Hey, just a quick update – The Light on Leeds podcast recently featured an HOUR LONG interview with yours truly – taking about my work as a script consultant and director.
Matthew Cooper has been a script writer for hireand 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.
My feature debt as a Director confounded a few viewers– when Markham was released in 2020, it wound up on a few torrent sites quite quickly- one person watching the film illegally gave it 5 stars out of 5 and left a message on the torrent board which read – ‘I’ve never seen another fucking film like it.’ Well, maybe that guy (or gal) might want to watch PHASE IV (1974)
Phase IV is a film directed by Saul Bass. It’s a small contained sci-fi about ants taking over the world. But this isn’t ‘Them’ (1954) – don’t expect to see stop motion creatures crunching on military hardware. Instead Phase IV is a visually stunning, cramped and claustrophobic film, that will make viewers uneasy and entertained in equal measure.
There’s not much of a plot to mention, and some of it won’t make much sense – but it will be compulsive viewing.
Saul Bass is a bit of a legend in the film world. He was a graphic designer by trade, and somehow ended up designing the title sequences for many classic films – from Martin Scorsese’ Casino right back to The Seven Year Itch. Sometimes the title sequences of the films he worked on were better, more interesting and more creative than the films themselves.
So, Saul had a cult following and a reputation for being visually exacting and super creative, but Saul only ever directed one feature film, so PHASE IV is they only fully realised film we have from him, and it’s a trip – and hints at what a talent he could have been given further commissions.
But like my debut film Markham – some reviewers at the time had never seen a fucking film like it! And that kind of put a stop to Saul’s career as a director right there...
Over the 47 years since the film was made, its built up a big cult following. The trailer is below, and I’d recommend you see it, as soon as you can.
Matthew Cooper has been a scriptwriter for hireand 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.
Matthew is also a director of feature films including the rubber reality horror thriller ‘Markham’ which was released in 2020. Matthew’s second feature film as director ‘At The Mountains Of Madness’ was released in July 2021.
After the two low budget horror films Markham and At The Mountains Of Madness one of my upcoming projects requires a lot of old school stop motion effects and miniature work. I’m looking forward to getting my hands dirty one-frame at a time – but any sort of stop motion work is a huge undertaking.
One of the last great practitioners of stop motion animation is Phil Tippett – Phil was the AT-AT man on Empire Strikes Back as well as the genius behind Robocop and Starship Troppers amazing special effects.
But almost in secret and in his spare time between Hollywood projects Phil has been working away on his own feature length stop-mo epic. Mad God has been 30 YEARS! That’s right -30YEARS- in the making, but from the trailer below it looks like it will have been more than worth the wait.
I just hope that my project using these effects doesn’t take as long to finish.
Matthew Cooper has been a scriptwriter for hireand 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.
Just wanted to add a really quick update to say that Markham, my feature film debut is on its way, and will hopefully be released by the end of this month (July 2020).
Next week I should be able to complete the final cut, with the ADR, music and final special effects sequences locked and loaded.
It goes without saying that this has been a huge effort, to produce a fully independent feature film from scratch, on a very low budget.
Keep an eye on this website and UK script consultant over the coming weeks, I’ll tell you when the film is released for sale, and much more about the making of Markham.
Matthew Cooper has been directing drama films since the early 90s, starting on super 8mm cine film and movie into video, long before it became digital. His feature film directorial debut Markham was released in 2020.
As well as being a freelance film director for hire, Matthew has also enjoyed a long career as a script writer for hire 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.
