Simon Horrocks

Simon Horrocks was born in Palmers Green, North London, on July 11th, 1965. He is the son of Anthony Horrocks and Janet Youngs, who separated when he was 3 years old. He has one older brother, Nicolas Horrocks, and a younger half-brother, Nathan Horrocks. Simon Horrocks spent part of his early childhood raised on an art and crafts commune in Somerset. After his father watched Easy Rider in 1969, he left his job as a lecturer at Hornsey School of Art and led a group of artists to start an alternative life on a farmhouse converted into studios. Horrocks made his first films from the age of 8, shooting with a clockwork 8mm camera. At the age of 9, his father went to live in St Lucia and he moved back with his mother and stepfather, Iain Manson, attending St Dunstans Secondary School. At 13, the family moved back to North London, where Horrocks has lived since (apart from 2 years in Brighton, from 1988-1990). Doing a Foundation in Art & Design in 1983-84 at Middlesex University, he again worked on 8mm films, this time in collaboration with Jonathan Glazer (Sexy Beast, Under the Skin). He applied to do a degree in Fine Art Film at St Martin University, but when he failed to get a place he went on to start a career music. In 1991 he formed pop-dance duo Aquarius with his then life-partner, Sarah Jane Fogg. Their debut single "Hey Babe" was awarded Melody Maker "Single of the Week" in January, 1993, two weeks after their first son, Titus, was born. Completely self-promoted, the song was played on Radio 1, notably by legendary DJ John Peel. Although, the exposure would normally have resulted in the song making it into the UK charts, the record label (Solid Pleasure, owned by Yello's Dieter Meier) had failed to distribute the single to stores as they didn't believe the song would get any media attention, and the release was a commercial failure. Horrocks and Fogg went on to produce Tara Newley's debut album (unreleased) for Trevor Horn's ZTT label. From 1997, they worked for major publishing label Carlin Music, who were later bought by Warner Chappell. After splitting with Sarah Fogg in 2008, in 2009 Horrocks set out to make his debut feature, Third Contact. Shooting the film on consumer camcorder, without a crew and a budget of £4000, it took 3 years to complete. On Sept 2nd, 2013, Third Contact made cinema history by being the first self-funded micro-budget film to screen during peak time at London's BFI IMAX and the first full-length fiction film to premiere in-theatre and simultaneously broadcast live to over 20 countries with a follow up director's Q&A via twitter and Google hangout. Third Contact was shot on a consumer camcorder, without a professional crew, on a budget of £4000 and premiered at the prestigious Hof Film Festival in Germany. German press reviewed the film very favourably, with award-winning critic Thomas Rothschild hailing it as a "masterpiece" and comparing it to work by Evald Schorm and Ken Loach.