Special program "Escaping Realities“  

Every four seconds a Harlequin Mills & Boon romance novel is sold somewhere in the world. In India, the books give Shumita hope that her straying husband will return. In Japan, housewife Hiroko yearns to make fantasy reality with her handsome ballroom dancing teacher. And in Warrington, mum-of-three Shirley rifles through the books for ideas on how to keep her marriage spicy. But it’s not only the female readers who dream of a perfect romance. New York model Stephen has been on over 200 Mills & Boon covers, but can’t find his true love. While romance novelist Gill Sanderson is in fact a pensioner called Roger, writing from a caravan in the North of England. Guilty Pleasures explores our universal struggle to reconcile inner fantasy with the tragicomic truths of real-life relationships. Five heroes, four continents, one dream of true love. Because real life begins where Mills & Boon ends…

Festivals

International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 2010
ZagrebDox International Documentary Film Festival, Croatia, 2011
BFI London Film Festival, Great Britain, 2010
Krakow Film Festival, Poland, 2011
DocVille International Documentary Film Festival, Leuven, Belgium, 2011

Julie Moggan

Growing up in a small town in East Anglia, she yearned for a way to escape what she thought was an ordinary, unremarkable life. After working in the local chicken factory to save some money, she set off at eighteen to see the world. Her travels inspired her to study social and visual anthropology and documentary-making at film school. There, she discovered that she’d come full circle, and that the films she liked most showed the beauty, drama and humour in ordinary, everyday life. She has made films for the BBC and Channel 4. Guilty Pleasures is her first feature length documentary.

Filmography

Waiting for a Lift (2004)
As the Sun Begins to Set (2005)