John Archer

In 1993, 16-year-old Brandon Lee enrolled at Bearsden Academy, a secondary school in a well-to-do suburb of Glasgow, Scotland. What followed over the next two years would become the stuff of legend.

Bedevilled by writer’s block, an unsupportive partner and a bad case of the heebie jeebies thanks to the neighbour from hell, a would-be children’s author seeks inspiration from an unlikely source.

In a quaint Scottish village in the Highlands, contenders from around the globe gather to compete for the title of World Porridge Champion armed only with oats, salt and water. As the ailing Porridge Chieftain's tenure ends, he embarks on a mission to find a successor. Amidst intense rivalries and the charm of eccentric locals, this documentary delves into the legacy of the village and unveils a captivating culinary spectacle.

Directed by Mark Cousins, My Name is Alfred Hitchcock re-examines the vast filmography and legacy of one of the 20th century’s greatest filmmakers, Alfred Hitchcock, through a new lens: through the auteur’s own voice.

Award winning director Lindsay Anderson subverts the mockumentary genre and presents to the audience a detailed and humored account of what truly means to be Lindsay Anderson.

A working-class photographer captures the impact of Thatcherism on the north of England but is unable to escape the poverty and inequality she exposed.

Portrait of Canadian singer, songwriter, poet and novelist Leonard Cohen, recorded in 1988. Featuring interviews, archive film and live performances from London, Paris, Athens and New York.

Siri wakes to find herself trapped inside a brutalist candy-coloured dreamhouse. Despite the cutesy decor, the place is far from benign, and she and her inmates are encouraged to compete for survival while being watched over by surveillance cameras, 24/7. Presiding over the group is an authoritarian diva who speaks entirely with the voice of Kenneth Clark from the 1960s BBC series Civilisation. As she forces the women to go head-to-head in a series of demeaning tasks, Siri, with the help of fellow inmate Alexa, starts subverting the rules and soon reveals the sinister truth that underpins their world.

Bogancloch is where Jake Williams lives, nestled in a vast highland forest of Scotland. The film portrays his life throughout the seasons, with other people occasionally crossing into his otherwise solitary life. At the heart a song, an argument between life and death, each stating their case to rule over the world. The film is without exposition, it aims at something less recognisable, a different existence of reality observed in discrete moments. A sequel to Two Years at Sea (2011), charting a subtly changing life in a radically changing world.

Alex Norton discovers how showbusiness has handled the portrayal of the Scottish accent. For over 100 years audiences have struggled to understand our braw brogue: silent Harry Lauder films attempted an accent in the captions, and in Hollywood's golden era , everyone wanted to paint their tonsils tartan- but as examples from Katharine Hepburn, Orson Welles and Richard Chamberlain show, they couldnae. Then Disney made Brave and proved that it disnae have to be all bad!

Tells the story of Beldina Odenyo, the Kenyan Scottish musician, singer and songwriter, who performed under the stage name, Heir of the Cursed as well as working across Scotland’s theatre and poetry communities. After her acclaimed performance at the Scottish Album of the Year Awards in 2021, Bel took her own life. She left behind raw, intimate video diaries and a hard drive full of original songs of great beauty. This stirring film documents the journey her sister and friends took to release her work posthumously, creating a heartfelt, insightful portrait of a complex, intelligent and profoundly talented young woman.

For much of his career, Lucian Freud allowed his paintings to speak for themselves, but in 1988 he talked for the first time - to Omnibus - about his work and ambitions.

The final chapter of his exceptional 15-part documentary exploring the history of cinema, The Story of Film: An Odyssey. Mark Cousins builds a bridge between the “before” of the health crisis, and the “after”.

For the people of Berneray in the Outer Hebrides, life changed dramatically in the latter part of the last century. Traditional ways of life eroded, and many families were forced to move away. Drawing on rare 8mm colour film of Berneray, directors Andy MacKinnon and Kirsty MacDonald offer a bridge between the contemporary citizens and their not-so-distant past. The result is a film of great emotion that speaks to the importance of place and the resilience of culture through language, song and memories.

Using only archive film and a new musical score by the band Mogwai, Mark Cousins presents an impressionistic kaleidoscope of our nuclear times – protest marches, Cold War sabre-rattling, Chernobyl and Fukishima – but also the sublime beauty of the atomic world, and how x-rays and MRI scans have improved human lives. The nuclear age has been a nightmare, but dreamlike too.

Faye Bowers is the host of a low-rent paranormal activity show, a master of trickery and pretence, but she is desperate to be taken seriously as a journalist. When she learns that the show is to be axed, she is determined to go out with a bang.

Paris had Cartier-Bresson, New York - Diane Arbus and Glasgow - Oscar Marzaroli. Man with a Camera celebrates the life and work of Glasgow's pre-eminent photographer, using some of the 50,000 shots taken over thirty years - a moving portrait of a love affair between a man and his city, and the affection in which he is held today. Marzaroli's black-and-white photographs have become synonymous with a post-war Scotland in the throes of regeneration. They captured both the aspects of the old, such as the rag-and-bone man in the Gorbals or the cockle gatherers of Barra, and the paraphernalia of the new - cranes, towers and construction at Glasgow's Charing Cross. As Glasgow's landscape changes once again and the high-rises that Marzaroli documented going up are gradually being razed to the ground, this film celebrates Marzaroli's remarkable photographic legacy.

Thirty years after his BBC film The Auden Landscape, director Adam Low returns to the poet and his work. Following surges of popularity - from featuring in Four Weddings And A Funeral to being the poet New Yorkers turned to after 9/11 - Low reveals how Auden’s poetry helps us to better understand the 21st century and the tumultuous political climate in which we now live.

Belfast, it's a city that is changing, changing because the people are leaving? But one came back, a 10,000 year old woman who claims that she is the city itself.

About small vexations in private life. You think you're the only one, but you're not.

As told through clips from 183 female directors, this epic history of the cinema focuses on women's integral role in the development of film art. Using almost a thousand film extracts from thirteen decades and five continents, Mark Cousins asks how films are made, shot and edited; how stories are shaped and how movies depict life, love, politics, humour and death, all through the compelling lens of some of the world's greatest filmmakers -- all of them women.

A worldwide guided tour of the greatest movies ever made and the story of international cinema through the history of cinematic innovation.