Countdown to Markham (2020) release

My feature debut as a director – Markham – is only weeks away from release now, there’s a little bit of work still to do on the film, but in these Covid crazy times I’ve found that my services as a script writer for hire, UK Script editor  and UK script consultant  have been highly in demand, as people have taken the downtime brought on by Covid to seek help developing their scripts and screenplays.

As well as being busy with my specialised script development service, I’ve also just finished the first draft of another feature film which I’m hoping to direct – The Battle of Belgrave Street. This script is one of the most hard boiled screenplays I’ve ever worked on, and is aiming for the action simplicity that Walter Hill gave to some of the screenplays he penned as writer and director. It’s a terse, script, with as few words as possible, it features laconic, easily defined characters, who are judged on action they take, and a very clean narrative which features a straightforward if difficult goal to obtain and lots of obstacles to overcome. In this case, a handful of bouncers need to protect a club from Yardie gangsters in Chapeltown, Leeds in the 1980s.

As well as writing for myself and for hire, I’ve also found that the extra time, given to post-production on Markham has helped a lot, and I’ve shot some extra scenes and increased the amount of practical special effects in the film.

Markham will be available to buy on this website very soon, before it moves onto one of the streaming services.

I’ve also, had some distribution experts’ look at Markham, with a view to giving the film as wide a release as possible, some of these guys are big ‘Hollywood’ type players with prestigious reputations in the industry. I’m still waiting to hear back from a couple of the bigger players, I’m pleased that in some way that Markham a low budget film, has put me on the map as a director in some way already (even before it’s released proper).

Feedback, from cast and crew so far has been positive too, I’m hoping to use many of the same actors in future productions and some of the same production crew too.

So, there’s no further news as of today (01/06/2020) but I’ll continue to add blog posts as we count down to the release of the film – very soon.

Matthew Cooper has been a script writer for hire, UK Script editor  and UK script consultant for over 20 years. He’s written for most of the UK soaps, including writing award winning episodes of Emmerdale, EastEnders, Hollyoaks and Family Affairs and has been BAFTA shortlisted and Royal Television Society nominated as a script writer. His UK script coverage service and script development service are highly sought after.

You can find some of his broadcast credits on the IMDb.His directorial debut, the rubber reality horror thriller Markham will be released in 2020. You can find out more about Matthew’s work as a director here.

You can get in touch with Matthew on matcoop23@yahoo.co.uk.