BFI-backed BDSM drama Pillion wins Best British Independent Film
Harry Lighton’s BDSM drama Pillion was given the top prize at this year’s British Independent Film Awards. Winning Best British Independent Film, the film – which stars Harry Melling and Alexander Skarsgård and was funded by the BFI National Lottery Filmmaking Fund, also won Best Debut Screenwriter for Lighton and two craft categories: Best Costume Design and Best Makeup and Hair Design.
Via bfi.org.uk (x)
Also via empire.online.com (x)
Pillion Dominates British Independent Film Awards 2025
No sooner does one awards season end than the next serving of celebrations (and commiserations) arrives. And this evening at London's Roundhouse Theatre, one year on from Kneecap's riotous night at the 2024 British Independent Film Awards, the 2025 BIFAs was, well, dominated by Harry Lighton's Pillion. The BDSM biker dom-com, in which Harry Melling and Alexander Skarsgård star as a mild-mannered submissive and his inscrutable leather-clad dominant, scooped four awards on the night, including Best British Independent Film and Best Debut Screenwriter for Lighton.
And
via hollywoodreporter.com (x)
‘Pillion’ Dominates BIFA Awards, ‘Sentimental Value’ Wins Best International Film
Harry Lighton’s sub/dom romance and ‘Warfare’ win four each, Myrid Carten’s doc ‘A Want in Her’ three, Akinola Davies Jr. is named best director for 'My Father's Shadow,' while the top acting honor goes to ‘I Swear’ star Robert Aramayo.
Excerpts:
"Writer-director Harry Lighton's feature debut Pillion, a sub/dom romance starring Alexander Skarsgård as a leather-clad biker and Harry Melling as a suburban Londoner who starts a relationship with him and becomes his submissive, won four British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) statuettes, including two for best independent British film and best debut screenwriter in London on Sunday. Celia Imrie presented the best film award at the end of an evening full of love and appreciation for indie film.
Including the recently unveiled BIFA craft awards, Pillion ended up with a total of four BIFA wins, the same number as Ray Mendoza and Alex Garland’s Navy SEALs platoon movie Warfare earned in the previously unveiled craft and ensemble cast categories."
[And] "During his acceptance speech, Lighton recalled being nominated for a BIFA with a short film in 2017. “I didn’t win, and I got incredibly drunk and spent the rest of the evening kind of burning industry bridges. I’m going to start by saying thank you to BIFA for not blacklisting me,” he quipped.
He thanked a range of collaborators, including the film’s stars, “Harry and Alex. What a hot couple!” Concluded Lighton: “I remember it kind of blew my mind that I sent both of you a script about butt plugs, and you both said yes.”
It's Flanagan's new Stephen King adaptation. Empire has more details.
In addition to his own original work on screens big and small, Mike Flanagan has proved himself adept at adapting Stephen King stories, including Gerald's Game and Doctor Sleep. He's back on the King beat, planning to bring The Life Of Chuck to screens with Mark Hamill and Tom Hiddleston starring.
Chuck, which Flanagan wrote and will direct, is drawn from the short story which appeared in King's 2020 collection, If It Bleeds (which also gave us John Lee Hancock's Mr Harrigan's Phone last year).
It's three separate stories linked to tell the biography of Charles Krantz in reverse, beginning with his death from a brain tumour at 39 and ending with his childhood in a supposedly haunted house. While there are supernatural elements (and some apocalyptic imagery), it's less focused on fear than some of King's other stories, tonally closer to The Shawshank Redemption or Stand By Me. Hiddleston is set as Chuck, while Hamill will play the character of Albie.
It'll be the genre icon's second collaboration with Flanagan after the upcoming The Fall Of The House Of Usher for Netflix.
