Experience the delights of the English countryside.

During the apple harvest season, a small Sussex village by the name of Ambleton is rocked by a government proposal for a nearby motorway, a concept rejected by the popular mayor (Coronation Street's Brian Capron), but embraced by a talented restaurateur and chef John Miller (Jos Lawton -Best Actor winner, International Filmmaker Festival), who is battling his own past as well as the historical village’s concept of change. It ultimately leads to inspiration and devastation, as seen through the eyes of a young, restaurant pianist and would-be filmmaker (Michael Dyllan).

Resonating with themes of discrimination, youth unemployment and small town politics, this is a human drama feature film based on a true story and written for the screen by Japanese writer Itsuka Yamasaki.

Discrimination. Drug abuse. Mid-life crisis. Racism. Youth unemployment. Suicide. Small town mindedness. Young filmmakers finding their voice.

For such a low-budget film (we had an original budget of ˆ5000, the final budget just on ˆ6000) this film has a large political arc and tackles some epic and yet important themes. Nonetheless this is a true story, set at a personal community level, and is ultimately a tragedy, a seemingly innocent community discriminating against a man and his fresh ideas based purely on his troubled past. It is my belief that this widely overlooked and yet probably most common form of discrimination has rarely been touched on in cinema.

The title, "Ambleton Delight", refers to an apple pie dessert created by the restaurateur and main character John Miller, and is a strong symbol in the film: the dessert itself replaces a more simple traditional recipe, representing John’s introduction of fresh and new ideas; the complex layers of pastry represent John’s more complicated back story, which the locals do not understand or accept. Later, John gives Chris (the pianist) the pie in a tin, symbolizing the passing on of a legacy.

As a structure, the main story - the fall of one man and his business- is inter-spliced with eight intense flashback sequences and four politically charged village council meetings. This leads to an interesting and insightful juxtaposition between peaceful village life and John’s violent background. We portrayed village life in lush color, and made use of the 35mm lenses to provide a shallow depth of field and cinematic feel to it. In contrast, the flashbacks were shot handheld, almost guerrilla style, and are all in black and white, shot completely from John’s point-of-view, thus the camera is constantly interacting with the action.

This story as a whole is seen through the eyes of a restaurant pianist, a young man who actually dreams of being a filmmaker, but is lacking the inspiration to make those dreams a reality. As a production team, this aspect of the story really intrigued and motivated us, as his story is something most of us can relate to. Gen Takahashi, a respected Japanese director, once offered me a piece of important advice: only shoot from your own point-of-view. This is what we have tried to do as far as possible –thus the film covers themes that are very personal to us. And hopefully this in turn inspires other filmmakers to think about their situation and see if there is an important story they have to tell.