Hollywood film director Kevin MacDonald awards budding film-makers for their short anti-smoking film
29/07/2010 15:37:01
National anti-smoking charity, The Deborah Hutton Campaign, is commending a series of young film makers and their schools for their innovative short films created as part of the groundbreaking new Cut Films competition, to help discourage their peers from taking up smoking.
As National ‘No Smoking Day’ (Wednesday 10th March) brings the health risks of smoking into public focus again, The Deborah Hutton Campaign, is celebrating the tremendous success of its Cut Films project.
Piloted in nine schools and one Youth Club between September and November 2009, the project challenged young people to research, write and produce a short film about the dangers of smoking, and then to publish them for other young people to view on You Tube and Facebook via the Cut Films website: www.cutfilms.org.
The winning films were premiered as part of a special Awards Ceremony on Thursday 18th March to an invited audience of the charity’s key supporters and stakeholders, during which each of the young film makers and their schools will receive an award for their film presented by leading Film Director, Kevin MacDonald (who was behind State of Play, My Enemy’s Enemy, The Last King of Scotland, and Touching the Void).
Charlie Stebbings, leading film director and Founding Trustee of the Deborah Hutton Campaign says;
“The number of people who smoke has come down significantly, but there are still too many teenagers starting smoking and getting addicted. I want to give young people a voice to explore and convey the messages that they think will stop other young people from smoking.”
In England today, there are over 2 million fewer adult smokers than there were a decade ago, yet this year alone, it is estimated that around 250,000 more people in England will start smoking. The majority of these will be under the age of 18.
The launch of Cut Film coincides with the Department of Health’s brand new Tobacco Control Strategy (published 1st February) which highlights the need ‘to stop the inflow of young people recruited as smokers’ as the first of its three key objectives, including a specific focus on reducing the smoking rate among 11–15-year-olds to 1% or less, and the rate among 16–17-year-olds to 8% by 2020.
Cut Films closely supports this Government ambition, providing an extremely timely, creative and cost-effective initiative which empowers young people to choose a smokefree future, and to encourage their peers to do the same.
An evaluation of the pilot phase of Cut Films has just been published, based upon research with teachers and students from participating schools, highlighting a number of positive outcomes.
Young people who took part in Cut Films felt that the approach created a strong environment for them to find their own voice on the issue of smoking, and to get the message out to their peers about the consequences of smoking in a creative, relevant and impactful way.
Some young participants who were reportedly non smokers also suggested that the film making process did help persuade them not to take up smoking.
Teachers involved in Cut Films reported that it provided them with a flexible, effective and user-friendly teaching resource for educating students on the issue of smoking, and without lecturing them, closely supporting their PSHE delivery.
In addition, many teachers found that the project improved the self esteem and self-confidence of participants and promoted a high level of engagement from disaffected students.
Lucinda Shaw, Director of The Deborah Hutton Campaign adds; “We’re delighted by the quality, diversity and creativity of the films that have been produced as part of Cut Films and most of all, by the energy, enthusiasm and dedication with which all of the young people have taken part in the campaign and embraced its messages.”
“Building on the learning and results from this successful pilot, we are now working towards rolling out Cut Films as an annual competition for all schools from Autumn 2010, with the aim of inspiring many more young people to communicate with their peers on this important message about not smoking.”