By Gabriella Adaway, Third Year, Theatre and Performance Studies
In a run of special festive screenings, Watershed is hosting a preview of Geoff Barrow's debut feature film, GAME (2025), before its official theatrical release on the 21st of November. What simply started as a conversation between the film’s producer/writer and one half of the leading men, developed into Marc Bessant and Jason Williamson’s taking on their first leading roles.
Set in the summer of 1993, an aging raver is stranded deep in the woods after a near-death car crash with nothing but stolen money and drugs. This thriller stars Bessant as David, exploring the hinge between surviving the wilderness and its unknown predators. Williamson, a mysterious poacher, becomes a watchful and unhinged presence that provides no comfort to David nor the audience. The film is self-described as watching a man ‘injured and helpless’ as he ‘hangs between life and death’.
A film coated in darkness from its storytelling to its cinematography, INVADA films, invites the audience into a sense of discomfort and unease effectively painted through the trailer that simply introduces the film through song, flashing elements of scenery and creepy imagery.
Co-Written and co-produced by English music producer and composer, Geoff Barrow has ventured into the world of filmmaking. As an influential figure in Bristol’s underground music scene having been a member of bands such as Portishead and Beak, it’s not hard to see where part of the influence of David’s character came from. Now’s he’s taking is record label, Invada, down a new venture, launching a strand of INVADA based in Bristol. Barrow's is running film producing alongside his long interest in composing film scores. After his successful collaboration with Ben Salisbury on the soundtrack for Civil War (2024), it is a relief that this artistic venture has not been halted by interest in Invada.
GAME’S director is John Minton, a Bristol based filmmaker not unknown to Barrow. Minton is known for his experimental and lo-fi style filmmaking, described as hallucinatory and iridescent, a style mirrored in the trailer for GAME. Having previously worked on music videos and live visuals with Portishead, Noel Gallagher and Simple Minds to name a few, Minton is not unknown to the world of cinema, having also been the editor of the 2008 BAFTA winning short film, September, also released by INVADA.
However, this is his first venture as director. Alongside Minton is the films screenplay writer Rob Williams, who is currently developing his own comic series, UNFOLLOW, with Margot Robbies’ Lucky Chap (Barbie, Saltburn) and HBO having previously written for DC and Marvel Comics and various British TV shows.
Bristol’s’ own Watershed is set to host the film’s (now sold-out) early screening and Q&A with part of the film’s creative team including Barrow, Minton and actors Williamson and Bessant, with Epigram in line to review. This film is entangled with rising talent and Bristol born and based creatives.
Featured Image: Invada Records
To find out more about the GAME screening and access tickets for more screenings: https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/13612/game-qa
