Lotje Sodderland

A profoundly personal voyage into the complexity, fragility and wonder of the human brain, after Lotje Sodderland miraculously survives a hemorrhagic stroke and finds herself starting again in an alien world, bereft of language and logic. This feature documentary takes us on a genre-twisting tale that is by turns excruciating and exquisite - from the devastating consequences of a first-time neurological experiment, through to the extraordinary revelations of her altered sensory perception.

Charting the particular, baffled and morbid character of English attitudes to mortality, The Animal Drums depicts the specific influence of urban space on the psyche. Recalling the tableu film-making of Peter Greenaway and the lyrical disjunction of Harold Pinter, The Animals Drums is one of the first significant British feature-length poetry-films of the 21st century. London disappears under the ground of the film’s ambiguous protagonist, who is half victim, half perpetrator. Gently mad, positively lost, we follow our host through the bounds of a changing, money-washed capital city. Fusing documentary technique, montage and theatrical set pieces, the film features appearances from authors like Iain Sinclair and Stewart Home, alongside actors like Edie Deffebach and Lotje Sodderland, The Animal Drums is unique representation of modern London in old England.