The climax of this year's Yarns filmmaking competition took place at Curzon Soho on November 13th, with the screening of the three winning short films, all based on the open-ended brief: Disinfo.

The three shorts - Clankers, Don’t Believe A Word I Say, and Angling For Love - each tackled the competition's subject in very different ways. At the Curzon Soho screening, the films were followed by a discussion involving all the filmmakers, in an insightful Q&A conducted by double act Craig Bingham and Ozzie Pullin of Now Then Talks, with a deeper dive into the directors’ visions and experiences throughout the process. 

This year's directors were also awarded the coveted Yarns moth, presented by the competition organisers Sarah Adewunmi and Alex Lennox-Warburton of Stitch Editing. Each of the films had been edited by editors at Homespun - Stitch's division for rising editing talent. 

Naomi Pallas’ hybrid documentary Clankers was praised for blurring the lines between fantasy and reality, comedy and existential terror in her exploration of the dark world of AI influencers. A welcome challenge for editor Laura Zvaríková to piece together entirely from screen recorded footage, and snippets of Zoom conversations.

"It was my first time making a desktop documentary so it was a steep learning curve full of highs and lows but the best thing about Yarns was the incredible support from beginning to end," says Pallas. "Everyone at Yarns, and all of the partners were so enthusiastic and helpful. And of course my editor Laura was the best! We captured hours and hours of footage of me building the model so it was a case of distilling it to a compelling narrative in 5 minutes."

Ciara O’Rourke’s gripping exploration of working class masculinity in Don’t Believe A Word I Say struck a cord with the audience. Along with her producer Jack Clarke, she took the Yarns funding home to Doncaster with a crew of local talent, to fulfil her passion for creating more filmmaking opportunities in the North. The film balances humour with its harder hitting underlying message through the work of first time Yarns editor Ruoyu Ou.

"The whole thing was scary and new in the best way," commented O'Rourke and Clarke. "Filming in Donny came with its own challenges: lack of facilities, lack of belief that film can even happen here but sticking to it was important. What we learned, what we pulled off, and the support we had from Yarns made it all worth it.

"A huge thanks to our editor Ruoyu and our sound designer Michele Covio, who both pushed themselves right alongside us, and the lovely bunch at Freefolk for believing in the film as much as we did."

Tom Tennant’s Angling For Love offered spades of laughs while poking fun at the surreal side of online dating, a hilarious script elevated by the comedic timing of Yarns regular Luke Anderson. A brilliant display of the creativity that is born from working within budget restraints, guests could be seen donning props from the film in the bar after the screening.

"Angling For Love wouldn’t have even existed as an idea, let alone got made, had it not been for Yarns," says Tennant. "So I’m very grateful to the whole team at Homespun and Stitch (and the Yarns partners) for all their support; I’ve loved the entire process."

Praise was also given to the post partners Sine Audio Post, Absolute, Freefolk and 1920vfx for the outstanding sound design, VFX and colour grading on display on the big screen, as well as competition sponsors Kodak, APA and Kinsale Sharks for generously supporting the next generation of filmmakers. 

"After a year’s hiatus we were keen to bring Yarns back with a bang," says Stitch co-owner Tim Hardy. "Seeing how each filmmaker has developed since the beginning of the process and how strong and varied the final films turned out was a real reminder of why we run the competition. We can’t wait to see where they’ll go next!"

And neither can the directors, who all have their eyes set on the next big project. Naomi Pallas is working on another documentary about ransomware negotiators, and has written her first fiction script. She’s looking for commercial representation.

Ciara O'Rourke and Jack Clarke are developing a new project, EDM, a short that taps back into her horror roots, as well as a documentary project with the Working Class Movement Library in Salford. Clarke is also joining the board of the SVTT in Salford. They’re unwavering in their long term goal of democratising the filmmaking process and pushing northern voices. 

Tom has just finished up at DOC NYC with another short film, Other Life, and has got a few short documentaries in development, primarily one titled The New Bromantics, which explores intimacy in modern male friendships.

• Watch the winning three films in Yarns: Disinfo here.