I was asked to direct this film by my actress friend Lindsay. It's quite a departure from the world of Gooch, but I found it very interesting to deal with these sorts of issues and try to tell a story with no dialogue, only a V/O and only one actor. The antagonist being life itself.

The Lonely Road is a short silent film, using voiceover to provide a narrative exploring an insight into the main actress's late aunts short and tragic life.The words you hear are taken directly from a journal of poems she left behind, these she wrote throughout the final years leading up to her death on July 4th, 1976.

Before this time Janet's life and experiences had been kept a closed book, this film gives a clear insight into some of her deepest thoughts, experiences and emotions.

This is what Lindsay had to say -

Janet grew up in South London and lived a troubled childhood, she was a closed individual who "nobody truely ever knew". Janet ran away from home in her late teens and lived on the streets of London, here she was raped, turned to drugs and spent her existence dreaming of escaping to the countryside and living on the farm she had once visited as a child; this however, was a dream she unfortunately was never able to achieve. Six months was spent researching into Janet's life:Tracking down her school teachers, friends and family members, to best understand her physicality, mentality and existence; Spending time volunteering with homeless people, an attempt to understand their struggles and attitudes in day to day life; Researching into the side effects of drug taking, physically and mentally; Placing myself on an extreme diet just two months before filming and loosing 1st 7b, in order to not only physically resemble the character, but to understand tired and frail mental and physical state. The film is a truthful insight into one woman's life, it serves not to answer questions, or change the world, but it does demonstrate that life is made up of chance and choice, not all of these can be made for yourself or changed for the better, but it only takes one wrong step to turn down an uncontrollable path.