Graduates of a film project in Birmingham are rubbing shoulders with Hollywood A-listers. Alison Jones reports.

A little over 10 years ago George Clooney made a memorable trip to Birmingham, performing ribbon cutting duties for the new cinema over at Star City.

For local film fans, a handshake across the crowd control barriers would be as close as they could get to the Hollywood hero.

The idea of working with him? Well that would be an impossible dream for most.

But not for Ruth Antoine.

Hers is not a name that will appear on the acting credits of his new film, Gravity, but she has made herself an indispensable member of the crew as a runner with the special responsibility of looking after the director – Alfonso Cuaron.

It is a small, but important, step onto the ladder of a career in film.

She was given a leg up by First Light, a national organisation based in Fazeley Street, Birmingham, that was established a decade ago, shortly after Clooney’s fleeting visit.

First Light was formed at the behest of the UK Film Council who wanted to find a way that young people could get involved in the film industry.

They didn’t have the expertise to run a scheme like that themselves so it was tendered out and was won by an organisation called Hi8us, which had a branch in Birmingham.

Through the organisation, lottery money was granted to groups who work with young people to create short films.

“We want to see the young people taking the lead in the process, from ideas development through to edit,” says Leigh Thomas, the CEO of First Light,

“We make sure they work with industry professionals, that they get their hands on good quality industry equipment and they begin to understand how the craft of filmmaking happens.

“We all know that many hand held devices can collect moving images these days. But pointing and shooting at somebody skateboarding isn’t really filmmaking. So there is a lot more professionalisation of the process.”

These budding auteurs are caught early. First Light works with children as young as five up to the ages of 19. Many of them connect via schools. First Light offers a lottery-supported funding programme and they also organise workshops in schools.

Others come through youth groups or sports clubs or as youngsters who are dealing with decidedly adult burdens.

“It could be a group of young carers, a group of young mums, or children who are already receiving some kind of additional support to help them with issues they are facing,” says Leigh.

“The vast majority of it is targeted at young people who have challenges in their life which makes it difficult for them to access opportunities very often.

“We had a 10th birthday celebration this week and we asked two young people who were based in Bridgwater, Somerset, to talk about their film which was about what it was like to be homeless – everything they had faced leading up to the point where they were homeless, then how they ended up at the YMCA and started to rebuild their lives.

“It was incredibly powerful. In lots of issue based documentaries young people are the subjects but they don’t actually get to influence the stories that are told.

“By giving them the skills to make their own films they are telling their own stories in their own way.”

Though it can start to lay the foundations for a future career, Leigh sees First Light as being about giving children a way to express themselves in a genre they can connect to.