Northern Ireland Screen is delighted to announce that Lost Connections has won first prize in the Best Use of Footage in a Short Film Production category at the 2022 FOCAL International Awards. 

Supported by Film Hub North on behalf of the BFI Film Audience Network through National Lottery Funding, Lost Connections is a unique UK-wide collaboration of national and regional film archives that offers a poetic response to the experience of the Coronavirus pandemic.  

Drawing on a century of archive footage, the film looks at the impact of loneliness on our mental wellbeing. It invites reflections on recovery, renewal, the human character, sadness and joy, what we really value, and our reconnection with each other, our communities, and the world around us. 

An echo of our own contemporary experiences, Lost Connections is an archive-based film which gives us hope for the future by connecting with the past. 

Northern Ireland Screen’s Digital Film Archive contribution features Ulster Television and Northern Ireland Tourist Board material, courtesy of the Department of Communities and the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland. 

The film was produced by Graham Relton, Sue Howard and Frank Gray. Andy Burns, Yorkshire Film Archive editor and filmmaker, meticulously crafted dialogue between the past and the present, using nearly 200 of the 500 films put forward by archive curators. Narrator Hussina Raja provided a connecting voice, responding to the imagery with a common and recurring thread that weaves through the film: “Can we always be connected?”

 View Lost Connections here and see below for the films used to inspire it.