IT is a long way from the dark editing rooms of Southampton's Solent University.

But a former Film Studies student will be mixing with the likes of Angelina Jolie, Penelope Cruz, and Jack Black on the French Riviera this week when his film appears at the Cannes Film Festival.

Neil McEnery-West spent five years making the 27-minute film Undertow that has already wowed film buffs by winning Best Actor and Best Director at the New York International Awards.

The 32-year-old film-maker, who is now based in London, described the film as a tragic love story about two people coming to terms with loss.

Click here to see a clip from the film

Filmed mostly in London, the film follows two men who wander the streets of a deserted city with neither having any memory of how they came to be there.

Speaking to the Daily Echo, Neil said: "It was a fantastic surprise and great honour when we got confirmation that we were going to the Cannes Film Festival.

"It's one of the most prestigious film festivals in the world and there's lots of great opportunities to meet other film producers and talk about exciting new projects.

"There's a couple of film-makers that I admire that I'm hoping to bump into but it's more about the business side of things for me and trying to sell on some future projects."

With a budget of only £200 Neil got his friends and family involved in the production, including his wife Clea, who appears in the film.

Neil said: "The film focuses on the story of two characters that experience the same emotional journey, but in opposite worlds that eventually collide.

"Dialogue is used at an absolute minimum and the story is communicated through a carefully constructed visual and sound design.

"The good thing about Undertow is that everyone has their own interpretation of it which they can contribute their personal experiences to. I think we managed to create a film that is quite unusual, it's almost like a visual poem."