Murder One are delighted to announce that the feature film ‘The Goodbye Girl’ (trailer at bottom of this page) has just won it’s 30th laurel, and another award – this time from the North Europe International Film Festival: London Edition 2019 – part of the Fusion International Film Festival. With a week of screenings the festival culminated in a Red Carpet Awards Ceremony at The Crowne Plaza, London Docklands, Aidey Pugh’s ‘The Goodbye Girl’ picked up an award for Best Editing. Pics from the festival can be viewed here. This follows on from the film being officially selected into the Mediterranean Film Festival Cannes which highlighted a selection of the best films from around the world at Hotel Barriere Le Gray d Albion of Cannes. Trailers for The Goodbye Girl can be viewed below…
The Goodbye Girl has also recently won ‘Best Feature Film’ and ‘Best Male Director’ (Aidey Pugh) at the Out Of The Can Film Festival in Derby! Helen Tunnicliff was also Runner Up for her portrayal of ‘Jacqui’ in the film and in addition Rik Garrad was a finalist for his performance as Gabriel, with Aidey Pugh a finalist for Best Producer. We were all delighted and honoured to win those categories and to be included amongst other amazing talent at this International Film Festival which had over 2000 entries from over 35 countries.
‘The Goodbye Girl’ is the first feature film by Murder One director Aidey Pugh. It is the follow up to his short ‘Empty Spaces’, the latter being screened at film festivals in the USA, including as a finalist in a Miami Film Festival in March 2018. It was two and a half years in the making and – with no crowd-funding or handouts – was made for a budget of just £900, which went on film kit for the crew, and sweets for the kids in the film!
In addition to the above awards the film has now won Best First Feature Film By The Director (Aidey Pugh), Best Director in a Feature Film (Aidey Pugh), Best Young Actress in a Feature Film (Millie-Grace Guy), Best Editing in a Feature Film (Aidey Pugh), Best Production Design in a Feature Film (Isobel Bailey, Aidey Pugh and Izzy Walker). As well as being officially selected in other festivals, The Goodbye Girl has also been semi-finalist in the Eurasia International Monthly Film Festival and winner as Best Feature Film in the UK Monthly Film Festival.
The hard-working, dedicated cast and crew kindly gave their time, skills and expertise for free and meticulous production values ensured that it’s low budget in no way detracts from the impact of this film. The English identity of the film is spiced with a hint of the cosmopolitan in that musicians and bands from Switzerland, Berlin, Miami, Orange County, Los Angeles, Cape Coral, San Diego and also Tel Aviv all generously allowed their music to be used, lending an international flavour to a film set in an unashamedly gritty town in the North of England. Inspired by the works of writer Jimmy McGovern (‘Cracker’; ‘The Street’) both ‘Empty Spaces’ and ‘The Goodbye Girl’ are gritty dramas revolving around the grim and tragic lives of Aidey’s characters who inhabit the typical terraced/back to back housing in this non-specified Northern town. With a nod to Jimmy McGovern’s ‘The Street’ there are several cross over characters in Aidey’s two films as their lives are explored.
The tagline of “The Goodbye Girl” offers a clue to the sinister nature of the film’s central character: “Pray she doesn’t tell you Goodbye” – as well as to the chillingly convincing performance of young Mille-Grace Guy, the eponymous six-year old Goodbye Girl herself, who amazed all involved in the production with her presence on camera and her ability to carry off such a demanding role with actors Rik Garrad (‘The Syndicate’, ‘In The Flesh’, ‘Hollyoakes’, ‘Coronation Street’) and Helen Tunnicliff (‘Home Grown’, ‘Bait’) receiving critical acclaim as her feuding parents.
In the film Lydia – a somewhat neglected, mysterious and troubled six year old girl – seems to predict (or cause?) a series of deaths in her prayers… Is it just coincidence… or is something more sinister at work… And as the body count rises how will a family member react when they hear the little girl forecast their own death?… Just pray she doesn’t tell you goodbye!
The film premiered to cast and crew on 25-03-18 and is now going from strength to strength worldwide, having been officially selected for Film Festivals in Rome, Moscow and the UK as well as semi-finalist and category winner in UK film festivals.
The Goodbye Girl also recently won ‘Best Feature Film made for under $5000 at the Monkey Bread Tree Film Awards. The festival director said of the film:
“The most impressive factor of The Goodbye Girl is really the sheer size of its cast and locale mounting. For a film produced on such a tight budget its hard to imagine such a realistic looking, as well as large scale, depicting almost an entire world with which the film takes place within.
Though the plot, and often some of the characters, leave a nasty taste in the viewers mouth, and there is of course the odd runtime – 53 minutes, which seems not much like a feature film at times… one can’t help but consider these flaws little, as in a certain context this film would have made for a great TV special, such as Ken Loach’s earlier work, in particular his contributions to The Wednesday Play – such as ‘Cathy Come Home’. However, I should add – The Goodbye Girl isn’t a socialist film really, as it slips in and out of its tonal moments, making it more of an entertaining film than say a sophisticated political one which aims to rouse a parliamentary debate.
All in all a well armed film, one which definitely highlights its teams abilities, and one which will pave the way to more lengthy and satisfying future works.”
And indeed some of the (surviving!) cast will return in Aidey Pugh’s next feature film – ‘Flower Boy‘ – currently in production…
Many production stills can be found in various galleries here.
Looks fab Mr Pugh! Xxx
thank you so much Miss Cross! A year of my life has gone into making it!.. Just the edit now! 😉 .. xx
Looking good, and that music is just so atmospheric (that’s posh for creepy!). I can’t wait to see the film…
Looks very enthralling, on the edge of your seat ! Good work all
Looks great, would have liked a bit more of a story direction on the trailer, didn’t really give anything away about the storyline, looking forward to seeing it though.
Hi Ewan… that’s kind of deliberate as it’s a personal irritation of mine when the plot is given away too much in trailers and you kinda feel like you’ve watched the film by watching the trailer!.. So it’s a personal and deliberate choice to show a montage of snippets from the film as a teaser 😉 Thanks for watching tho and it’ll be released on here once fully edited.. Running time will be approx 55 minutes.. short drama about a six year old girl who’s father suspects she is predicting – or maybe somehow causing – the death of family members and others…
Hard work, colourful characters and great people…..all put into a bowl. The result…..The Goodbye Girl.
Gourmet movie.
Very good work, beautiful.
Looking great, can’t wait to see the film! Well done!!!!
Is my trainspotting speech still in the film?
You’ll have to wait and see sirrah! 😉
Absolutely superb!.. I’m hooked and wanna see more already! when is it released?!?! Love the look of these characters. looks like it’ll be another amazing film from you 🙂
Looks great! Well done to everyone involved, looking forward to seeing the full length film
Aww thank you so much for your kind words Chloe… Glad you like it. Full length film will hopefully be released within the next month! 🙂 Watch this space x
looks amazing wow amazing trailer
Looks right up my street that!! Well done Aidy x
Think this might be your best yet. Very gritty and disturbing. Congratulations to all involved x
Looks brilliant and was a pleasure to be a part of! Can’t wait to watch the full thing soon! x
Excellent trailer, obvious that s lot of TLC went into the making of this, congratulations and best wishes for a very successful run.
Frank Ryan
thanks folks! Yep two years of tender loving care and the work of over 150 Yorkshire creatives to bring it from script to screen! 🙂 Thanks for your kind words. Hopefully to be released End of Aug, early Sept 🙂
Brilliant , look forward to seeing it. 🙂
Knowing of the personal dedication and the many disappointments that have been overcome in the making of this film it deserves all the success it’s due. Many of the cast are friends of mine and I give you my heartfelt congratulations on such great work. Aidey has given so much of his heart and soul in making this. Heartache and personal grief have been overcome at great cost and this film proves that dedication and determination will always win no matter who or what tries to stop you. Well done.
Many thanks Alan… much appreciated. Yep it’s been a hard slog and many obstacles to overcome.. but it’ll be worth it!
Looks great!
Both trailers have built my anticipation and can’t wait to see it. Looks like it should be on TV.
thanks Blake… You’ll love it! Watch this space 🙂
Well those two trailers gave me goosebumps. It’s looking very slick after all your patient and painful editing, and I’m so looking forward to seeing it! (even if I’m a big wuss at scary films…)
Looking forward to seeing the film when it’s finished. Disturbing but intriguing. I am sure that it will be very successful. As another post said “it should be on TV.” Good luck!
Thank you very much Kate! It’s nearly all edited now, and then it’ll be released! Watch this space! 🙂
Looks like a great story
Thanks Julie! We like to think so! It’s released at a cinema on 25th March 2018 then will be posted on this site and submitted to film festivals worldwide.
Can’t wait to see this.been waiting so long.nice job everyone.the trailer has us
gripped already.x
This is what BAFTA’s are made of!! An excellent film of today!! On the edge of my seat throughout with a twist in the tale at the very end!! Can’t wait to see the sequel!! An excellent story performed by an excellent cast!! Well done Aidey!!
Thank you so much Jean! So glad you like it… three years of my life went into that film! 🙂 x
Congratulations to everyone involved. Would love to see the finished film. Well done Aidey
My wife and I would like to commend Aidey and the whole crew and cast for such a great movie. We were attending the ‘Out Of The Can’ film festival in Derby last year to see our son, Neal Ward as Captain Penny in another award-winner ‘The Code’. However, we were also completely enamoured with ‘The Goodbye Girl’. Everything about it oozes quality and the plot is superbly gripping. We look forward to viewing other work by Aidey but in the meantime, can you tell us where we can see or get a copy of the movie please?
Hi there! Many thanks for your kind words, and congratulations to your fantastic actor-son and ‘The Code’ which my family and I enjoyed down in Derby last year. How did you find me by the way? Thank you for tracking me down – glad you did! As the film is still doing the rounds at film festivals (it’s in London Docklands next month) I’m not allowed to display it publicly anywhere, but I’ll email you shortly…
Kind regards and thanks again for your praise,
Aidey
Director/Producer – ‘The Goodbye Girl’