Coreetta’s film attracts Stateside interest

A Forth Valley College student’s short film is attracting serious interest from US actors, producers and film-makers.

Coreetta Buchan’s sci-fi space mission project titled ‘The Pull’ – which she has written, directed and filmed – has generated a buzz from her lecturers, fellow students and even a Hollywood actor, and she now hopes to garner more feedback after entering it into a Stateside film competition which she believes an audience of NASA employees and fans will enjoy.

She has been encouraged by the enthusiastic support of her lecturers especially Vincent Mulligan, Barry Frame and Curriculum Manager Colin McGeoch and her fellow NC TV, Film and Media classmates James Brannan, Brandon Walker, Nikki Mathieson and Ellis Harrison, in the making of her film project.

Coreetta (49), from Bannockburn, who has just signed up for a HND Media course starting in August, explained: “I had written the script eight years ago before I came to College and just shelved it, but I did want to tell the story the best way I knew at the time. A Hollywood actor called Charlie Powell attached himself, he saw my work online and loved it, so it was an honour to work with him and some other Americans that I knew including an actress called Regan who is at the University of Stirling who has now come on board.

“The opportunity came up again this year when we had to film our own work during my course at Forth Valley College, so I used a small section of my script, and I chose the Dolby Studio at the Stirling Campus to film it. It was an ideal environment and I was delighted that Curriculum Manager Collin McGeoch authorised the studio for filming. 

“There was a film festival held at the Stirling Campus as part of the course and I used the film for that, but the competition I submitted my sci-fi short to, was actually in the US. I believe because NASA is US based and that is the audience for this film type, I think the film will be substantially better received there. Nasa has global support and die-hard fans, so I preferred to go down that route.

“I have been offered support by an investor and they wanted to support development and release, but I was unsure if I need that input at the moment, as I want to keep full creative control and honour the hardworking students who chose to work with me especially outside college timetable.

“All the students involved were classmates on the course alongside myself. The group I was assigned were all incredibly skilled. I was delighted with them. My lecturer Vincent Mulligan has always been enthusiastic about the film and very excited about this. It was very encouraging when feedback came in from other students about how good it looked. I was then asked if they could see more. I then decided I needed to film a longer version of the film.   

“FVC Sound Production Lecturer Barry Frame is also going to get one of his advanced students to work on the sound side of ‘The Pull’ - for best quality.  Barry has incredible skills in sound engineering, so its great more students are coming on board to work on this. Fellow Lecturer Colm Clerkin – who also has played an amazing scene in the pull - is great with animation and I've asked him for support with some visual effects.

“We are delighted with Barry Frame giving us his time and talents to help us as a once off in this film despite all his commitments. Barry is a multi-talented Lecturer who is well loved by students. I'm extremely grateful for his support in this film I made sure to give his character an epic send-off -depicted in the screener. His acting skills are on Hollywood level! We were also very excited to have Colm Clerkin’s support as well.

“Three film festivals – two based in the USA - haven't finished judging the film yet as I'm still waiting to hear and will know in August. And I have now been invited to submit the film into three or four other festivals. ‘The Pull’ is to be a joint US and UK collaboration and I’ve now written the feature script and I am about to submit this for analysis so it can be read and scored next month. It's always a good idea for any filmmaker to have a script that is scored by a producer to support their film. The plan is to release a feature film digitally in the US & UK.”

To view the trailer for The Pull visit The pull rough cut 2.mp4 | Videos & Movies on Vimeo and the screener here https://vimeo.com/1218294555?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci