HAVING BEEN groomed by unscrupulous gang members as a young teen and surviving been stabbed seven times, Amani Simpson said it would have been easier for him to blend into the background as he grew up.
He didn’t, thankfully, and this week sees the 33-year-old release his directorial debut, Save Me, a short film about two teenagers; Fiona (15) who finds herself in several unsafe situations and Dean (13) who is grieving the loss of his mum. The pair meet after Dean is being bullied in the park, which then strikes up an unusual friendship.
As well as premiering in July, ‘Save Me’ will be used as a digital training tool in schools across the UK.It’s a glowing endorsement of the work created by Simpson, a project he is excited to bring to market having been forced to sit on it for two years.
He explained: “Save Me is a film that I wrote and directed in collaboration with young people from Enfield. It’s a film that follows two teenagers that are connected through trauma. It’s a deep film, it’s a film that was written intentionally to start conversation and empower change.
“For me it’s all about how people that watch the film can use it to converse with each other about what they can do in their community and speak to young people about some of the dangers that happen around them and essentially, just be a tool for a generation to use and safeguard our young people.”
Simpson says although he’d been a part of a successful short film based on his own life, he’d never envisioned taking up the role of film director himself.
Able to pivot towards the skill set required to fulfill the newly struck ambition due to having time on his hands during the pandemic, Simpson explained how the opportunity arose.
“It was commissioned by Enfield council, the area I grew up in.”It was based on the success of the first short film I was involved in called Amani, which was about me.”They initially wanted to make a training DVD, but I said I didn’t remember the last time I watched a DVD so, let’s make a short film, right?”
We had done an initial pilot project about empowering families and early interventions and stuff like that for children in primary schools and so this was a legacy piece of the back of that film.
“When I was given the commission initially, I thought I was only going to produce it, I wasn’t going to direct or write because I had never done either before, this is my director debut.
“So I started to work with young people and listen to them and before you knew it, I just fell in love with telling Dean and Fiona’s story.
“And then lockdown happened, and an opportunity presented itself for me to basically dive deeper into writing and directing it and I just used that downtime when everyone was inside their house to watch loads of masterclasses and read loads of books, speak to friends that were writers and directors.
“So I just took the opportunity and used it to do something that I am super proud of.
“We shot this in 2021, so I’ve had this film loading for a while and I am so happy we’re moments away from it being outside and whatever comes next.”
Learn more about ‘Save Me‘ and Amani Simpson in the full interview below.
Comments Form