Branchage Official Film Festival Trailer 2010 from Branchage Film Festival on Vimeo.

I was mowing the lawn yesterday morning when Xanthe, Queen of Branchage, rang to ask if I’d introduce British Sea Power’s live soundtrack to The Man Of Arran at the Union Chapel in Islington that night. Having previously witnessed the astonishing audio visual bombardment that is this event at last years Branchage Festival I jumped at the chance. The film and the sound track have lost none of their impact, suffering nothing from this time lacking the mildly hallucinogenic affect…

Friends of the heart, friends of the head and companions to my soul, apologises all for my recent absence from your servers, feeds and screens. I’ve been stretched thinner than the skin across a super model’s rib cage. Of this more later, but first I note that the period of my online silence happens to span the period between the birthday of Mr.Philip Ilson and that of Ms.Kate Taylor two of the finest gems on the crown of independent film…

Ooh my head. Bloody Mary’s followed by Guinness is oddly similar to eating a steak with a peppery tomato salsa. Plus a great deal of alcohol. Never the less last night at the London Short Film Festival screening of the Vauxhall Branchage 48hr Challenge films at the Roxy Bar and Screen, I was in the mood for celebrating. Not because the film Chris and I made, “Truth In The Valley” was the ultimate winner of the generous £1,000 prize, because…

Doing our best to stop it turning into Strictly Come Filmmaking (a title which suggests entirely the wrong sort of movie), Phil, Hannah, myself and maestro of ceremonies Mullighan will be performing mouth-to-mouth on some arresting short films at The Hospital in Covent Garden tonight from 6.30pm. Not only will it be full of gems of filmmaking advice it’s also good fun, especially if it’s not your film that’s dying on the slab. So put on your best Branchage brogues…

What glorious weather. I haven’t felt quite this warm and lazily content since I was in Jersey last year, which is perhaps just a trick of the light because who’s that standing by the lift with her phone to her ear but Xanthe Hamilton, creator and director of the Branchage Film Festival, Jersey’s more civilised answer to Woodstock… However, whilst there is something of the Dryad about her, stumbling into her in the late sunshine is no piece of early…

Which, as we all know, means “I am a doughnut” which, sadly, is closer to the truth than any statement about my belonging to the German capital. However on Saturday I found myself with some time to kill in Covent Garden and rather than spending money I don’t have on shoes I don’t need, I met up with Phil and Kate and went to a screening of short films about Berlin which they were hosting as part of the London…