Plaza Cinema screenings for John May and Tim Edwards’ emotional film that’s had standing ovations

A powerful film documenting a life-changing walk by Liverpool comedian and actor John May and Tim Edwards, whose daughter Elle was murdered on Christmas Eve 2022, is being screened at the Plaza Cinema in November.

The Two of Us tells the story of two men going through their own very personal struggles and finding support, friendship and laughs on an emotional journey from Land’s End to John O’Groats.

Made by John and director Owen Ward, the 90-minute film had its world premiere at the 33rd Raindance Film Festival 2025 in London this summer. 

It was nominated for Best Documentary Feature and Best UK Cinematography and had standing ovations from audiences at every screening.

Now local audiences will have a chance to see it on the big screen when it’s shown at the Plaza in Waterloo on limited release from Sunday November 16 to Thursday November 20.

There will also be an exclusive screening on the Saturday evening including a live Q&A with John and Owen and a charity auction which will raise funds to help the pair take their film to more festivals around the world.

After fantastic reviews and an overwhelmingly positive reception so far, John says they’re keen to get The Two of Us seen by as many people as possible.

He said:

“We’re an independent production company, we both had jobs which we gave up to give this a go, so we’re trying our hardest to get this out there. This run really helps us showcase the film even more and the aim then is to get distribution.”

When John set off on the walk of self-discovery, intending to raise awareness about gun and knife crime, he’d always planned to vlog it for his own YouTube channel.

But having Tim join him changed what the journey was about and they ended up tackling not only the physical challenges of a 1,000-mile trek, but the emotional ones too as they opened up about their experiences and trauma.

By the end, John realised that the footage he had was more than just some vlogs.

“Me and Owen had a backer who’d offered to support us in starting our own production company but we didn’t know what our first project was going to be,” he explains.

“I’d been filming the whole time I was away with Tim and the longer it went on, the more it was obvious to me that it wasn’t just about a walk, it was about two men dealing with hardships and having to learn lessons along the way. To me it had the beats of a film.”

He discussed the idea with Owen, who agreed.

“We had all this rough phone footage and we thought we could build a documentary around it, but it couldn’t just be that,” says Owen. “So then we thought, how do we elevate it? 

“We decided we wanted to tell the story through interviews and contrast that with the footage of the walk. So we went back to the locations and once we were there, memories came flooding back, and things I hadn’t planned just came out and took things in a different direction.

“We do go to some quite dark places with it, but my intention was always to lift that up with humour every now and then to keep the balance. That’s what happened on the journey they were on anyway, Tim was in this dark place of grief and John would lift him up with humour so I wanted to do that within the film and I think that’s what has resonated with people.”

John says so many people who’ve already seen The Two of Us have been moved by the two men’s openness.

“I’ve always been transparent about my mental health and I think people see me, a lad from County Road, being honest about my struggles and it makes them feel a bit more normal.

“We didn’t set out to make a statement about mental health but a lot of people have described this film as important, and that’s not something we’d ever really considered. 

“Even people like Jimmy McGovern and Colin McKeown have said we’ve created something special so to have praise from them really means something.

“We believe we’ve made something good, people who’ve seen it tell us we have, so now we just want more people to see it.”

Book you tickets on the Plaza Community Cinema website.

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