From Life

...without any explanation. The music, the location, the meets between artist and young woman. The music, the location, the performances, the end. All as part of a sort of magic. One of short films talking to the soul. About presences in a churchyard, about a drawing and its deep sense, about past and hommage to it.

This is very well made atmospheric 8 minute ghost story set in a historic churchyard in Hampstead, London. The story is clever and I did not work it out.

It is about an artist who likes to sit and draw in the churchyard. He (Tom Ashley) sees an attractive young lady (Emma Laird) from an earlier time-period and draws her. She fades in and out of the picture in ghostly fashion. Eventually she sees his drawings and speaks to him, and he is suprised when she does.

In the end, all is revealed and the film finishes with a pertient message putting the humanity into perspective.

For a lady dressed in 19th Century clothing, something I found odd was that she addressed him as Godfrey Williams, rather than the more formal Mr Williams. This may be technically correct if she, with her upper class dress and voice was talking to someone of lower class.

There are some Easter Eggs in this film which actually give away the timeframe, and which I completely overlooked. Carefully watch and listen when the gardener appears.

Well acted and well filmed. The atmosphere of the film is also enhanced by music from.Lindsay Wright and excellent drawings by Andrei Riabovitchev.