The Following People DO NOT Smoke Weed
Julia Mervis
Director's Works
Julia Mervis is an emerging director from London, with a distinctive, wry approach and chronically low budgets. Her work has been screened & nominated across lots of great festivals, including London Short Film Fest, Sheffield Doc Fest, BFI Future Film Festival, Open City Docs, SXSW London, and recently winning the Audience Choice Award at Canon's Stories in Motion competition.
Julia's films are bold, playful and funny. They experiment with truth, filmmaking and what we have come to accept as normal, and dive into the big issues of today through, well, less big entry points.
The Following People DO NOT Smoke Weed is a documentary about who tried to snitch on my friends when we were 15 years old.
But, no spoilers, it's also about documentary's obsession with trauma and tragedy, interrogating how far we are willing to go in the name of entertainment.
Telling people that we're making this film has been one of my favourite parts of this whole process- and it turns out that whether it's finding out who wrote the Weed List, or who shat on C-block stairs in year 9, or whether Mr Gilbert actually had a basement full of children in his house, the story sparks something in people.
About a year ago, The Following People DO NOT Smoke Weed was one of 12 documentaries shortlisted to receive £30,000 with the Netflix Talent Fund; and we were even able to budget for 'DIT' - whatever that is. We didn't end up getting the funding, but we went ahead and raised a fraction of that, attached some unsuitably incredible, Oscar and BAFTA winning executive producers and made it ourselves on two camcorders, a Zoom H5 and an Apeture 300d light.
So, even if you're faced with a no or a rejection- it doesn't mean it's the end of the road!
