Sharp Shorts Year 1
Running Time: 16mins
Year: 2021
Synopsis: Folding traces the unlikely friendship between Li, a vulnerable Taiwanese woman, and Errol, an elderly black widower. A fleeting and tender story about what unites us and the universal power of compassion and trust even in the most desperate situations.
FILM CREW:
Director: Paul Sng
Producer: Johanna Blair
Screenwriter: Maisie Chan
DOP: David Lee
Editor: Christopher Chow
Sound Design: Emma Butt
Composer: Sarah Playford
Costume Design: Siam Colvine
Hair & Makeup: Jak Morgan
VFX: Envy
Casting: Claire Catterall
Cast: Joseph Marcell, Shin-Fei Chen, Paul Donnelly, Andrew John Tait
Photo credit: Chris McCluskie
Paul is a bi-racial British Chinese filmmaker based in Edinburgh, Scotland whose work focuses on people who challenge the status quo. His work has been broadcast on UK national television and screened internationally, and his feature film credits include Dispossession, Year of The Dog and Poly Styrene: I Am A Cliche (Winner of BIFA 2021 Best Documentary and Raindance Discovery Award, nominated for several Best Documentary awards including BAFTA and Grierson). Sng has recently started to transition to drama and directed his first short film, Folding, funded by BFI Network and Screen Scotland. Underpinning all Sng’s work is an eye for strong characters and compelling narratives, all the while working to establish and maintain trustful relationships with people in front of and behind the camera. Paul’s second dramatic short Aska is in post, starring Kate Dickie.
Maisie Chan is a multi-award-winning children’s author, best known for her debut novel Danny Chung Does Not Do Maths, which was also shortlisted for the Blue Peter Book Awards 2022 and the Diverse Book Award 2022. Her latest novel is Keep Dancing, Lizzie Chu. She runs Bubble Tea Writers Network which was set up to support and encourage writers of East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) descent in the U.K.
She won the BBC Writersroom competition BBC Bites in 2008 for Lychees and Bingoballs and was shortlisted for Digishorts with B3 Media and Screen West Midlands for her short Aston Manna. More recently, she completed Write4Film with Scottish Film Talent Network in 2020, was also a BEATS Screenwriting fellow that same year, her mentor was Emma Reeves. Maisie completed the Write for Animation Screenskills course with Myles Mcleod which led to her training with Magic Light Pictures to write on Pip and Posy, of which she wrote an episode for season two. Folding (BFI/Screen Scotland)is her first short to be produced. She is currently working on an idea for a TV drama. She lives in Glasgow.