Duncan Cowles

Using his failed attempts at creating profitable stock footage, a filmmaker reflects on the absurd, mundane and funny side of being trapped inside your own head as an out of work, self-employed freelancer.

Unable to move on from the death of his granny, a filmmaker desperately searches for the right film idea that will finally allow him to let go…

What stops a father and son from being able to talk? As far back as I can remember, my dad and I haven't been able to communicate to each other very well. I know hardly anything about him, except that he likes jazz music and fiddling with old radios in the garage. In an attempt to find out why my dad and I don't talk, I look at the life of a man I know absolutely nothing about - My dad's father.

Everyone knows Neil Armstrong came back from the Moon in 1969 – but it wasn’t until three years later, when the people of a tiny Scottish town stepped in, that he finally got home. Neil Armstrong and the Langholmites is a film about the day one of the world’s most famous men visited the small ‘burgh’ of Langholm and the profound emotional effect the place, and its people, had on the normally stoic astronaut. From Industria Studios and Duncan Cowles, director of acclaimed 2024 feature Silent Men, comes a wry and beautiful slice of Scottish life and a unique, lesser-known tale about one of America’s most famous sons.

What's it like to feel no emotion?

Gavin built a giant volcano sculpture that's now in his dad's shed. Gavin seeks his dad's understanding but he's uninterested in modern art and refuses to participate in the documentary.

Fatigue expressed in an endless sea of content.

This film aims to capture the stories of the aging Isabella, but also captures her condition and loss of cohesiveness as she loses herself into dementia and Parkinson's. It is also a very personal film since the subject is the grandmother of one of the co- directors. The idea is interesting as it links one strong clear memory, told several times, to other fragments and truths of her condition. Animation is sparingly but cleverly used to complement the delivery and avoid it just being a talking head.

Part road trip, part coming-of-middle-age tale, Cowles’ laconic humour and frank approach to his subject proves effective in exploring aspects of masculinity that all too often are little discussed.

Through distant observation of people walking on desire lines, a filmmaker notices a pattern in peoples tendency to cut corners, and reflects on what this might mean for the future of our planet. Desire Lines are the official name given to the unofficial paths created as a consequence of erosion by human or animal footfall. These paths usually represent the shortest or most easily navigated route between an origin and destination. What do desire lines say about human nature and our attitude towards the changing climate? Are we doomed to always take the path of least resistance? Or can we still be saved by collectively forging a new path together?

That's Your Lot - A very short film about nothing by Duncan Cowles made in an afternoon in late 2023 (largely with the purpose of testing a new camera.)

The pressures of having to make an amazing film for TED sent this deadpan, deep-voiced, award-winning filmmaker into a crippling spiral of self-doubt and comic indecision.

Living at home when you're twenty-one has it's downsides...

A short character portrait of Stuart Murray, a Glaswegian Postman and Artist

Prompted by the death of his grandfather, a filmmaker comes to terms with his feelings of loss by focussing on something smaller.

Contrasting artistic visions, misplaced confidence and blatant ignorance collide on the backdrop of an increasingly fragile and divided world. Two stubborn Scottish filmmakers struggle to make a short film together in the Austrian Alps.