Kamasa described it as “one of the largest single investments in independent British movies by any one company in the last 12 months”.

He is very much on track to fulfil the strategy outlined when the company was launched towards the end of 2023 of co-financing more than $150m of UK independent productions over True Brit’s first three years, with backing from international music management company Three Six Zero.

“We absolutely believe that audiences are craving more great British movies that do not need necessarily to be about huge budget or scale, but are interesting, original, commercial with great British characters, settings and stories that they can go and see at the cinema,” Kamasa told the industry audience at London’s Vue West End.

True Brit currently has a slate of 13 films. Ten films have completed shooting, with three due to start in the coming months.

Projects in the edit to debut footage at yesterday’s event include Gurinder Chadha’s Christmas Karma, a London-shot and set contemporary family musical inspired by Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, with an eclectic cast list that includes Kunal Nayyar, Eva Longoria, Hugh Bonneville, Danny Dyer, Boy George, Pixie Lott and Billy Porter, to be released in UK-Ireland cinemas on November 28.

“My main aim with Christmas Karma was to create a festive classic that made me feel like [Frank] Capra’s movie [It’s A Wonderful Life], but for our times and for generations to come, by adapting one of history’s greatest novels, Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol,” said Chadha.

The Bend It Like Beckham director continued, “It’s a magical, colourful, feel-good Christmas movie. I know I do feel-good, but I’ve outdone myself with feel-good on this one.”

Chadha commended True Brit for what she perceived as “putting the soul back into British cinema”.

Director-actor Craig Roberts introduced footage of his Wales-shot comedy horror The Scurry, which stars Paapa Essiedu, Antonia Thomas and Rhys Ifans.

“The Scurry was born out of my love for legendary genre films and creature features like The Birds and Jaws,”  he said. “I want this film to kind of take audiences on a wild and unpredictable ride, to be honest, like laughing out loud one second, but then jumping out of their seats in pure terror the next. And what’s important to me is that people experience this film in the most cinematic way.”

George Jaques introduced a scene from his sophomore feature, Sunny Dancer, three weeks into its edit; the film stars Bella Ramsey, Neil Patrick Harris, James Norton and Jessica Gunning. It wrapped its Glasgow shoot in May.

The comedy drama follows a 17-year-old at a summer camp for young people affected by cancer, although, Jaques was keen to point out, “Cancer is the least interesting thing about them. This isn’t a sob story. It has no hospital scenes. This is a love letter to young survivors who are done with being shown as bald, sickly children… And I wanted this to be a love letter to the ’90s ensemble films I loved so much, even if I wasn’t born when they came out.”

Footage was also debuted of Amir El-Masry and Pierce Brosnan in Rowan Athale’s Leeds-shot Giant, a biopic of boxer Prince Naseem ‘Naz’ Hamed, that follows his rise from the working-class streets of Sheffield, to which Kamasa drew comparisons with Southpaw, Ali and Eddie The Eagle. It will hit UK-Ireland cinemas on October 24. Another boxing biopic, Anthony Wonke’s Ramla Ali film In The Shadows, is also set for release later this year.

In 2026, True Brit will distribute Morgan Mathews’ Ireland-set 500 Miles starring Bill Nighy and Maisie Williams, and Natasha Kermani’s Cornwall-shot gothic horror The Dreadful starring Kit Harington and Sophie Turner.

Also completed is Michael Sarnoski’s The Death Of Robin Hood, starring Hugh Jackman and Jodie Comer, which A24 will release in the US.

True Brit has already released Anand Tucker’s The Critic, which grossed £1.7m at the UK-Ireland box office with Lionsgate licensed to distribute, and Nick Love’s Marching Powder, which took £3.1m.