Virgin Atlantic has joined forces with First Light Movies to showcase young up and coming film making talent onboard flights this summer.  The airline is screening five short films, made by groups of young people aged between six and 18 years from across the UK, as part of its inflight entertainment.

Using UK Film Council National Lottery money through First Light Movies funding, the young filmmakers were able to be involved in every aspect of making their short films, from developing the story and characters, interviewing participants, to creating the models, filming and editing under the guidance of professional filmmakers.

The films are being shown on the airline’s V Port inflight entertainment system from July to November, offering all passengers a variety of TV programmes, films and games to entertain them through their flight.

Faye Spiller, Media Acquisitions Executive for Virgin Atlantic commented:

“Virgin Atlantic is delighted to be supporting this great initiative that encourages creativity in kids.  We love showcasing new talent and are pleased to include these films in our award winning inflight entertainment, which offers over 300 hours of entertainment.  We hope this will be the start of some very successful careers in the film industry in the future.”

First Light Movies provides funding and expertise to enable groups of five to 19-year-olds, from all backgrounds throughout the UK, make their own short digital films.  Since launching in 2001, First Light Movies has helped more than 12,000 young filmmakers script, shoot, act in, light, direct, produce, edit and screen over 900 films, which reflect the diversity of their lives.

Pip Eldridge, Chief Executive Officer for First Light Movies, commented:

“It’s brilliant that the young people’s films are being seen as part of the entertainment on Virgin Atlantic flights, alongside their huge variety of films and TV programmes.  Not only does this give the films a whole new audience to enjoy them, but we are also hoping to inspire other young people and their families to pick up cameras and have a go themselves”.

All Virgin Atlantic aircraft are fitted with personal seat back TV’s for every passenger.  V:Port, the latest in inflight entertainment, has over 300 hours of Video and Audio on demand which allows passengers to stop, start, fast forward and rewind all the action.
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