A second year student on HND Film Making at Kidderminster College has just won a prestigious national award in film production from the BBC.
David Poole, aged 20, from Bournville, is the proud recipient of a bursary worth £3000 to work with the head of comedy at BBC television.

“Competition for the award was pretty fierce,” said David. “As I was up against serious professionals from all across the country, but the evidence is there that the BBC think I’m up for it.”

David’s winning entry, called ‘Sensitivity’ was screened on BB2 Friday 28th November – the public can still however view on BBC i-player. The inspiration for it came during David’s scriptwriting module when he was tasked with writing a script that contained just twenty five words of dialogue or less.

David explained ‘I thought basically we were being asked for a silent film, so I decided to do a silent comedy which told the story through sounds. The idea itself came from the fact that I get easily irritated if people make a noise when I am trying to watch a film, a television programme or reading a book or magazine. The advice you are given as screenwriters is write about what you know, so I thought that it might be interesting if I took this aspect of my personality and used it as the basis of my five minute film.’

And this has certainly paid off for David will now be mentored by the head of Comedy at the BBC and his new project will be featured as part of a BBC2 programme scheduled to be broadcast next year.
“This is great news for David,” said Dr. Roger Cottrell, HND Film Making Course Leader at Kidderminster College. “But it’s also great news for the College and what we are trying to achieve in film. Without doubt, David is a creative student. We have a lot of strong students, whether as budding writers, directors, film critics, academics or practitioners of professional film craft.

“What we’re committed to at Kidderminster is giving our students a solid theoretical grounding, as well as the practical experience to secure them the qualification that they need. But we’re also committed, whether in house (through Green Fuse films) or through prestigious institutions like the BBC, is securing for our students the production credits they need to flourish in a tough industry in harsh economic times. This is what David’s triumph is about and this is what we’re about. Expect to hear more of the same from us in the future.”