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Morgan Matthews

Director

Morgan Matthews founded Minnow Films to develop and produce intelligent films of the highest quality. In addition to directing the documentaries below, Morgan has also Executive Produced all Minnow Films’ other titles.

 

Credits

FEATURE FILM
Production (role):
THE RAILWAY CHILDREN RETURN
Company:
StudioCanal
Project details:
Writer Daniel Brocklehurst
Production (role):
GYPSY BOY
Company:
BBC Films
Project details:
Adaptation from the autobiography by Mikey Walsh.

Writer James Graham
Production (role):
MONSTERS
Company:
Shine Films/Minnow/Film 4
Project details:
Director/Producer. Feature Film in development

Writer James Woods
Production (role):
X+Y
Company:
Minnow Films / Origin Pictures / BBC Films / BFI
Project details:
Director/Producer

Story based on 2007 BAFTA nominated documentary Beautiful Young Minds

Wr. James Graham

Starring Rafe Spall, Sally Hawkins and Asa Butterfield

Nominated: Douglas Hickox Best Debut Director BIFA Awards 2014

Nominated: Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress BIFA Awards 2014

Official Selection Special Presentation Toronto International Film Festival 2014

Official Selection Busan International Film Festival 2014

Official Selection Dinard Film Festival 2014

Official Selection London Film Festival 2014

Official Selection Rome Film Festival 2014, Winner Alice nella città strand the prize

Official Selection Black Nights Film festival 2014, Winner Just Film Grand Prix prize

Official Selection International Young Audience Film Festival Ale Kino, Winner Children’s Jury prize
DOCUMENTARY
Production (role):
GRENFELL
Company:
Minnow Films/BBC One
Project details:
Nominated RTS Award Best Single Documentary 2019
Nominated Broadcast Awards Best Documentary 2019
Production (role):
WILLIAMS
Company:
Minnow Films/BBC/Artificial Eye
Project details:
Documentary about the Williams F1 Team

Nominated BIFA Award Best Documentary 2017

Nominated National Film Awards Best Documentary 2018
Production (role):
SHOOTING BIGFOOT (Director / Producer)
Company:
Minnow Films / BBC Storyville / BFI
Project details:
90’ film

A fascinating and touching portrait of men who are obsessed with monsters and their adventures to find them

Premiered at Edinburgh Film Festival 2013
Production (role):
BRITAIN IN A DAY (Director / Producer)
Company:
Minnow Films / Scott Free Productions / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 90'

Tx Jun 2012

On Saturday 12th November 2011 an eclectic range of British people turned the camera on themselves, capturing the entertaining and mundane, the exciting and unusual, the poignant and the everyday. The result, Britain in a Day tells the fascinating story of the British public in their own words. Following on from the feature film Life in a Day, this film offers an extraordinarily candid look at 21st century life across the UK, crafted from over 750 hours of footage.

“the warp and weft of different lives were woven together to make something really wonderful. The craft and joy of this film was in the criss-crossing of singular and common experience” – The Guardian

Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival 2012
Production (role):
SCENES FROM A TEENAGE KILLING (Director / Producer)
Company:
Minnow Films / BBC 4
Project details:
1 x 120'

Tx 2011 with transmissions on BBC 3 & BBC 2

This film explores the impact of teenage killings on families and communities across Britain. It is a powerful and emotional journey that chronicles every teenager who died as a result of violence in 2009 across the UK

Nominated: BAFTA Best Single Documentary

Winner: Sheffield Documentary Festival Audience Award

“…once in a while, along comes a film that is so powerful and haunting that it seems to stop the world as you watch, leaving you struggling to enter the reality of unfolding life… such was the force of Scenes from a Teenage Killing. [Matthews] trained his camera with unjudgemental humanity and warmth. The result was thoroughly chilling.” - The Observer

“In many ways Morgan Matthews’s film is remarkable. Brave, intimate and instructive” - The Daily Telegraph
Production (role):
THE FALLEN (Director / Producer)
Company:
Minnow Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 180'

Tx Nov 2008

Broadcast shortly after Remembrance Day 2008, The Fallen is a powerful and poignant film in which families and friends of those who have died whilst serving with the British Armed Forces in Afghanistan and Iraq talk openly about their feelings, their loved ones and their grief

Winner: BAFTA Best Director Factual

Winner: BAFTA Best Editing Factual

Winner: RTS Best Documentary


Winner: RTS Best Editing Documentary / Factual

Winner: Sheffield Documentary Festival Audience Award

Nominated: BAFTA Best Single Documentary

Nominated: Grierson Best Documentary on a Contemporary Issue

Nominated: Broadcast Award Best Documentary

"As comprehensive and moving an analysis of grief as has been assembled in recent times" - Time Out

"I’d be astonished if we see a more moving film this year, or next" – Independent
Production (role):
BATTLESHIP ANTARCTICA (Director / Producer)
Company:
Minnow Films / Channel 4
Project details:
1 x 50'

Tx Dec 2007

Morgan spent nearly two months filming with Greenpeace during their 2007 expedition to confront the Japanese whaling fleet in Antarctic waters. This journey through hostile seas and the beautiful frozen landscape takes an extraordinary turn when after weeks of searching, Greenpeace encounter their old adversaries in the most unexpected of circumstances

Nominated: Grierson, Sheffield Youth Jury Award

Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Festival

Official Selection: Ecocinema, International Film Festival, Athens

"…an exquisitely shot documentary that, surprisingly given the subject matter, was often as funny as it was enlightening" - Gerard O'Donovan, The Daily Telegraph

"It's been said of this director that he always lets people's humanity shine through, no matter how off-beam or out of order their own lives are. He certainly did a good number on Greenpeace" - Matt Baylis, Daily Express
Production (role):
BEAUTIFUL YOUNG MINDS
Company:
Blast! Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 90'

Tx Oct 2007

The most gifted mathematical teenagers from over 90 countries compete at the International Mathematics Olympiad. This film follows the British team through the selection process at a series of intensive training camps leading up to the 2006 IMO in Slovenia

Nominated: BAFTA, Single Documentary

Nominated: RTS, Best Observational Documentary

Nominated: Grierson, Best Documentary

Nominated: Prix Europa

Official Selection: Britdoc, Film Festival

“My number one television documentary of the year” - Sam Wollaston, The Guardian

“Beautiful Young Minds was utterly brilliant…the film was moving and insightful and told stories that were by turns funny and sad and never less than riveting” - The Observer
Production (role):
BLUE SUEDE JEW
Company:
Blast! Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 60'

Tx Apr 2007

This film concentrates on Gilles Elmalih, an Elvis impersonator from Jerusalem who believes he has a spiritual connection to The King himself. An Israeli living in the bitterly divided West Bank, Gilles is convinced that Elvis' music can restore world peace, and also claims to have regular communication with Elvis from beyond the grave. The film follows Gilles to Memphis for the world championships of Elvis impersonators

Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival

“An astonishing film” - Daily Mail

“Compelling viewing” - The Observer
Production (role):
MILLION DOLLAR PIGEON
Company:
Blast! Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 60'

Tx May 2007

A quirky and touching film focussing on the lucrative world of international pigeon racing. The film follows British players obsessed by the power of the pigeon to the biggest contest of them all - the Million Dollar Pigeon Race in South Africa

“A splendid documentary that treats its subjects as lovingly as they treated the contents of their own pigeon lofts” - Daily Express

“Another terrific observational documentary from Morgan Matthews” - Daily Mail
Production (role):
HAIR WARS
Company:
Blast! Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 X 60'

Tx May 2007

In this story of the cut and thrust of competition hairdressing, we meet ex-world champion hairdresser John Phelps. Banned from competition and with serious problems at home, he tries to pull his family together with a comeback. We also follow the GB team as they prepare for the World Hairdressing Championships in Moscow

“A near perfect documentary… this film moved you from laughter through anger to tears” - The Times

“Gripping” - The Guardian
Production (role):
QUITTERS
Company:
Century Films / BBC 4
Project details:
1 x 90'

Tx May 2006

An intimate observational film behind the doors of Phoenix House drug rehab in South London. Some of the UK’s most afflicted heroin and crack users are sent here on a Drug Treatment and Testing Order as an alternative to prison. With unprecedented access to therapy groups, this documentary follows the journey of several residents as they undergo 6 months of treatment designed to free them from addiction

Official Selection: Doxa, Documentary Festival, Canada

"An intensely personal film… one that helps us to understand the problems and the hazards serial drug abusers face" - Daily Telegraph
Production (role):
TAXIDERMY: STUFF THE WORLD
Company:
Century Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 90'

Tx Aug 2005

A film following the fate of a handful of contributors as they prepare for, and compete at, the World Taxidermy Championships 2005 in Illinois, USA – a huge competition with 1000 entries from 49 US States and 29 countries around the world. It explores the obsessive passion of the craft and intense competitive nature of the championships

Nominated: BAFTA, Best Single Documentary 2005

Nominated: RTS, Best Single Documentary 2005

Nominated: Grierson, Most Entertaining Documentary 2005

"If there’s a better documentary this year than Stuff The World… I shall be very surprised… it is a gorgeous piece of filmmaking" - The Times

"Morgan Matthews’ fabulous documentary… was beautifully articulated so that it began as a genial study of eccentricity and darkened into something far more melancholy and disturbing" - The Independent
Production (role):
MY CRAZY PARENTS
Company:
Century Films / Channel 4
Project details:
2 x 50’

Tx Sep 2004

Two emotionally charged films about children living with parents suffering with mental health problems. Exploring afflictions including schizophrenia and self-harm, this series takes the viewer uncomfortably close to a child’s experience of parental mental illness

Nomination: RTS, Best Documentary Series 2004

"An intimate, involved and grown-up series about mental illness" - Time Out
Production (role):
RUDEGIRLS
Company:
Century Films / BBC 2
Project details:
1 x 90’

Tx Aug 2004

A feature-length, observational film following the exploits of three groups of tear-away teenage girls as they rampage around London. This documentary goes beyond the bravado and examines the motivation behind their behaviour

Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival 2003

Official Selection: Britspotting Documentary Festival, Berlin 2004

“One of the most shocking but insightful documentaries of the year” - The Times

“Reveals a truth that is far more complex than reductive scaremongering often suggests” - Time Out
Production (role):
CAREHOUSE
Company:
Century Films / BBC 4
Project details:
1 x 94’

Tx May 2003

An observational documentary about a controversial care home in York. All residents at the Cusick’s care home have learning difficulties and challenging behaviour. Many have been diagnosed as ‘untreatable psychopaths’, yet under the care of the Cusick’s, their behaviour has improved dramatically. Sixth months spent living at the care home produced an emotional and intimate film about a group of people marginalised by society.
Production (role):
FELTHAM SINGS (2nd Unit Director)
Company:
Century Films / Channel 4
Project details:
1 x 50’

Dir. Brian Hill

Tx Dec 2002

Documentary ‘musical’ set in Feltham Young Offenders’ Institute. Combining the stories of young offenders with the lyrics of Simon Armitage, this acclaimed film challenged the form of documentary whilst examining the motivation of young men at the notorious prison

Winner: BAFTA Flaherty Award for Best Single Documentary 2003

Nominated: Grierson, Best Documentary on a Contemporary Subject

Ivor Novello award for best music in a television programme
SKILLS / QUALIFICATIONS
Blast! Films: Oct 2005 – May 2007

Century Films: Sept 2000 – Sept 2005

Credits

  • Production (role)
    Company
    Project details
  • Production (role): THE RAILWAY CHILDREN RETURN
    Company: StudioCanal
    Project details: Writer Daniel Brocklehurst
  • Production (role): GYPSY BOY
    Company: BBC Films
    Project details: Adaptation from the autobiography by Mikey Walsh.

    Writer James Graham
  • Production (role): MONSTERS
    Company: Shine Films/Minnow/Film 4
    Project details: Director/Producer. Feature Film in development

    Writer James Woods
  • Production (role): X+Y
    Company: Minnow Films / Origin Pictures / BBC Films / BFI
    Project details: Director/Producer

    Story based on 2007 BAFTA nominated documentary Beautiful Young Minds

    Wr. James Graham

    Starring Rafe Spall, Sally Hawkins and Asa Butterfield

    Nominated: Douglas Hickox Best Debut Director BIFA Awards 2014

    Nominated: Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress BIFA Awards 2014

    Official Selection Special Presentation Toronto International Film Festival 2014

    Official Selection Busan International Film Festival 2014

    Official Selection Dinard Film Festival 2014

    Official Selection London Film Festival 2014

    Official Selection Rome Film Festival 2014, Winner Alice nella città strand the prize

    Official Selection Black Nights Film festival 2014, Winner Just Film Grand Prix prize

    Official Selection International Young Audience Film Festival Ale Kino, Winner Children’s Jury prize
  • Production (role)
    Company
    Project details
  • Production (role): GRENFELL
    Company: Minnow Films/BBC One
    Project details: Nominated RTS Award Best Single Documentary 2019
    Nominated Broadcast Awards Best Documentary 2019
  • Production (role): WILLIAMS
    Company: Minnow Films/BBC/Artificial Eye
    Project details: Documentary about the Williams F1 Team

    Nominated BIFA Award Best Documentary 2017

    Nominated National Film Awards Best Documentary 2018
  • Production (role): SHOOTING BIGFOOT (Director / Producer)
    Company: Minnow Films / BBC Storyville / BFI
    Project details: 90’ film

    A fascinating and touching portrait of men who are obsessed with monsters and their adventures to find them

    Premiered at Edinburgh Film Festival 2013
  • Production (role): BRITAIN IN A DAY (Director / Producer)
    Company: Minnow Films / Scott Free Productions / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 90'

    Tx Jun 2012

    On Saturday 12th November 2011 an eclectic range of British people turned the camera on themselves, capturing the entertaining and mundane, the exciting and unusual, the poignant and the everyday. The result, Britain in a Day tells the fascinating story of the British public in their own words. Following on from the feature film Life in a Day, this film offers an extraordinarily candid look at 21st century life across the UK, crafted from over 750 hours of footage.

    “the warp and weft of different lives were woven together to make something really wonderful. The craft and joy of this film was in the criss-crossing of singular and common experience” – The Guardian

    Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival 2012
  • Production (role): SCENES FROM A TEENAGE KILLING (Director / Producer)
    Company: Minnow Films / BBC 4
    Project details: 1 x 120'

    Tx 2011 with transmissions on BBC 3 & BBC 2

    This film explores the impact of teenage killings on families and communities across Britain. It is a powerful and emotional journey that chronicles every teenager who died as a result of violence in 2009 across the UK

    Nominated: BAFTA Best Single Documentary

    Winner: Sheffield Documentary Festival Audience Award

    “…once in a while, along comes a film that is so powerful and haunting that it seems to stop the world as you watch, leaving you struggling to enter the reality of unfolding life… such was the force of Scenes from a Teenage Killing. [Matthews] trained his camera with unjudgemental humanity and warmth. The result was thoroughly chilling.” - The Observer

    “In many ways Morgan Matthews’s film is remarkable. Brave, intimate and instructive” - The Daily Telegraph
  • Production (role): THE FALLEN (Director / Producer)
    Company: Minnow Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 180'

    Tx Nov 2008

    Broadcast shortly after Remembrance Day 2008, The Fallen is a powerful and poignant film in which families and friends of those who have died whilst serving with the British Armed Forces in Afghanistan and Iraq talk openly about their feelings, their loved ones and their grief

    Winner: BAFTA Best Director Factual

    Winner: BAFTA Best Editing Factual

    Winner: RTS Best Documentary


    Winner: RTS Best Editing Documentary / Factual

    Winner: Sheffield Documentary Festival Audience Award

    Nominated: BAFTA Best Single Documentary

    Nominated: Grierson Best Documentary on a Contemporary Issue

    Nominated: Broadcast Award Best Documentary

    "As comprehensive and moving an analysis of grief as has been assembled in recent times" - Time Out

    "I’d be astonished if we see a more moving film this year, or next" – Independent
  • Production (role): BATTLESHIP ANTARCTICA (Director / Producer)
    Company: Minnow Films / Channel 4
    Project details: 1 x 50'

    Tx Dec 2007

    Morgan spent nearly two months filming with Greenpeace during their 2007 expedition to confront the Japanese whaling fleet in Antarctic waters. This journey through hostile seas and the beautiful frozen landscape takes an extraordinary turn when after weeks of searching, Greenpeace encounter their old adversaries in the most unexpected of circumstances

    Nominated: Grierson, Sheffield Youth Jury Award

    Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Festival

    Official Selection: Ecocinema, International Film Festival, Athens

    "…an exquisitely shot documentary that, surprisingly given the subject matter, was often as funny as it was enlightening" - Gerard O'Donovan, The Daily Telegraph

    "It's been said of this director that he always lets people's humanity shine through, no matter how off-beam or out of order their own lives are. He certainly did a good number on Greenpeace" - Matt Baylis, Daily Express
  • Production (role): BEAUTIFUL YOUNG MINDS
    Company: Blast! Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 90'

    Tx Oct 2007

    The most gifted mathematical teenagers from over 90 countries compete at the International Mathematics Olympiad. This film follows the British team through the selection process at a series of intensive training camps leading up to the 2006 IMO in Slovenia

    Nominated: BAFTA, Single Documentary

    Nominated: RTS, Best Observational Documentary

    Nominated: Grierson, Best Documentary

    Nominated: Prix Europa

    Official Selection: Britdoc, Film Festival

    “My number one television documentary of the year” - Sam Wollaston, The Guardian

    “Beautiful Young Minds was utterly brilliant…the film was moving and insightful and told stories that were by turns funny and sad and never less than riveting” - The Observer
  • Production (role): BLUE SUEDE JEW
    Company: Blast! Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 60'

    Tx Apr 2007

    This film concentrates on Gilles Elmalih, an Elvis impersonator from Jerusalem who believes he has a spiritual connection to The King himself. An Israeli living in the bitterly divided West Bank, Gilles is convinced that Elvis' music can restore world peace, and also claims to have regular communication with Elvis from beyond the grave. The film follows Gilles to Memphis for the world championships of Elvis impersonators

    Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival

    “An astonishing film” - Daily Mail

    “Compelling viewing” - The Observer
  • Production (role): MILLION DOLLAR PIGEON
    Company: Blast! Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 60'

    Tx May 2007

    A quirky and touching film focussing on the lucrative world of international pigeon racing. The film follows British players obsessed by the power of the pigeon to the biggest contest of them all - the Million Dollar Pigeon Race in South Africa

    “A splendid documentary that treats its subjects as lovingly as they treated the contents of their own pigeon lofts” - Daily Express

    “Another terrific observational documentary from Morgan Matthews” - Daily Mail
  • Production (role): HAIR WARS
    Company: Blast! Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 X 60'

    Tx May 2007

    In this story of the cut and thrust of competition hairdressing, we meet ex-world champion hairdresser John Phelps. Banned from competition and with serious problems at home, he tries to pull his family together with a comeback. We also follow the GB team as they prepare for the World Hairdressing Championships in Moscow

    “A near perfect documentary… this film moved you from laughter through anger to tears” - The Times

    “Gripping” - The Guardian
  • Production (role): QUITTERS
    Company: Century Films / BBC 4
    Project details: 1 x 90'

    Tx May 2006

    An intimate observational film behind the doors of Phoenix House drug rehab in South London. Some of the UK’s most afflicted heroin and crack users are sent here on a Drug Treatment and Testing Order as an alternative to prison. With unprecedented access to therapy groups, this documentary follows the journey of several residents as they undergo 6 months of treatment designed to free them from addiction

    Official Selection: Doxa, Documentary Festival, Canada

    "An intensely personal film… one that helps us to understand the problems and the hazards serial drug abusers face" - Daily Telegraph
  • Production (role): TAXIDERMY: STUFF THE WORLD
    Company: Century Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 90'

    Tx Aug 2005

    A film following the fate of a handful of contributors as they prepare for, and compete at, the World Taxidermy Championships 2005 in Illinois, USA – a huge competition with 1000 entries from 49 US States and 29 countries around the world. It explores the obsessive passion of the craft and intense competitive nature of the championships

    Nominated: BAFTA, Best Single Documentary 2005

    Nominated: RTS, Best Single Documentary 2005

    Nominated: Grierson, Most Entertaining Documentary 2005

    "If there’s a better documentary this year than Stuff The World… I shall be very surprised… it is a gorgeous piece of filmmaking" - The Times

    "Morgan Matthews’ fabulous documentary… was beautifully articulated so that it began as a genial study of eccentricity and darkened into something far more melancholy and disturbing" - The Independent
  • Production (role): MY CRAZY PARENTS
    Company: Century Films / Channel 4
    Project details: 2 x 50’

    Tx Sep 2004

    Two emotionally charged films about children living with parents suffering with mental health problems. Exploring afflictions including schizophrenia and self-harm, this series takes the viewer uncomfortably close to a child’s experience of parental mental illness

    Nomination: RTS, Best Documentary Series 2004

    "An intimate, involved and grown-up series about mental illness" - Time Out
  • Production (role): RUDEGIRLS
    Company: Century Films / BBC 2
    Project details: 1 x 90’

    Tx Aug 2004

    A feature-length, observational film following the exploits of three groups of tear-away teenage girls as they rampage around London. This documentary goes beyond the bravado and examines the motivation behind their behaviour

    Official Selection: Sheffield Documentary Film Festival 2003

    Official Selection: Britspotting Documentary Festival, Berlin 2004

    “One of the most shocking but insightful documentaries of the year” - The Times

    “Reveals a truth that is far more complex than reductive scaremongering often suggests” - Time Out
  • Production (role): CAREHOUSE
    Company: Century Films / BBC 4
    Project details: 1 x 94’

    Tx May 2003

    An observational documentary about a controversial care home in York. All residents at the Cusick’s care home have learning difficulties and challenging behaviour. Many have been diagnosed as ‘untreatable psychopaths’, yet under the care of the Cusick’s, their behaviour has improved dramatically. Sixth months spent living at the care home produced an emotional and intimate film about a group of people marginalised by society.
  • Production (role): FELTHAM SINGS (2nd Unit Director)
    Company: Century Films / Channel 4
    Project details: 1 x 50’

    Dir. Brian Hill

    Tx Dec 2002

    Documentary ‘musical’ set in Feltham Young Offenders’ Institute. Combining the stories of young offenders with the lyrics of Simon Armitage, this acclaimed film challenged the form of documentary whilst examining the motivation of young men at the notorious prison

    Winner: BAFTA Flaherty Award for Best Single Documentary 2003

    Nominated: Grierson, Best Documentary on a Contemporary Subject

    Ivor Novello award for best music in a television programme
  • Blast! Films: Oct 2005 – May 2007

  • Century Films: Sept 2000 – Sept 2005
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