Movie co-created by Wigan film-maker is on Amazon Prime
The film, set on Manchester's famous Canal Street, was made by Abigail Henry, who is originally from Marsh Green, and Kieron Moore from Manchester.
Spectrum’s celebration and exploration of diversity and sexuality toured film festivals in 2019 but the team is delighted it is now online for anyone to watch.
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Hide AdAbigail said: “It’s incredible to have these stories about the LGBTQ+ community in Manchester on a platform that is so accessible.
“The source of pride for us is that having spent so long working with people across a diverse community capturing these stories they re now available for audiences to view.
“We’ve had some really positive feedback from people who haven’t necessarily seen themselves represented on screen before. That has been a joy to receive and read.”
Spectrum enjoyed some success on the film circuit, screening as far afield as Canada and picking up a prize at a festival in Kansas in the USA.
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Hide AdThe film was shot in 2018 with cast and crew from Manchester’s LGBTQ+ community and appearances from Emmerdale’s Bhasker Patel and Shameless’ Alice Barry.
Ranging across a number of styles and genres, and mixing fiction with documentary elements, the stories in Spectrum include an amateur drag king, a trans woman on her first night out in her new identity and a vampire using a hook-up app.
All these lives intersect on one night in the northern city’s iconic gay village.
The Spectrum team says that during the Covid-19 pandemic the film has inadvertently become something of a time capsule remembering when nights out were possible and venues were open, and hopes it will strike a chord among viewers living under lockdown.
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Hide AdAbigail and Kieron are also working on another project, a full-length feature film which again is set around Manchester and Canal Street and explores LGBTQ+ themes.
Spectrum can be streamed by Amazon Prime subscribers, or rented by those who have not signed up at www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B088TQKQ9Y/