 62 Spring Grove Crescent,
Hounslow, Middlesex TW3 4DB
Tel: 0181 737 4806