Long and the short

Josie leads an army of comics making indie films

Josie Long is to make a short film named after her Edinburgh Fringe show Romance and Adventure.

She has taken to crowd-sourcing website Sponsume to appeal for the £9,500 she estimates it will take to make the movie – and is almost a third of the way to hitting the target already.

It will be the second short film she has made with her friend Douglas King. The first, called Let’s Go Swimming, was a melancholy comedy about a young woman as she escapes London and starts a new life in Glasgow, a city she calls an ‘indie themepark’.

That 20-minute short was shot with no budget, just by asking for favours and Long says: ‘ We are now desperate to make another, but we really want to pay people properly .

‘We want to be able to put the same crew together and actually hire the equipment we need so we don't wear out the goodwill that was shown to us.

On the Sponsume website, she adds: ‘The reason we are asking for your investment is that we are impatient and idealistic. We want to be able to make our film without giving up creative control, or waiting for anybody else. The money we are asking for is to pay for camera and equipment hire and post production and to pay our seven-strong crew for a five day shoot.'

Here’s a very short clip from Let’s Go Swimming:

Long is just one of several comedians moving into independent movie-making.

British-based American stand-up Dave Fulton’s latest short, No Prisoner, has just been accepted into London’s Raindance festival, where it will have its premiere on October 2.

The ten-minute film, which Fulton wrote and directed, stars Phill Jupitus as a gas man, who is mistaken for a thief by lonely householder Josie Lawrence.

It is his follow-up to Pay First, which starred Omid Djalili and Michael Smiley and has been accepted into ten festivals, including the Busho Budapest Short Film Festival, where it won the main prize earlier this month.

Here's an excerpt:

Meanwhile, Greg Davies, Isy Suttie, Ralf Little, Jonny Sweet and Diane Morgan all star in the comedy short Get Lucky, which is getting its world premiere at the London Film Festival next month. Directed by Norma Burke, the film is one of 36 UK shorts selected for screening.

Finally, The Limelight – a low-budget film made by Glen Maney about a tragic stand-up has been released as a download. It also stars Ricky Grover, Patrick Monahan and Jay Sodagar, with appearances by Craig Campbell and Phil Nichol.

Here’s the trailer for that one - or click here to rent the full movie: