As you may recall from previous issues, Watership Down, produced by Ingenious Broadcasting 14/15, fund company Eleos Productions Ltd, was nominated in multiple categories for an Emmy award. We are pleased to announce that on 5 May, Watership Down won the award for ‘ Outstanding Special Class Animation Programme.’

And Ingenious backed Black Summer is the most watched scripted show on Netflix

Black Summer, which dropped on Netflix on 11 April, produced by Diggy Productions Ltd, is the most watched scripted show in the UK on Netflix. Black Summer comes from the Ingenious Broadcasting EIS 8 fund and has received a lot of positive attention in a short amount of time.

The first two films from our strategic partnership with AGC studios are now in production through our Greenlight companies:

Voyagers, directed by Neil Burger who helmed the recent box office hit The Upside, stars Colin Farrell and Tye Sheridan. From the producers of the John Wick and Sicario films, Voyagers focuses on thirty children sent into space on a multi-generational mission to reach and populate a newly discovered planet. After the adult captain of the mission is mysteriously killed, the young crew descends in chaos, reverting to a primitive and tribal state of being, and giving into their most feral and animal desires. The film has started shooting in Romania. The EIS production company is Freecss Films Ltd.

The Secrets We Keep, stars Joel Kinnaman and Noomi Rapace. The Kirkhaus Films Ltd production is set amid a paranoid post-war upstate suburban New York, a woman encounters an eerily familiar figure from her past life, but is he really the man she thinks he is? She takes matters in her own hands and kidnaps him, setting in motion a series of memories and events that will change her whole perception of the trust.

Further films closed in Greenlight include:

What is Life Worth, starring Michael Keaton and Stanley Tucci, follows the efforts of a Washington lawyer put in charge of the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund. Throughout three years of pro bono work, he fights off the cynicism, bureaucracy and politics associated with administering government funds. In so doing, he discovers what life is worth. What is Life Worth is being produced by Wiffle Films Ltd.

Liam Neeson and his son Michael star in romantic comedy Made in Italy which is actor James D’Arcy’s directorial debut. A bohemian artist travels from London to Tuscany with his son to sell the house they inherited from his late wife. This rom-com is being produced by Rojovid Films Ltd.

Films recently closed in Ingenious Shelley companies include:

Sci-fi thriller Possessor, produced by Rakija Films Ltd, starring Sean Bean, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Andrea Riseborough. The film is directed by Brandon Cronenberg, the son of the legendary David Cronenberg. VOS is an agent for a secretive organization who uses brain-implant technology to inhabit other people’s bodies, driving them to commit assassinations for the benefit of high-paying clients. Something goes wrong with a routine job and she soon finds herself trapped in the mind of a man whose appetite for violence rivals her own.

Action thriller The Doorman stars Jean Reno and Ruby Rose. The film involves a heist to steal priceless art from decades ago, a prestigious building housing New York’s elite over countless years, and a doorman… unlike any other. The Doorman is being produced by Gora Films Ltd.

After Cannes, we will be reporting US rights acquisitions on a number of our films.

UK High Streets have reached a ‘tipping point’, according to a recently published parliamentary inquiry report.

The shift to online sales (now accounting for 20% of all retail sales), the upward revaluation of business rates, previous planning policies, and local authority financing constraints are impacting retailers and high streets up and down the country, and across all sectors.

As concerns have intensified about the state of our high streets, the Government is slowly starting to take action. Urban regeneration is set to be a significant area of policy focus over the next few years, as the high street is rightly seen as a vital component of the UK’s economic and social fabric. In consequence, property investors should be seeing this as an emerging opportunity.

At the beginning of March Ingenious Greenlight’s The Wedding Guest was released by IFC films. Bleecker Street opened Shelley’s Hotel Mumbai last weekend with a platform release on four screens, averaging a very solid $21,623 per theatre. The film will go wide this weekend to 800 screens. Also, Ingenious Shelley’s Out of Bluehas opened in the UK and US.

Watership Down has been nominated for the 46th annual Daytime Emmy Awards which takes place on 5 May 2019. The Ingenious Broadcasting production has been nominated in the following categories:

Watership Down was produced by Eleos Production Ltd. and has the joint highest nominations for an animated show.

We are proud to announce our backing for forthcoming film Dream Horse, starring Damian Lewis and Toni Collette. The film tells the true story of Jan Vokes (Collette) and husband Howard Davies (Lewis) living out their dream to breed a champion racehorse in Cefn Fforest, Wales. Filming will take place this spring.

The script was written by Bafta-winner Neil McKay and filming is being directed by Euros Lyn, who has previously worked on Doctor Who, Sherlock and Black Mirror.

Fellow backers include Film4, Ffilm Cymru Wales and the Welsh Government. Warner Bros has bought the UK distribution rights while Cornerstone Films will handle international sales.

We are delighted that Ingenious-backed Mindful Education, a London-based education technology company, took home the Study Resource of the Year award at this year’s PQ Awards 2019, held on Tuesday 26 February.

The PQ Awards have been a fixture in the accountancy industry calendar for over 15 years. Hosted in London’s West End, the awards bring the sector together to celebrate the successes of part-qualified accountants, and those that help them achieve their goals.

The shortlist for this year’s award included Kaplan Financial, the London School of Business and Finance, and BPP Learning Media.

Judges for the award cited the impressive pass, merit and distinction rates achieved by colleges who use Mindful Education’s accounting solutions, as well as how Mindful Education were making flexible study possible for learners.

Both learners and employers are increasingly asking for high-quality, flexible courses that provide the knowledge and skills required to progress in the workplace.

Start-up education companies like us have a vital role to play in this so we are thrilled to have been recognised.

Mark Mckenna

Managing Director of Mindful Education

Mindful Education was shortlisted last year and goes one better in 2019.

The judges were impressed at how their solution reduces in-class time by 60% and recognised the impact Mindful Education has made in the sector since 2017. They felt this is a product that works for both learners and colleges.

Graham Hambly

Editor of PQ Magazine

Mindful Education partners with colleges across the UK to deliver media-rich professional courses in accounting, management, law and human resources.

Simon Pegg, Connie Nielsen and Lily Collins star in the White Comet Films Ltd. production, Inheritance which is filming in Alabama. This Shelley film is about a patriarch of a wealthy family suddenly passes away, leaving his wife and daughter with a shocking secret inheritance that threatens to unravel and destroy their lives.

Popara Films Limited are producing Greenlight’s Dream Horse starring Toni Collette and Damian Lewis. Euros Lyn, director of Sherlock, Happy Valley and Black Mirror, is helming the true story about a woman’s dream to breed and raise a champion racehorse on the allotment of her modest Welsh village.Little Miss Sunshine star Collette is taking the lead role of Jan Vokes, a middle-aged barmaid at a working men’s club who recruits her initially reluctant husband Brian and local accountant Howard Davies (Lewis) to help her bring together a syndicate of local people to breed a foal – which they name Dream Alliance. On the racetrack, he proves himself to be more than a match for the multi-million pound racehorses he comes up against, transforming the lives of those around him. Warner Bros will distribute in the UK.

Ingenious-backed The Kindness of Strangers has been selected to open the 69th Berlin International Film Festival in February 2019. The film is directed by Lone Scherfig and will also play in competition.

The New York-set drama stars Zoe Kazan, Tahar Rahim, Andrea Riseborough, Caleb Landry Jones, Jay Baruchel and Bill Nighy. The Kindness of Strangers is a contemporary ensemble drama that follows a group of characters all trying to survive a cold New York City winter, who find laughter, love and kindness in each other. 

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