After more than a decade-long hiatus from the big screen, Shane Meadows is making a return to cinema with a new film, Chork.
Penned by Adolescence writer Jack Thorne and set along the east coast of England, Chork follows 15-year-old Kit and 11-year-old Ani as they leave their foster home and trek across the coastline in hopes of a brighter future. With the police in pursuit and a national search underway, Kit must use all her determination and wits to protect Ani and fulfil their mission.
Cast by Meadows’ frequent collaborator, Shaheen Baig (Adolescence, Hot Milk) the two have secured the film’s lead cast with open casting calls taking place earlier in the year throughout the U.K.
“To be returning to film after 17 years, writing alongside ‘megadude’ Jack Thorne again, and working with so many gifted collaborators, has been an absolute privilege,” said Meadows. “Our story follows two beyond bright, funny as heck and mischievously ingenious young people on a ‘runaway’ road trip the length of this glorious isle.”
“Safe to say,” he continued, “I’m beyond excited about what we’ve captured on their journey. I’m also hugely grateful to our partners at BBC Film, BFI, Screen Yorkshire, Hoopsa Films and Altitude for their undying trust and support throughout.”
Meadows gained critical acclaim with features TwentyFourSeven, Dead Man’s Shoes, A Room for Romeo Brass and Somers Town. His television credits include This Is England, which premiered in Toronto in 2006, The Virtues starring Stephen Graham and The Gallows Pole.
Chork is produced by Ben Pugh and Cathy King for 42, Lauren Dark and Amy Jackson for Unified, Meadows’ Big Arty and Thorne’s One Shoe Films, both of whom will also executive produce.
The film is financed by BBC Film, BFI (awarding National Lottery funding), Screen Yorkshire (via the Yorkshire Content Fund), and Hoopsa Films.
Executive producers are Eva Yates and Kristin Irving for BBC Film, Louise Ortega for the BFI, Caroline Cooper Charles for Screen Yorkshire, Sonny Gill and Tim Macready for Hoopsa Films and Ali Jazayeri and Keith Kehoe for Three Picture Capital alongside Laura Jackson and Joshua Horsfield. The film was developed with BBC Film.
Altitude will release Chork in U.K. and Irish cinemas in 2026 and will manage international sales.
Yates, director of BBC Film, added: “The films of Shane Meadows are at the heart of contemporary British independent cinema and we are hugely excited to support his return, with a cast of exceptional new actors, his brilliant writing collaborator Jack Thorne, and an anarchic story of love, redemption and the untapped and profound potential of youth.”