8 Minutes Idle

Tom Hughes has cheekbones. (via)

All right everyone! I'm plugging a thing. Get ready. It's a good thing I promise.

So as most of you know, I was sort of recently living in London, doing an MA program in Creative Writing at Brunel Uni. For my dissertation I got to work with Matt Thorne, one of the instructors of the Novel Writing program, whose book Eight Minutes Idle was being adapted to film at the time. Matt co-wrote the screenplay, and when the film was finished he invited Lucy and me to a screening in Soho. I absolutely loved it; it had a distinctly British indie feel, whatever that means to you, and was sweet and quirky without being twee. You would like it. Also it's about people who work in a call center, and you know everyone has had that one shitty call center job!

After the screening I kept sending Matt nagging emails, asking him when the film would be released, why he hadn't written a sequel yet, etc., and he said they had yet to find a distributor. Well they eventually found one, only the distributor promptly went bankrupt before the film could be released. Sad trombone.

Now the important bit! 8 Minutes Idle has now turned to Kickstarter, where they are trying to raise £20,000 to bring the film to cinemas. You can read more at the Guardian, and their Kickstarter page is here. Also check out IMDb for a plot summary and stuff.

So far they've raised quite a lot (£16,930), but I thought I would boost the signal here on my blog because it's a really great film, and I want it to get its ass to cinemas so I can force everyone I know in the UK to go and see it! I know a lot of my readers are in the US, and may not be able to see the film for some time after its hopeful release date of Valentine's Day 2014, but it's a project worth supporting! Not least of all because Matt helped me write my horrible rambling novel, and his awesome movie really deserves to be seen by the public.

SO BACK THIS THANG. 

There are only 9 days to go, so even if you don't contribute, boost the signal!

Also look at Tom Hughes and those cheekbones, guys. Those cheekbones have got to be worth $8 at least.