The Reel deal

Words from the winner

After the screening, Inside Housing sounded out winner Megan K Fox about her inspiration for the film – and what she is planning to do next. The 25-year-old film-maker, originally from Dublin, is based in south London and works at membership organisation Women in Film & TV UK. She holds an MA in film directing from the Met Film School, based at Ealing Studios. She worked on her film, Girl, with actress Natalia Kostrzewa, director of photography Ben Calloway and make-up artist Hannah Hubbard. Here are her initial thoughts.

What inspired the idea for your film?

Megan K Fox

As a teenager I spent two summers volunteering in my local soup kitchen in Ireland, and since then I’ve always held the issue of homelessness and rough sleeping close to my heart. It’s such an important issue and when I started making films I realised that I couldn’t find many (possibly any!) positive or particularly compassionate portrayals of homeless characters on screen. I found out about a vertical video challenge and started thinking about that visual format, how claustrophobic and limiting it is, and I thought that this would be a perfect format in which to tell the story of a homeless woman as it provided a visual metaphor for her feelings of isolation and insignificance, her lack of options or opportunities to escape from her situation. I thought about a feeling that I take for granted every day, as many of us do: the feeling of putting on clean, fresh clothes and what that does to our sense of self worth.

Then I imagined how it would feel to be denied that and to crave it more than any other drug or alcohol that so many people assume rough sleepers are dependent on.

I wanted to portray a homeless character with the dignity and pride that we all deserve to feel.

What did you make of the evening and the other entries?

It was incredibly moving to screen my film alongside some really affecting documentaries and test footage videos about homelessness and the housing crisis. To be in a room full of people who really care, some of whom have been homeless themselves, and are actively working to solve this issue was an honour. I think all of the film-makers left with an increased sense of how important it is to keep telling these stories and representing the under-represented on screen. It was a fantastic and really impactful event.

What are your initial thoughts about how you would like to develop the film after winning the competition?

I’d love to tell the story of how this young Polish woman became homeless, following the first days of her rough sleeping in a fictional narrative that will shed some light on just how easy it is for any of us to fall into this situation, and also highlight some of the struggles that women in particular have to face on the streets. One of the most hurtful remarks I often hear people say when they see homeless foreigners is ‘why don’t you just go back to your own country?’.

I’m hoping to make a short film that will make people think twice about that kind of remark, and share a narrative that explores how immigrants in the UK can fall through the cracks and be left without options when it comes to housing and security.

The other shortlisted entrants were:

Adam Baird – The Cost of Livin’

Adam, 35, from Liverpool, is a contributor to the satirical website The Daily Mash and occasionally runs creative writing workshops at homelessness and housing charity the Whitechapel Centre. His film tells the story of a man who has been homeless for some time and manages to get a flat with the help of a housing advisor after being attacked in the tent in which he has been sleeping. But this is not the end of his troubles.

Carol-Mei Barker and Lukas Demgenski – Crisis

Carol-Mei, 36, works in education for the British Film Institute and produced and co-directed the film with cinematographer Lukas Demgenski. Crisis tells the story of the regeneration of the Gascoigne Estate in Barking, where Carol-Mei lived as a teenager.

Olivia Cheung – Astray

Olivia, 20, lives in Cardiff and has just finished studying film at the University of South Wales. Her entry, based on the true stories of two women, depicts the life of a young woman living in a tent.

Damien Hasson – The Guest

Damien, 36, is an actor and writer originally from the north of Ireland. His idea came when he was volunteering with the Simon Community homelessness charity in London and learnt about Operation Poncho, a robust policy for dealing with rough sleepers in the City of London.

Jennifer Hartley – My Favourite Thing

Jennifer, 43, from Cardiff, is a director of Theatre Versus Oppression, an applied theatre charity which creates and runs projects with marginal and disadvantaged people. Her film features six people who have been sleeping rough in and around Cardiff talking about their favourite household items now they have a roof over their head.

Harry Johnson – Have You Heard About Nigel?

Harry, 25, is a freelance film-maker and videographer based in Liverpool. His film is about a man who is in employment but also lives in poverty and becomes homeless.

Ellie Jones – A Moth Inflamed

Ellie, 21, from Birmingham, is about to graduate from Westminster Film School with a BA (Hons) in film production. Her film is inspired by a group of anarchist squatters occupying an abandoned parliamentary building and protesting about the housing crisis.

Roxy Roscoe – Don’t Look Down

Roxy, 22, lives in Greater Manchester and works in developing digital media and marketing campaigns. Shocked by the number of rough sleepers in the city, she wrote, directed, produced and edited the film while studying television and radio production at the University of Salford.

Mei Leng Yew and Natalie Ktena – My Homeless Housemate

Mei Leng is an emerging film-maker from south London. She splits her time between working as an assistant in documentaries/factual for broadcast television and working with the British Film Institute on its ‘Displaced in Media’ programme. This is her first independent production as producer/director.

Natalie Ktena, based in West London, is the assistant producer. She works as a production co-ordinator for BBC Three.

Their documentary follows three Brits who have opened up their homes to homeless people.

Reel Homes: backers

• Accent
• Aldwyck
• Arches
• Axiom
• Bournemouth Churches Housing Association
• Brighter Futures
• Broadland
• Bromford
• Community Gateway
• Connect
• Croydon Churches Housing Association
• Cynon Taf
• EMH Homes
• Family Mosaic
• Halton Housing
• Hastoe
• Hexagon
• Hightown Housing
• Irwell Valley
• Leeds and Yorkshire Housing Association
• Liverpool Housing Trust
• Network
• North Star
• Nottingham Community Housing Association
• Orbit
• Placeshapers
• Richmond Housing Partnership
• Riverside
• Shepherds Bush
• Soha Housing
• South Liverpool Homes
• South Yorkshire Housing
• St Vincent’s
• Trafford Housing Trust
• Tyne
• Wandle