The story is about Nina, a transgender woman who was rejected by her family. 5 years later she receives an envelope from her brother Ryan. Instead of finding a letter, Nina finds a wedding portrait of Ryan and his wife. She responds by sending a photo of her and Mary, her girlfriend. They exchange photos for months. Not a word is ever exchanged between the siblings. Nina will have to overcome her anger towards her family.

Family is usually the place where we first experience love and this story explores the difficulty of being rejected by one’s family because of their gender identity. The main character Nina shows how she struggles between her love for her brother and the chase of her true self. While they were separated by force, the intricate way in which the siblings manage to stay connected without the exchange of words depicts the power of connection between them, and the power of love and acceptance. The film will portray the complex emotions of each character. The message is that time and love can heal everything.

The setting is an extension of the character's inner emotions, so we will be using dark red and navy colours to represent Nina's anger and resentment and light green and yellow colours to represent the sense of hope and the possibility of a new beginning.

Time is an important theme of Dear Brother, we will include slow motion, long takes and other forms of time manipulation to help convey the message of the story.

Close-ups and extreme close-ups will be used to highlight the character’s emotional depth, while wide shots will be used to extenuate the feelings of loss and isolation.

As with any film production, many elements are required to bring a beautiful story to life. As students in film production, we are lucky to have free access to film equipment, however, we still need your support to find filming locations, the cast, props and costumes, and most importantly to create a safe work environment for the cast and crew. We are not paying ourselves to make this film as we want to invest all your donations in the quality of the film. We wish to allocate the money we collect as follows:

Christophe Mordant

I am Christophe, the director on this project. I am a final year student at Queen Mary University of London. To me, Dear Brother is a beautiful way to finish my degree before jumping in the film industry for good. I love how this story shows that whatever your gender identity is, we are all the same and the emotions we go through are universal.