Home grown horror movie Scopophobia set for Welsh premiere

Stephen Price

A home grown horror film which is receiving glowing reviews is set to have its Welsh premiere at one of the country’s most iconic cinemas next month.

On Saturday 7 September, the Lyric Theatre will screen the Welsh premiere of  ‘Scopophobia’ – a 100-minute horror feature film.

The film was written and directed by Carmarthen’s own Aled Owen, who also produced the film, alongside Portsmouth’s Tom Rawding, as the Carmarthen-based production company Melyn Pictures Ltd, which was established in 2021.

Ghost town

The title, “Scopophobia”, refers to the fear of being watched.

The film follows Rhiannon (Swansea’s Catrin Jones) who suffers from the titular condition as a result of deep guilt, having been peer-pressured by her friends to steal money from their local steel mill as a teenager.

Ten years later, the film finds Rhiannon reuniting with these friends, played by Carmarthen’s Bethany Williams-Potter, Bridgend’s Emma Stacey, and Tenby’s Ellen Jane-Thomas.

This time, the place is a ghost town, and the girls pressure Rhiannon into taking them back into the now-abandoned mill, to retrieve the stolen money.

Rhiannon hid the cash box within the mill’s walls, but when they enter the mill to find it, they get locked inside, and there’s someone strange inside the mill with them.

Perhaps their past has come back to haunt them, or perhaps it’s just their guilty conscience playing tricks.

Passion project

‘Scopophobia’ was produced on a shoestring budget made up entirely of the cast and crew’s own funding, and two online crowdfunding campaigns (on Indiegogo and Greenlit respectively).

Production began with a 5-day shoot in Carmarthen, in March 2022. These were predominantly the film’s cheapest scenes (dialogue scenes, free of any action or effects), and the footage was then used to raise more funds for another 6-day shoot in October 2022, this time taking place in Swansea’s Bay Studios and the National Botanic Garden of Wales.

Stunt/Fight Coordinator Kevin McCurdy and Special Effects Prosthetics Artist Ellie Baldwin joined the production at this stage.

With two-thirds of the film shot and edited, another crowdfunding campaign allowed the cast and crew to complete filming with one final 4-day shoot in March 2023, in the factories of Middlesbrough. Within 15 days across 1 year, the film’s production was completed.

Home grown talent

Aled Owen and Tom Rawding met at the Northern Film School (Leeds Beckett University) and both graduated in 2019. This project began when the Covid-19 pandemic caused Aled’s first film industry job to end prematurely.

Worried that this would set him back to square one, Aled and Tom decided to create an opportunity for themselves.

The script’s story was conceived by Aled while walking around Carmarthen during his allowed outdoor hours throughout lockdown. Seeing his hometown so empty and lifeless inspired the plot of ‘Scopophobia’

The Melyn Pictures crew is made up of diverse people from all over the country, with the majority of them set to return to Carmarthen, for the Welsh premiere at the Lyric Theatre.

The cast is entirely Welsh, with several originally from Carmarthen itself. Bethany Williams-Potter and Steffan Cennydd were fellow Ysgol Bro Myrddin alumni alongside Aled Owen, with Bethany and Aled having become friends through the Carmarthen Youth Opera.

Seasoned actors Ioan Hefin, Christine Kempell, and Lisa Marged are also Carmarthen-based, having played supporting roles in the film.

Despite its financial limitations, Melyn Pictures is proud to have completed its production of ‘Scopophobia’, a true passion project for all involved.

It has already been accepted into some prestigious horror film festivals around the world, where Melyn Pictures hopes to acquire widespread distribution for ‘Scopophobia’.

The first of these festivals was London’s Pigeon Shrine FrightFest, where ‘Scopophobia’ had its UK premiere two weeks before its Welsh premiere, at the Odeon Luxe in Leicester Square on Saturday 24 August.

The film was edited by Daniel Rosenberg, composed by Cardiff-based Lloyd Morgan, and features songs written and performed by Carmarthen’s own GG Fearn.

Fearn will be performing these songs live at Cwrw, on King Street, immediately after the screening on 7 September, to celebrate the film’s release.

Stream the Scopophobia Soundtrack from GG Fearn here.

The Welsh premiere of Scopophobia takes place at the Lyric Carmarthen on 7 September at 7.30. Find out more about that and future screenings here.