A Quest for Peace and a Red Rose Revival

Peace Quest Documentary and a Red Rose.

World Peace has never been harder lost than right now with a war in the Middle East and another in Europe in Ukraine. Back in 2023 at the New Year, I made a resolution to visit one community per month that promoted World peace either politically or spiritually speaking. It seemed an innocent naive thing to ask now given the ferocity of the fighting on both fronts. Ten months later it's been hard to go around to visit and film these communities because of two things my own priority list that got in the way and that of the interviewees who seemed to be doing more important things to sustain their communities and groups during the world crisis. How could this be? So far I managed to interview the head of the Peace Sanctuary in Allanton, responsible for the well-known Peace Poles of May Peace dwell on Earth motto and earlier in the year Leader of the Samye Ling Buddhist Monastery. I then went to speak with some of the SGI Sokka Gaki Buddhists about their Peace initiatives plus members of the Bahai Faith. However, there are gaps in the monthly forrays to Peace Communities due to an illness of mine, like a nasty tooth abscess in July coupled with a six-month train strike that limited journeys and sometimes made travel impossible due to cancellations. So now I must catch up in November and December to speak  Christian and Muslim Groups along with other political organisations. Will I make it? I soon found I needed money to get around so I launched a Crowdfunder and I'm appealing to you to help because I have left the Crowdfunder open after the window for donations and it is still available for support. You can help by donating at this link here Peace Quest

To make this more attractive anyone donating over £10 will receive a free Peace Symbol Necklace with their contribution. They are also available on Etsy to buy for Peace Quest at this link Peace Necklace 

In the lead up to Christmas I hope people will consider helping Peace-Quest documentary reach its goal. It will be edited from January 2025 to April given that 12 communities were the goal and that filming them would not be completed by December 2024. It's a challenge, but I do hope it will get people in general inspired to consider peace as the only option for humanity.

Red Rose Film in 2024 20th Anniversary Revival 

Red Rose the film I wrote and produced in 2004 is having a revival with screening in Scotland. In July it screened at the Theatre Royal Dumfries on the anniversary of Robert Burn's death. It was a historical event because Robert Burns was associated with the theatre due to the riot that ensued over his failure to stand for the National Anthem.  A documentary was made about the Red Rose screenings this summer and you can see it on you tube or again at this link below.

Red Rose Revival Screenings

Here is the new trailer at the link here Red Rose Trailer

If you would like a screening of the film accompanied by a Q and A from me please do get in touch.

Art Centres in Scotland have also requested the film for Burns Suppers in 2025 for which it is available.

More up dates on my other projects soon here because the Blog seems to be the most efficient way to get the word out in these times.

More soon.

Nessie Film in Cinemas throughout Scotland

 

The film Nessie is available in cinemas this month throughout Scotland and only this week the Odeon extended its run on Edinburgh Lothian Rd Cinema thoughout this coming weekend August 11th plus more shows at its Glasgow Braehead venue. However it does not stop there with a full weeks release at the Grovenor Cinema in Glasgow West End and then it goes on to Oban Cinema also from this Friday and then back into Edinburgh at the Scotsman Picturehouse through August at the Kids Club. In order not to miss this charming comedy about Scotland's National Hero, the Loch Ness Monster I have listed the ticket links below.

TICKET LINKS BELOW

NESSIE starring John Michie (Taggart) Patrick Kilpatrick (Minority Report) Tanya Fear (Dr Who) Stephanie Beacham (Dynasty)Nessie is, a comedy about the Loch Ness Monster in Cinemas in Scotland for its summer release of the week beginning the 5th August with a premiere at Grovenor Cinema Glasgow I enclose the trailer here Nessie Movie Trailer

The Odeon Braehead Glasgow runs the film from the 6th August, along side the Grovenor West End in Glasgow with the Edinburgh Scotsman Cinema screening it daily for ten days, plus in North Argyll the Oban Phoenix Cinema screens it for a week, Aberfeldy Cinema too, while Highland Fort William Cinema extend the release to September.  Here is how the other cinemas are presenting the film in the Central Belt. More to follow on the Highland screenings. 

GROVENOR CINEMA GLASOW 

You can see the Grovenor shows here Ticket Link Ashton Lane 

 

ODEON

Edinburgh Lothian Rd Odeon Ticket Link Lothian Rd 

Glasgow Braehead Odeon Braehead Odeon

If you join the Odeon website you get tickets for £5 

 

OBAN

Oban Tickets from Friday 11th Nessie Oban Pheonix Cinema

 

ABERFELDY

Aberfeldy Cinema Ticket Link The Birks Cinema

 

EDINBURGH SCOTSMAN PICTURE HOUSE 

From August 19th for ten days to August 29th at the Kids Club

Scotsman Cinema  Kids Club Scotsman Picturehouse

The Film is distributed by my company Sunset Entertainment a Boutique Theatrical Cinema Distribution and Film Sales Company. The film was made by Palm Tree Universal and produced by Rachael Sutherland and Robbie Moffat who also directed the film.

I would like to thank my daughter Rachael Sutherland who organised the Premiere of the Picture at the Grovenor Cinema last weekend and also added the additional cinemas of Grovenor and Edinburgh Scotsman Picturehouse to the List of Cinemas taking Nessie for this summers release. I would also like to thank the other cinemas Oban Phoenix, Aberfeldy Birks, Fort Willian Highland and not forgetting the Odeon who have put the film in again this weekend and next week. 

This release has built on the other cinema release that Sunset Entertainment made of Dracula on Holiday in 2021 when it saw a gap in the market in Scotland for local independent film producers to break into cinema distribution.

The difference between a B12 deficiency and Pernicious Anaemia diagnosis

Cannes Film Festival 2023 - Stuck by the Male Perogative -No change then!

Last months blog updated with a photo and a comment on the Kind Cannes Film Association

For me Cannes 2023 was a wake up call to stand up against the prevailing mentality that delights to the point of a sadists satisfaction, in demeaning women on every level, both mentally and physically. This was enshrined in the pervading atmosphere this year which was remicisent of the first Festivals I went to in the mid and late 1990's when the prostituion networks were at their height and visibly triumphant in their operations, where the march of the girls would occur on La Croisette, every evening as if like a promenade of flesh. Groups of girls all wearing short mini dresses and 4 inch heels would  gather outside the Casino and then simply strut down the coastal promenade catching looks from the men who invarably got drawn in to an expensive evening where they paid for everything quite literally and would be found the next day burnt out shanghied with no money in their pockets because it had all gone on one night where no business was done but one thing!!!

Today post MeToo such days of the 1990's seem like a bygone era, that one would think and hope would have no reappearance of the prostitute rings. Not so in 2023 they were bold as brass, heavy dewed with expensive perfume, and unrelentant that it was to be- business as usual. Noone was going to stop them if they made the the pimps visable and as threatening as possible. Indeed they had been stopped in 2013 when the prostitution ring or at least one brand of it had been broken by the police or rather Interpol who raided the parties that had gone on for almost a decade or more in the penthouses of one of the most famous hotels in Cannes. 

Post MeToo one would have hoped that the atmosphere of Cannes would have been cleaned up in a way that the prositution had been eliminated never to return as if it could be cleaned clear through and deoderised too just like a laundered dish cloth might be from the cleansing revulsion and anger that had prevaded the whole MeToo process of speaking out. Well well not so.....

Then there were the legitamising forces of the sponsors of the Festival and their behavior, which seemed oddly out of tune with the awakened parts of the film industry and their audiences. Many of the sponsors seemed intent in keeping the habits and mores of a begone era where women were seen but not heard as if we had to bow down and say All Hail to the Brand no matter how dehumanising the processes of its marketing campaigns. This was summed up by an event that was to spoil the evening for many who attended one such brand's party, namely Campari who had hired a security wrangler from another time and place akin to an Italian racket and not the tennis kind either. His behviour of pulling and pushing the ticketed guests in the entryline caused a dangerous crush situation for many so much so that large numbers of those in the crush and subsequent fall out filmed the actions of this head wrangler pushing and shoving the people in the ticket line. Once he understood his actions had been caught on camera by, err, wait for it film makers whose job it is to catch people in the act, he curtailed his thuggery and on cue when the camera turned he realised he must make like a good man and let the poor people gain entry without his slapping hand in front and behind them. Many women complained that he had felt their breasts while he beat them away to fit in with his strange method of crowd control which back fired because in disgust many gave up on wanting to attend the event despite having tickets. I observed the scrum which was akin to a rugby match,  and I complained to the head of marketing there who was hiding out in a side room with the skinny models and the vision mixers who were trying to make an art of getting the dancers who were on stage clicking their bums up in a pert sexy way presumably to try to corner the market of eroticism that might only impress the sunburnt penniless men who had lost their money to the prostitute promenade. The marketing department thought they were so cool when in actual fact they were so last year in fashion terms, in that they had not taken MeToo into account or its transformative power. Campari lost out because its party was less than capacity with guests entering and then promptly leaving when they saw the style faux pas of the dancing girls.

Oh well? But something did change, the Palm D'or went to a woman director this year so at least the organisers had made an effort to impress the MeToo female lobby if only for the Awards catagories. Out with that, Cannes was the same old, same old, recipe of gender abuse where women were quite literally the bottom of the heap, under the cosh of the four inch high heeled shoed women who ralled against the normal footware of white tennis shoes that had come into fashion there in 2012 after Julia Roberts made her defiant walk up the Red Carpet in bare feet in way of rebelling against the dress code that said flat shoes could not be woren . Now in 2023 the dress code has fallen into line and been changed to allow women to wear flat dress shoes and high heeled shoes on the Red Carpet though the Tennis shoes remain the provence of the film market (Marche Du Film) where the women producers and directors (at least the film crews) would not be seen dead in four inch high heeled shoes because they symbolize oppression and submission to the mis directed authority of men. In that sense there has been one victory but in terms of the overall social standing of women kind, Cannes Film Festival has a very long way to go.

In order to change the atmosphere in Cannes Film Festival to create postive images of women, I have set up the Kind Cannes Film Association. It will try to create spaces where people can go to chill out, that are alcohol free and may provide for meditation and mindfulness practise. It will also campaign to have better non alcoholic sponsors for the festival that will promote lifestyle options that move away from treating woman badly as only sex objects with no intrinsic creative abilities. Cannes is supposed to be an arts and cultural event not a commercial conduit for business interests of drink,fashion and hospitality brands, who often promote women as purely objects to sell their products. When woman are treated as commodities rather than human beings this is only a short step towards the spectre of prostitution which has regained a footing in the world now to such a degree that sex trafficking is common place. For this to happen the film industry have choosen to ignore their own events as if they are not part of the problem instead of readjusting behaviour to be favourable to allow women to thrive rather than to be pressured into modes that only encourage prositution at a marco - level. Ending exploitation at the heart film industry can only be acheived if it seeks to change itself from within.

 

Oh dear a blog without a tale.

 I was going great guns up to the point my mother died last February 2022 I was putting the films Dracula on Holiday and The Right Bus into cinemas plus I was trying to launch a Screenplay course on Mastermind.All got shelved during the arrangements for the funeral and the resulting fall out from inevitable small print in Mums will. It was always known my brother would inherit the house despite the Scottish tradition that a house should go to all of the children my mother disagreed with my father on this and insisted the first born would get the property.Strange old fashioned views that ignored the concept that the world was enlightened towards equality these days.Oh well I move on sadder and wiser but it does not make up for the loss of my Mum who worked hard to make sure everyone was provided for at least. I managed to get my National Insurance debts paid thanks to her - something that was difficult to pay because of being self employed. I at least moved forward out of the trauma of her sudden death.Now to pick up the pieces of all the things that did not get done last year.The greatest thing that suffered was the film script writing when writers block descended like a big bad fog. 

3 scripts sat in the shadows unfinished and the pick up on them is a hard ask.However fast forward to last week and the decision to attend the Matthew McConaughey Road trip to More jolted me out of my complacency and put me into the mode of making my accountability list. So now all being well I hope to launch 3 courses on Mastermind this year then also complete my screenplays and begin the process of raising finance for these film productions. Each one has a specific character and  special needs.They are  almost like a young children, so that you have to nurture a screenplay into existence and even more so it's next step into production. For this purpose I set up my new company Sans Peur Productions and only a few months old it has got a long way to go before it will figure out the funding elements of each project. Already one of them has a co- Producer so that is a start. What I can say is McConaugheys course challenges you to look at the lies that tell yourself. The lies you tell yourself that your dreams are too hard to achieve. If you let them. The course moves you to the next level of admission that of  action. It shows you how to take the steps to make your personal goals and dreams happen. Now I'm on that road having submitted my resignation from Palm Tree Universal to take clear action that I'm going it alone with my new company Sans Peur which means  Without Fear in French and I'm going to need a lot of it -without fear- that is because if the procrastination on this was anything to go by then I'm scared stiff. My dreams are awaiting round the corner with a big to do list but one thing is for sure. The Roadtrip to More Transformation by Matthew McConaughey course definitely works. 

My Father's Garden

 Oft times a subject comes up that you feel would make a nice blog. One that doesn't ruffle feathers or take a poke at the current milieu or maelstrom depending on your point of view. My Father's Garden comes to mind and I don't mean that in a religiously symbolic way I just mean it, as it was, my Dad's Garden where he nurtured it for many years creating vast crops of strawberries, potatoes, carrots, onions, gooseberries, blackberries to name but a few.

His garden was a wonderful creation that he tended with some professionalism, because his degree in agriculture made available to him in the post-war education of returning soldiers from the battlefields of world war two, allowed him to know about the correct seeding of plants, the turning of the soil at the right time and all the other secrets that others might not know. 

But his tilling of the soil came from another tradition that was embedded in him from his days as a child watching his forebearers, Highland crofting exiles manage what little land they had left. This crofting tradition saw the use of trees to create fruit while the land below was prepared for potatoes and other vegetables in a rotated way that would mean the food was on our table until the ravages of winter came along.

How I enjoyed as a child the fruits of my father's labors because we eat all of the food he produced with great relish. He of course was ahead of his time in that most suburban homes only had a patch of grass and lines of domesticated flowers to show off, while he had a finely honed system that could only have been got from a long line of land managers in the Sutherland deer estates of the North and further afield in places like Montana where his Uncle had reared sheep, to the vast wilderness of Patagonia where his Father had run cattle for the Estancia companies there. The land was my father's forte and in his work as an Inspector for the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries he had stopped many an epidemic in farms of foot and mouth disease. His one accolade that remains as a testament to his ability to understand ecology was his attention to the preservation of the red squirrel and the area of some 500 miles straight across for which he was in charge for some 40 years remains the only active domain of Red Squirrels in Scotland.

He was very much before his time and if he had been around today he would have been lauded for his simple crofting techniques that are now regarded as the future of a vast present system of intensive farming that is failing to deliver safely manageable food chains for large populations.

As the experts begin to understand the cost of overproduction and its effect on the climate and the ecology of animals, the 'grow your own movement' is becoming a cry for change. How is it then that those who pushed for a balanced ecosystem of small-scale crofting, were marginalized in their time and their work was gone unseen? Just like the now deserted island of Tanera on the West coast of Scotland near Ullapool, where the famous ecologist conservationist Fraser Darling wrote his books and planted the seeds for the future of land management. Little wonder it was there that my grandmother was brought up and also handed down in Gaelic the special heritage of Walking songs about the making of the wool from the occupying army of sheep, whose presence was not accepted fully and today remains a blight on the sustainable management of the land in the Highlands.

My Father's Garden remains a testament to him and his ability to cast forward and know that it was to become one of the most important lessons for present humanity as it deals with the erosion of the topsoil of the entire planet alongside vast wildfires, and the destruction of entire animal species.

My Dad was smart, innovative, and forward thinking, during the 1970s when such ideas were neither understood nor appreciated for what they were or how they should be practiced. It is a great shame that the society he founded The Highland Resettlement Society fell by the wayside after he become ill with diabetes in 1972.   

To Dad missed but not forgotten pictured there with a cigar in the late 1960s visit to Essex. (Mushroom Farm)

                                   Donald Fraser Sutherland 12th June 1920 to 27th Jan 1997

The Art of the Screenplay Module 1 The beginning

Here is Module Number one of my Free Screenplay Course. You can join it on Mastemind.com for Live Sessions here You can also get the course Module 1 download worksheet by emailing mairi.sutherland@gmail.com I hope to see you there.