Filmmaker Statement

BabyThump is a dark satire about the arrival of a baby on a bewildered and emotionally detached couple. The film reflects my own feelings around repression and emotional growth; being in touch with emotions is important to me and I wanted to explore how a deeply repressed couple might cope with the most important arrival that can occur in any couple’s lives…the arrival of a baby. The question I set when writing was this, “If I develop characters who are extremely out of touch with their emotions…what will they do? Where will the story go? How will their lack of emotion drive the story forward?” I hope that audiences will feel the repression and detachment of the two main characters and that, as a consequence of how they are, their actions will have an inevitability about them; an inevitability that carries an emotional price. Whilst the subject matter is dark and potentially provocative, the film’s setting, design and play suggests a fever dream that is not meant to be read literally.