Better Anything

Loss doesn't just hurt—it corrupts. The hopeless spiral that follows, the rationalisations we build to justify what we'd never have considered before, that's where real horror lives.

I started writing Better Anything after finishing multiple short horror scripts, which, while exciting, had little chance of being made, especially by a first-time filmmaker. They were all too bombastic, filled with blood, guts and the heroic final girl, inspired by the films I loved growing up. After sharing a few of these with other writer friends, I was given the best advice I have ever received: to write something simple, a conversation between two people. Within those confines, I tried to find where the horror would be, and discovered it wasn't in jump scares or gore—it was in recognising yourself in someone doing something unforgivable.

In Better Anything, a couple with a terrible past are in the woods to bury a body. The forest becomes a pressure cooker where their carefully constructed justifications begin to crack. Through their conversations, we watch two people fighting not just each other but their own complicity. Tommy clings to his narrative with desperate volatility, while Alice refuses to let either of them play victim.

These characters act as the two sides of someone's mind as they go through hardship that they aren't entirely innocent of creating for themselves. I wanted to capture that claustrophobic feeling of being trapped with your own thoughts, where the horror isn't what's lurking in the darkness but what you've brought with you into it. The woods strip away everything but the characters' raw psychology—no escape routes, no distractions, just two people confronting what they've become. I used the camera like a witness that won't look away, trapping the audience in the same uncomfortable intimacy that makes the characters squirm.

Better Anything is a film I have been putting off making for the last couple of years. It wasn't until December 2023, as I was about to turn 36, that I realised I couldn't wait any longer.
Working with Benjamin O'Mahony (Kajaki, Ripper Street, Hollyoaks) and Abigail Hardingham (Nina Forever, The Missing), I found the directing experience came naturally. I loved every second of working with the actors on set and together we were able to craft performances that inhabit the grey areas of moral ambiguity. The way they were both able to dive headfirst into what is admittedly a difficult subject matter was commendable. Now, following a long post-production process, we have finally completed the film. What I hope audiences take from Better Anything is a recognition of how we all carry the capacity for both terrible choices and genuine remorse, and how the horror of loss isn't just in what we've lost, but in what we're willing to do to cope with that emptiness.