James Sutherland is a Kiwi screenwriter based in Tokyo, Japan, his feature film script Takao was recently a quarter finalist in the Emerging Screenwriters Suspense Screenplay Competition and won Best Feature screenplay in international festivals in New York and Hong Kong. With experience in front of the camera in film and television he moved from directing and teaching theatre to building a portfolio of crime pilots and features. His stories center around finding family. He has a Masters in Theatre Directing from Victoria University and the New Zealand Drama School and is dad to two growing boys of mixed ethnicity who don’t like to listen, but love to eat.
FLY BY NIGHT Budget: $0 - $100K | Crime SERIES LOGLINE The disappearance of a loan shark’s granddaughter gives a failed private investigator haunted by his past a last chance to clear his debt by finding her; as police hunt him he fights to rebuild severed relationships and repair his destroyed reputation unearthing ties to trafficking, organized crime and his former boss, a corrupt politician. PILOT LOGLINE When a failed investigator can`t pay back his gambling debt he gets one week to find the missing granddaughter of his murderous creditor.
BOBBY KNUX Budget: $1M - $5M | Sports ⋄ Crime A disgraced and timeworn boxer fights to re-up his license to get back in the ring and save his kidnapped son.
TAKAO Budget: $1M - $5M | Thriller A Tokyo detective banished to a rural precinct embeds herself in a case involving severalgruesome murders to hide the fact she’s avenging the death of her daughter.
THE CLEANER Thriller ⋄ Action A grieving father takes a job as a janitor to break into a building and gatecrash a Christmas party to exact revenge on those who committed a heinous act against his son.
DAUGHTER Budget: $1M - $5M | Thriller ⋄ Crime A bullied suburban housewife who walks into the robbery homicide of a loan shark must evade being hunted by both sides of the law to protect her family.
SHEARWATER Budget: $1M - $5M | Thriller ⋄ Crime When their debts start piling up a crew of fishermen must tread dangerous waters and cooperate with a ruthless organized crime gang or risk becoming one of the towns’ murdered.
FIFTH STREET Drama An ex-gambler and her estranged poker champion mother in law compete for sole custody of her daughter.
Silent Service
(
Television
William D Collins
Nihon Dokuritsu
(
Film
Donald D Hoover
Coin Lunch
(
Film (short)
Jeff
The Last Recipe
(
Film
Russian Spy
Kodomo Tsukai
(
Film
Tommy
Official Selection Tokyo Lift - Off Festival
(2024)
Official Selection Dubai International Cineverse Screenplay Awards
(2024)
Best Feature Screenplay The Flight Deck Film Festival
(2024)
Quarter Finalist Emerging Screenwriter Suspense Screenplay Competition
(2024)
Finalist Dubai International Cineverse Screenplay Awards
(2024)
Finalist Clown International Film Festival Paris
(2024)
Honorable Mention WideScreen Film and Music Video Festival
(2024)
Quarter Finalist WideScreen Film and Music Video Festival
(2024)
Best Feature Screenplay The Flight Deck Film Festival
(2024)
Finalist London International CINEVERSE Film Festival
(2024)
Best Screenplay Hong Kong International Cineverse Screenplay Awards
(2024)
Finalist Chatham-Kent International Film Festival
(2024)
Best Original Screenplay Sugar Loaf Film Festival (SLFF)
(2024)
Finalist Paris International CINEVERSE Film Festival
(2024)
Victoria University of Wellington
(1997-2003)