Production starts on my feature documentary directorial debut – The First Film

Here is a great example of how important it is for filmmaker’s to build strong relationships with other people in the industry and to have a solid online presence. Chris Jones, Oscar shortlisted director and author of one of the best selling indie filmmaking books (The Guerilla Filmmaker’s Handbooks) has become a good friend over the last few years. This friendship resulted in him recommending me for a director role in a feature length documentary!

I was approached several months ago by London based producer David Nicholas Wilkinson of Guerilla Films. David wanted to meet and discuss the position of director on the project. The initial meeting went well and David offered me the position just minutes after the meeting ended.

During that initial meeting David went in to great detail to explain the story of the documentary and it didn’t take long before I was completely hooked in. I now desperately wanted to get my hands on this project. David told me about a French inventor living in Leeds called Louis Le Prince and the true story of him inventing the FIRST motion picture camera, right here in Leeds, Yorkshire. At first I thought he was mad, but then he started to show me the evidence to back up his claim – it’s all there in black and white!

The very foundations of cinema were born in the city of Leeds back in the late 1880’s. Yet, the LePrince name is nowhere to be seen in the history books, nothing. It’s a story that hides under a mysterious dark cloud of conspiracy and massive injustice.

“On 16th September 1890, just days before he was due to sail to New York to demonstrate his new camera to the American public, Louis Aime Le Prince stepped onto the Dijon to Paris train and was never seen again.”

How could I resist getting involved.

We’ve already started filming sections of the documentary with many more filming days to come in the summer of 2013, including trips to Dijon, Paris, Cannes, New York and Los Angeles. We’re hoping to have the film finished by early 2014 ready for cinema release and a film festival campaign.

This is going to be one hell of an adventure, it’ll question the very foundations on which cinema as we know it is built on.

Please do follow facebook.com/thefirstfilm page for lots of behind the scenes information, including video clips and pictures. We’re also on twitter.com/thefirstfilm.

Lots of updates to come.

Thanks for stopping by.

Danny
dannylaceyfilm.co.uk
twitter.com/dannylaceyfilm
youtube.com/dannylaceyfilm