Coconut Monk Films
Discover Stories That Matter
About
Coconut Monk Films is an independent production company led by Julia Stovell and Oliver Potterton, creating compelling documentaries and narrative films that explore complex human stories with depth and integrity.
Julia Stovell is a BAFTA-longlisted documentary filmmaker whose work spans character-driven observational documentaries and narrative features. Her first broadcast documentary, The Boy With Proteus Syndrome for Channel 4, was longlisted for Breakthrough Talent (sponsored by HBO Films) at the BAFTA Television Craft Awards 2006 and was broadcast in prime time and sold internationally. Four generations of her family have served, and she has spent a decade building relationships within the Vietnam War photographer and veteran community. Julia was selected for the prestigious Guiding Lights Mentorship Programme with Academy Award-winner James Marsh and has been mentored by renowned producer Kenith Trodd (The Singing Detective). Her narrative screenplay Broken Ground (developed as Deadeye) received support through the BFI NETWORK England: Early Development Fund.
Oliver Potterton is a producer and editor who began his career at The National Film Board of Canada before spending several years as a trailer editor in London, cutting campaigns for films by the Coen Brothers, Ken Loach, Robert Altman, and Roman Polanski. Chosen by acclaimed photographer Helmut Newton to cut Helmut By June (StudioCanal/HBO/BBC Four), he was also additional editor on Peace One Day (dir. Jeremy Gilley, BBC / Passion Pictures), nominated for Best Documentary at the British Independent Film Awards 2004. He produced and edited Everything, starring Ray Winstone, which earned writer-director Richard Hawkins a BAFTA nomination for the Carl Foreman Award.
Together, we've created over 20 years of work across BBC, Channel 4, and independent production, specializing in character-driven storytelling across documentary and narrative forms.
PTSD A Love Story.
“A masterpiece on trauma, healing and hope” Professor Peter Lee. RAF Chaplain Iraq.
PTSD A Love Story. In post production
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PTSD A Love Story. In post production *
PTSD: A Love Story. A feature-length documentary.
Tagline: “One war ends, another begins at home.”
Logline: An RAF veteran returns from Afghanistan with severe PTSD, and his wife begins a seven-year fight to keep him alive.
Synopsis: Luke comes home from Afghanistan and attempts to take his own life twice. His wife Nikita refuses to give up on him, launching a desperate campaign to save both her husband and their family. Filmed with unprecedented access over seven years, PTSD: A Love Story is an intimate portrait of the hidden war fought in Britain's living rooms — and of what "coming home" really means for military families.
Status: In post production.
Directed and Produced by Julia Stovell & Oliver Potterton.
Edited by Oliver Potterton.
Executive Producer: André Singer.
Consulting Editor: Judith Merritt.
THE HEIST
THE HEIST. Feature documentary. In development
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THE HEIST. Feature documentary. In development *
“When heroes become revolutionaries, the whole world watches.”
THE HEIST. A feature-length documentary
Tagline: “When heroes become revolutionaries, the whole world watches.”
Logline: Three paralysed Vietnam veterans execute the ultimate political heist- infiltrating the 1972 Republican National Convention to disrupt Nixon’s acceptance speech on live TV, launching a movement that changed America forever.
A political thriller, documented by legendary war photographers Catherine Leroy and Tim Page, and anchored by Bruce Springsteen’s transformative Vietnam Veteran’s benefit concert in LA, this film reveals how the most wounded among us became the most powerful voices for change.
Status: In development.
Writer/Director: Julia Stovell.
Executive Producers: Alex Gibney & André Singer.
BROKEN GROUND
(Developed as DEADEYE)
BROKEN GROUND. Fiction Feature. BFI NETWORK England: Early Development Fund.
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BROKEN GROUND. Fiction Feature. BFI NETWORK England: Early Development Fund. *
What happens when the most wounded among us become our greatest healers?
BROKEN GROUND: Fiction Feature
Tagline: What happens when the most wounded among us become our greatest healers?
Logline: A suicidal veteran goes to the Scottish Highlands to die. What he finds instead is a man undone by grief, a thoroughbred that won’t be touched, and a winter that changes all three of them.
Status: In development. Completed screenplay.
Writer/Director: Julia Stovell.
Development Support: BFI NETWORK England: Early Development Fund.
RAISING HELL. Feature documentary. In Production
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RAISING HELL. Feature documentary. In Production *
RAISING HELL
RAISING HELL: The Ballad of James Marcus Smith. A feature-length documentary.
Logline: Fifty years after he vanished at the height of his fame, a filmmaker finds the man who was going to be bigger than Elvis living in obscurity in the English Midlands.
Synopsis: 1964. Texan-born James Marcus Smith (PJ Proby) was set on being bigger than Elvis, who had hired him to record his demos. The Beatles launched his career on their first ever TV show in England. Tom Jones called him “…the greatest singer I ever heard” and Led Zeppelin were his backing band on his Three Week Hero album. Then overnight he disappeared. 50 years later, a naive filmmaker turns up on his doorstep in his hideaway in the middle of England and is told a story stranger than fiction…
Filmed over ten years, Raising Hell is a psychological portrait of talent, trauma and the patterns we struggle to break.
Status: Filming.
Writer/Director: Julia Stovell.
Produced and photographed by Julia Stovell & Oliver Potterton.
HIGHLAND COWBOY. Feature documentary. In development
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HIGHLAND COWBOY. Feature documentary. In development *
HIGHLAND COWBOY
HIGHLAND COWBOY- A feature-length documentary.
Logline: Jock Hutchison, a former Royal Marine pilot turned Highland cowboy, has discovered that the damaged racehorses he rescues from slaughter can heal his fellow veterans from the invisible wounds of war.
Status: In development. Eighteen months filmed.
Writer/ Director/Producer: Julia Stovell.
Photographed by: Oliver Potterton.
