The film, which features a working class cast and crew, has been developed by Kevin Walls, a Film and Television lecturer at New College Lanarkshire, who describes his new work as a “coming-of-age film about two millennials who aren’t quite fully formed.”
It stars Elle Watson as Eilidh, an “aimless” aspiring, and failing, artist, alongside James Rottger as Cameron, her “meticulous, career-obsessed” flatmate.
When Eilidh realises she is pregnant, both “assume there is an obvious way out”, but as it becomes clear that she cannot go through with an abortion, the two are forced to confront reality in an “awkward, absurd and increasingly intimate attempt at preparing for parenthood”.
Premature sees two flatmates forced to confront the reality of parenthood and more after a one-night stand. (Image: Thomas Alexander)
For Walls, producing a film marks the culmination of many years of study and professional work that has seen him gain experience across both the public and private sectors in a variety of different roles: “I did my undergrad in sound production at the college, with a final year at UWS,” he told The Herald.
“Then I went to the Art School and did a Masters in Sound for Moving Image, having got a scholarship for that.
“After that I went and worked in industry for a bit as a sound mixer, so worked for BBC in daytime shows just mixing sound for that, and then I started doing night classes in screen writing, and also started making stuff for BBC The Social – I was one of the first contributors on that in early days.
“I also went and worked at STV as a video journalist, and when I was doing that during the day, I was doing my second Masters over at Glasgow Caledonian in TV writing, which again I got a scholarship for, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to afford it.
“When I finished that I started getting a couple of writing commissions with the BBC.”
Writer and director Kevin Walls (Image: Thomas Alexander)
Teaching work in a private school in Glasgow eventually led to a lecturing post at New College Lanarkshire, and during that time Walls also completed a further degree in acting in the same institution.
From there, writing a full feature film became the next target, with the summer holidays providing an ideal opportunity to produce an initial draft:
“A couple of weeks before we went back from summer break I just took two weeks, sat down, and wrote a script. I thought that I know plenty of actors now, we could get locations – it just felt much more achievable.
“There were parts in the script where I knew actors who were perfect for it, but we cast externally as well and ended up getting so many people who came through the college, or who were acting lecturers at the college, to step into these roles. We ended up having loads of people from the college who really wanted to get on board.”
The film was produced independently on a budget of just £16,000 – all of which was funded by Walls himself. It used a small core team and was shot across the greater Glasgow area over a 23-day period in the summer of 2025, with the production spending several days at the Coatbridge campus of New College Lanarkshire, and concluding at the University of the West of Scotland’s Ayrshire campus.
Artwork has been provided by GSA graduate Erin Marshall, while music from Scottish bands including Admiral Fallow, Cloth, Martha May and the Mondays, and Brownbear has also been licensed for the film.
The film was shot in locations across the Greater Glasgow area. (Image: Thomas Alexander)
Support was also provided by the Ideas to Impact funding programme at Glasgow Caledonian University, which provided £5,000 towards distribution costs.
For Walls, a key aspect of the projects success has been the incorporation and presentation of working class talent, much of which he sourced through the college itself:
“There’s a big thing in the film and TV industry about working class representation, and even just representation of people from Scotland in general, but New College Lancashire obviously have so many students who come from working class backgrounds. I think it was a really good opportunity to present an almost entirely working class crew and cast, with everything coming together to make something, which we normally don’t get to do.”
Walls also sought to portray Glasgow in a way that challenged stereotypical depictions of the city, with an emphasis on bright colours and a story that is “contemporary, romantic, and recognisably Scottish without defaulting to bleakness”:
“People fall in love in Glasgow, yet that version of the city isn’t always visible in film and television.”
Premature will official open on Friday 18th September with a Q&A screening at Showcase Cinema, Coatbridge.
The film will also be shown at:
Odeon (Glasgow Quay, Braehead, East Kilbride, Edinburgh West, Dundee, Dunfermline)
Omniplex (Glasgow and Clydebank)
Waterfront Cinema (Greenock)
Kino (Glenrothes)
Eden Court (Inverness)
Cromarty Cinema (Cromarty)
Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre (Dumfries)
Lonsdale Cinema (Annan)
Macrobert Arts Centre (University of Stirling)