Mia Bays is winding down her tenure in charge of one of the biggest backers of British independent film, the British Film Institute’s Filmmaking Fund.
She’s done and seen it all over the past five years, having become the first person ever to hold the position for a fixed term — a change implemented in recognition of just how influential the job is — and joining at a time when the industry, post-pandemic, had been transformed for good.
Bays, who will leave her post in October of this year, has experience in producing, exhibition, distribution and international sales strategy. She considers herself a cultural and gender equity activist, and with the BFI Filmmaking Fund, consolidated all of that expertise into overseeing a budget of around 20 million pounds ($27 million) a year. She’s put relatively unknown filmmakers up for Oscar consideration, made BAFTA winners out of others, and done it all with what she says is a knack for kicking the industry’s risk aversion to the curb.
“I think [risk] is absolutely a fundamental part of what the public funds are there for,” Bays tells The Hollywood Reporter ahead of her last Cannes Film Festival as the BFI Filmmaking Fund boss. She cites some of her recent, edgy successes — Rich Peppiatt’s raucous “print the legend” biopic Kneecap, Harry Lighton’s biker BDSM dramedy Pillion and Akinola Davies Jr.’s tender, Lagos-set My Father’s Shadow, selected as the U.K.’s 2026 Oscars entry — as evidence of the payoff of that audaciousness.
Bays has also invigorated the country’s largest open-access fund by reshaping the team, improving how the fund is performing against the BFI’s inclusion targets and even setting up brand new pots of money for more experienced directors (the Impact Fund), as well as higher-budget, live-action shortform projects (Future Takes). Financing just 12 feature films a year, she’s homed in on talent pursuing cultural and social reverberations.
With recruitment for her replacement officially underway, Bays sat down with THR to talk about the obstacles plaguing the British film industry — and what we should be optimistic about. She discusses some of the buzzy BFI movies hitting the Croisette this year, such as Clio Barnard’s I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning; why co-productions might just be British film’s savior; and the key piece of advice she has for her successor.
Reflecting on the past five years, what feelings come up for you?
Well, I subscribe to creative renewal, so I think it’s healthy. I think five years is a good amount of time to effect enough change — to do so quite fast — and then to leave a steady ship, I hope. Reflecting on the films and the features we’ve supported, we won a BAFTA for best [British] debut two years running, Kneecap in 2025 and My Father’s Shadow this year, both incredibly unusual, I would say, and fresh voices and narratives. We also won the best [British] Independent Film Award [BIFA] two years running [with] Kneecap and Pillion. Awards are only one arbiter of impact, obviously. But our films have been selected as the U.K. entry for best international feature at the Oscars — Santosh in 2025 and My Father’s Shadow in 2026. And then … Two Black Boys in Paradise, which is supported through our short animation fund, won the BAFTA for best short animation this year. And Magid / Zafar, which is through Future Takes — our higher-budget short scheme — won the BIFA for best short and was also nominated for a BAFTA.
‘Pillion’
A24
What comes into the decision-making process for you — what must a project have to get funding?
Our fund priorities are a really important steer. So it’s really vital to us that whoever is applying understands what our priorities and what we are looking for, and what steers our decisions as they’re applying. That’s been a very big part of the work — to make sure that the fund is transparent. There are six fund priorities, [and] that’s a very important tool. There are other frameworks around having a balanced slate, prioritizing U.K.-wide, so not everything being made is from London and the South East — that we really are entirely representative of the U.K. — that we back creative risk, that the films can have some impact, both at home and away. [We] consider audiences and perhaps who has been underserved.
What do you think is the biggest hurdle facing the British film industry right now?
It’s the challenges of distribution. Whenever we have the contraction that we’re seeing now among distributors becoming risk-averse and less money being risked on releases and P&A [prints and advertising] and the struggle to sell internationally, that then creates an environment that makes it very hard to make the risky films, which tends to be the kind of films that we support. It makes our funds more important than ever. But as I said, we only make 12 features a year, so that’s not enabling much, really, in the grand scheme of things. It’s doing a substantial amount, but it’s not enough. I mean, thank God that our sister fund, the U.K. Global Screen Fund, also exists. They’re there to support minority co-productions, and the terrific news is that they’ve got more money now. Over the course of the next few months, they’re announcing new interventions and new funds. That’s incredibly important, because we need to be co-producing more. It’s incredibly hard to finance a film entirely out of the U.K. at the moment. Yeah, those are the challenges.
And once the industry contracts and other investors become risk-averse, what that does is shut out the underrepresented voices. That’s the fear — the rollback on the progress that has been made over the past few years in diversifying [film], which has created some incredible and exciting work. But thank God that we can keep existing.
Are co-productions the way forward for British film right now?
Yeah, 100 percent. Even with the nations and regions within our smaller conurbation between the U.K. and Ireland, [it] can be very substantial — accessing the two tax credits and then public funds. We fund with Ffilm Cymru [Wales] and Screen Scotland and Northern Ireland Screen. And those are incredibly meaningful partnerships. Kneecap is a really good example, which is a co-production between the U.K. and Ireland and two broadcasters and three significant lottery funds. I don’t think that film would have been made without that. But I hope it’s opened the door to privileging more Irish-language work and showing that actually, that kind of work is exciting. It’s an incredibly important part of [Irish] heritage as well, the Celtic language.
Do you consider it your job to be risky? Do you think films should be risky in the current climate?
Yeah, that’s absolutely a fundamental part of what the public funds are there for. And risk can show up in various ways. It doesn’t always mean in the content and around edgy narratives that push at the boundaries. Obviously, Kneecap is a great example of that. Pillion is another version of that. Palestine 36 is another version, because that was an untold story — the colonial impact of the U.K. in Palestine and [how] we’re seeing the effects of that still to this day. Those films just wouldn’t be made without us. That enriches not just the film culture, but the wider culture in the U.K. — how we see ourselves, how we represent ourselves. It’s fundamental that we’re doing that. If we were just steering everything through our own personal taste … I think in the bygone eras, a lot of these roles were often [navigated] with a tastemaker principle. We’ve moved away from that to have a wider scope around what role we play, and what we don’t see getting made is absolutely what we should be there for.
What do you feel optimistic about?
I’m always buoyed by the work. And I just feel like British filmmaking at the moment is really, really consistently world-class and evidencing that. When we just look at our own slate and how much impact those films are having internationally, and we know that through how well they’re selling and how significant the box office is at home and away — within a relatively contained realm. We’re still seeing some worldwide deals. I’ve loved the resurgence of comedy that we’re seeing in the U.K. That’s long overdue. Seven out of 10 of the qualifying indies at the U.K. box office last year were comedies or comedy-drama. I’m really excited about that. We’ve got a bit of a resurgence [with] films like The Ballad of Wallis Island and Marching Powder, Pillion, a very, very strong range of work. But again, we’ve got a really important comedy tradition, which I felt had slightly disappeared. Our own The Incomer made a really big mark in Sundance this year, very proudly and very culturally Scottish, and the human really translated. It was a joy to be in a room full of 400 people in Sundance guffawing away.
Talk to me about what’s coming up in Cannes — I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning is just brilliant.
I’m so delighted to hear that. I loved working on that film — it’s a novelist collaborating with a screenwriter, collaborating with Clio Barnard, the director and Tracy [O’Riordan], the producer. They were a really strong team. They gathered such an incredible crew. All of the cast are just absolute knockouts, not just in that piece, but they’re all real rising stars. The kind of alchemy of what they create together … they were so collaborative. So I’m really excited about that film, because I do feel that it really speaks to the challenges of a generation, particularly 30-somethings. It really opens up a very important conversation that perhaps isn’t just British either, and it does it with such heart and such tenderness and with such care.
What advice would you offer to your successor?
I really like the principle of beginner’s mind — coming in and not thinking you know everything. You may have an idea, but context changes once you have more information. Just being able to listen is such an incredible part of what good leadership looks like, and then being able to act upon it and striking the balance between bringing your own ideas, but also the listening. You’re really, really taking on what the industry are telling you they need now. Some of that you have to filter out. Some of it won’t be possible. But there will be good ideas, and there could be important changes that are needed for the next five years. The fund may shift, because that’s what the industry needs next.
Is there a particular project or creative you’re especially proud of championing?
It’s picking between children. It’s too difficult. I would just center the work of the team.
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