Stroud Film Festival
Friday 7th March 7.30pm
STILL OUT: Ambient soundscapes, connecting landscapes, exploring the transience of time.
Join us for the premiere screening of STILL OUT, an ambient road trip that touches on friendship, place and the passing of time. STILL OUT is an audio-visual collaboration between music producers Will Cookson and Tom Haverly and filmmaker Rufus Exton. The screening will be preceded by a Q&A with the filmmakers. There will be DJ sets by Mat Sefton, Darius Akashic and Ross Lily, inspired by the film.
STILL OUT is a reflection on what it means to step away from the routine of daily life, celebrating our relationship to the world around us and what it means to pass through time and space.
Tickets:
Pay what you can
£4 (low income/cost of living affected)
£6 (standard)
£8 (pay it forward)
STILL OUT - ambient road trip - KiF // Trailer
STILL OUT a film by Will Cookson, Tom Haverly & Rufus Exton
Touching on friendship, place and the passing of time, STILL OUT is an audio-visual collaboration between music producers Will Cookson and Tom Haverly and filmmaker Rufus Exton. Non-narrative in form yet resonant with embedded meanings, it evokes a road trip from North Yorkshire to North Devon they took together in the summer of 2024, featuring luminous footage of the natural world set to a soundtrack that was inspired by their long-standing interest in ambient and electronic music.
The film is also an oblique homage to The KLF’s iconic 1990 album Chill Out, which the pair revisited after it turned up unexpectedly a few years back in Tom’s dad’s record collection. To create their own version, Will and Tom relocated to the Devon coast in late summer 2023, splicing together an audio collage from a mix of original and found recordings in a remote cabin with no electricity or mobile reception.
Only after Will met friend and filmmaker Rufus Exton later that year to discuss visiting various landscapes referenced in the music did the idea of creating a visual counterpart take shape. Shot in the summer of 2024 the resulting work is a 40-minute reflection on the mental and emotional shift that occurs when stepping away from the routine of daily life. An adventure in feeling and form, the film celebrates our ever-changing relationship to the world around us and the mystery of what it means to pass through time and space.
The film runs for 44 minutes, and we will have a Q&A preceding it with the three of us, which will be moderated by Rupert Howe (TBC). I have lined up Darius Akashic (Crooked Stylus), Mat Sefton (Loose Joints) and Ross Lilly (Disco Sucks) to play freeform DJ sets that complement the film drawing upon ambient, film soundtracks, downbeat selections and balearic styles.