Hollywood actor DB Sweeney presented Stuart St Paul with Best Director at the prestigious Breckenridge Film Festival, where his film Freight also took Best Actor for Danny Midwinter who plays the evil Russian sex trafficker.

St Paul beat fellow director Anthony Waller, who he previously collaborated with on American Werewolf In Paris years before in Luxembourg. Waller was also a nominee (finalist), and he walked away with some of the other technical awards.

The next day many winners took questions at a press gala, but it was St Paul’s sex trafficking film Freight that took all the limelight.

The movie Freight was bought by Mel Gibson’s company ICON and investors were repaid with a profit. ICON now own the rights and income. It was on Netflix and is now on Prime, but can be found on Amazon.

The Good Film Guide on Freight – 

Stuart tested himself as a novelist by writing the book based on the award winning screenplay. The novel Human Freight and the DVD Freight are available on Amazon.

ITV nearly joined the Freight team in the venture, but when they said no, and Screen Yorkshire also bowed out in favour of higher profile films, Yorkshire Business Angels stepped in and funded the Leeds based movie along with funds from Stuart St Paul, his producer partner Martin Campbell and Stuart’s son, entrepreneur Luke Aikman (who plays one of the brothers in the film). All financiers and the Yorkshire Angels Group were paid back in full with a premium within a year.

Freight also stars Craig Fairbrass who stars in BBC’s Boat Story, and Laura Aikman (Stuart’s daughter) who plays Dyan Cannon in ITVX’s Archie, and she appears as James Corden’s girlfriend in the Christmas special of Gavin and Stacey. Both are with Stuart in Bula Quo where Craig first works the dry humour he uses in Boat Story.

Freight brought Stuart and Martin invitations and awards from all over the globe. The no-budget twenty day Brit-flic was made in Leeds with many crew from ITV’s soap Emmerdale. Stuart is a film maker who spent about two days a month as an advisor to Emmerdale for 26 years. Members of the crew often said they wanted to make a movie and he called their bluff. Martin Campbell, Stuart St Paul, and the ITV team have together won dozens of awards for Best Episode, Best Exit, Best Action, etc, and had all sat at a table at the NTA awards as finalists for the Emmerdale episode The Storm.

Stuart said that what topped his desire to make the film about sex trafficking was a documentary about Eastern Europe from his old buddy Michael Pallin, who he worked with on Channel 4’s GBH. The figures shocked Stuart so much that he set about a screenplay. The extensive research was harrowing, and he has used it in two of the CSCI cruise novels. Cruise Traffic: Human Laundry and he touches upon it in the seventh book out in 2024, Cruise Ship Murder Reunion.