The Hollywood Reporter can unveil an exclusive clip from Ollie Gardner and Jake Harvey’s The State of Us, ahead of its premiere in competition at Edinburgh International Film Festival on Friday.
Led by California Schemin‘s Samuel Bottomley and It’s a Sin breakout star Callum Scott Howells, the British indie follows a boisterous tearaway called Frankie (Bottomley), who is struggling to come to terms with the inevitability of losing his best friend Taylor (Howells) to cancer. Frankie impulsively breaks Taylor out of hospice care for one final night of fun and debauchery, but what promises to be a night of hedonism quickly becomes something much more complicated.
In the clip, Bottomley’s character can be seen cajoling Howells’ Taylor into having a drink and letting loose at a house party. On the dance floor, Taylor feels some semblance of relief as he reconnects with his childhood best friend.
The characters in The State of Us are loosely based on Harvey’s childhood friendship group, in particular a friend called Jake Andrews, who died from cancer at the age of 18. Harvey and Gardner first met at university before pursuing careers in the arts — Harvey in TV, Gardner in theater — and with this movie, make their feature-length debuts. Co-starring with Bottomley and Howells are Frances Barber, Safia Oakley-Green, Seamus O’Hara, and Duggal Ram.
Gardner told THR ahead of the film’s premiere: “I think it’d be quite nice for young men to see this film and see themselves in it from a perspective of, ‘Oh I can joke around and I know where the line is, but I also can really tap into the love that I feel for those male friendships.’ This is one very small seed that we’re trying to [plant] in the discourse of masculinity. We really want to dig into it because it’s such an incredibly complex and complicated theme.”
Harvey added that he also hopes the humor lifts audiences heading to watch the film in the Scottish capital. “I think there’s a version of our film which was probably a bit more arthouse, a bit more serious, and more lends itself to that contemporary British type of independent cinema. But actually, [we’re] trying to do something that feels accessible,” he said. “It’s got its jokes and it’s dark humor, [and we hope] that it could actually reach the audience that it needs to speak to.”
The 2026 Edinburgh International Film Festival runs from Aug. 14-21, and kicks off on Thursday with Louis Paxton’s The Incomer. Festival director Paul Ridd told THR he thinks it’s their greatest competition slate since they rebooted the event three years ago. “I’ve been very proud of everything we’ve done in 2024 [and] 2025… But this one, I think, is really kind of surpassing expectations.”
Take a look at Samuel Bottomley and Callum Scott Howells in a clip from The State of Us below.
