Marcus Dillistone

Dillistone with The Princess Royal at BAFTA for the royal premiere of his film The Troop.

Marcus Dillistone is a British film director.

A close friend of Sir John Mills, he directed the BBC/Carlton documentary of Mills' life, Sir John Mills' Moving Memories. Dillistone and Mills first collaborated on Dillistone's film The Troop, which had a Royal Premiere at BAFTA in the presence of The Princess Royal. A copy of the film was requested by a Royal Equerry for screening to The Queen at Sandringham over Christmas. A 35mm film print was donated by Fujifilm, Technicolor, and Glory Film Co. Dillistone directed Mills in his last ever screen appearance, Lights 2, in which he played a tramp.^[1] Shot at Pinewood Studios, Mills was lit by veteran cinematographer Jack Cardiff, they had last worked together on 'Scott of The Antarctic'.

Dillistone was educated at The Skinners' School in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, and Medway College of Design, before gaining an honours degree at Staffordshire University, specialising in design and film production. He set up the company Glory Film Co. to make The Troop with help from Paul-Anthony Viollet, a former King's Troop RHA officer. Cinematographer on The Troop was Alex Thomson (cinematographer).^[2]

As a result of The Troop, with which Fujifilm collaborated, Dillistone was commissioned to make a series of films for worldwide release to demonstrate Fuji's new motion picture filmstocks. For these technically demanding projects, Marcus employed some of the world's leading cinematographers:^[3] Oscar-winners Jack Cardiff and Ronnie Taylor, together with Phedon Papamichael,^[4] John de Borman, Sue Gibson, Thierry Arbogast, Ron Stanett, and Tony Pierce-Roberts. The films were shot at Pinewood and Shepperton studios, with locations including Hastings in East Sussex.

In 2001, Dillistone directed a major British Film Institute tribute event held in the Painted Hall in Greenwich. Hosted by The Lord's Taverners, and the First Sea Lord of the Royal Navy, Admiral Sir Nigel Essenhigh; participating artists included Sir Roger Moore, Stephen Fry, Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber, Lord Richard Attenborough, Juliet Mills, Hayley Mills, Richard Stilgoe, Sarah Miles, and Dame Kiri te Kanawa.

Experience working on major musical recordings, including work with The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra,^[5] led to Dillistone being employed as Associate Producer Music for the Athens 2004 Summer Olympics opening ceremony and closing ceremony. In December 2007, Dillistone was invited by the Governor of Luxor to screen a trailer of his latest film to the former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and the Prime Minister of Egypt, Ahmed Nazif. This was followed by an Invitation from the Jordanian Minister of Culture to present a film at the 2009 Jordan Festival in Amman.

In December 2010, Dillistone completed an Ice Suite for the world famous Icehotel (Jukkasjärvi), working 200km north of the Arctic Circle in Swedish Lappland at temperatures down to –40°C. On 2 July 2013, it was announced by Icehotel that Marcus would return to the Arctic to complete a new creative concept: a London Underground tube terminus built entirely from snow and ice entitled "Mind the Gap (Last Stop on the Northern Line)".

Dillistone is also involved in social and charitable film making, being particularly known for films dealing with social and medical matters (his films have garnered a number of British Medical Association awards). Dillistone has supported organisations such as the Riding for the Disabled Association, the British Brain and Spine Foundation, and the Sarah Lamping Memorial Expedition. In June 2011, he was invited to launch the Spinal Injury Patient Film at The Ludwig Guttmann conference - this film garnered a prize at the 2012 Telly Awards.

Dillistone has presented papers at the World's two leading broadcast conventions, NAB (USA) and IBC (Europe). He also lectures extensively on film making, including lectures at UCLA, the American University in Washington DC and Staffordshire University (UK). Topics include documentary films, scientific, medical and technical films, and travel films. Marcus has also hosted master-classes in the USA, Europe and the Caribbean, on filmmaking, imaging and photography. Dillistone has written articles for several professional publications, including Televisual, AV Magazine, Kodak's magazine and Exposure.

In September 2013, in recognition of his contribution to medical filmmaking, Dillistone was elected a Member of the Royal Society of Medicine. He is a key figure in the development of healthcare knowledge transfer, and on 30 April 2014 gave the keynote lecture at The Royal Society's annual conference on ethics.

Marcus Dillistone

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