The Silent Child
Set in rural England and Inspired by real life events. The Silent Child film centres around a profoundly deaf four year old girl named Libby who is born into a middle class family and lives in a world of silence until a caring social worker teaches her the gift of communication.
When fresh faced social worker, Joanne turns up we see Libby transform. This once withdrawn four year old suddenly feels connected to the world and over a short period of time Joanne and Libby’s relationship blossoms.
An insightful short story, inspired by real life events, observing one of the loneliest disabilities and the avoidable struggles that deaf children face.
“Gorgeously shot and perfectly performed, the movie delivers an emotional wallop that many features six times its length never achieve” – The New York Times
The journey for The Silent Child is rather unique. From an IndieGoGo campaign, all the way to The Oscars, this short film started conversations about the important issues for deaf people all around the globe. The Silent Child gained a rare amount of exposure for a short film.
“Effortlessly heart-tugging” – Los Angeles Times
The film has played in over 100 film festivals world wide as well as airing on prime time television on BBC One. Theresa May congratulated the impact the film has had in Parliament as well as the education minister considering a GCSE in British Sign Language for the first time ever.
Not only has the film achieved huge critical acclaim but it has also changed the life of one very special young girl. Maisie Sly, the star of the film, was 5 years old at the time of filming. She broke hearts around the world with her stunning performance and has more than just a few Best Actress accolades to add to her trophy cabinet. She is a true deaf role model and has even been awarded a Points Of Light Award from the prime-minister for her contribution in raising the profile of deafness. Maisie is in popular demand as an actress and has already done commercials for Aldi and Hauwei.
The prime minister told MPs: “I think everybody was captivated by Maisie’s example and by the film that won the Oscar.”
Theresa May paid tribute to Maisie “for her incredible achievement”.
“I think this is important in highlighting the issue of disabled people particularly of deaf people and I think this has captured the imagination of so many across the world,” she said.
“A rich script from first-time screenwriter Rachel Shenton” – IndieWire
Maisie Sly communicates using British Sign Language (BSL) and had never acted before when she competed against 100 other deaf or hard-of-hearing children for the lead role in the short film.
Maisie’s MP Justin Tomlinson asked the prime minister and MPs to praise his constituent for her amazing achievement.
And he paid tribute to her school, Red Oaks primary, “who helped her fulfill her true potential.”
“On Sunday it wasn’t Meryl Streep winning an Oscar but my constituent Maisie Sly aged just six years old and born profoundly deaf for her amazing performance in the film The Silent Child,” he said.
“The only one that stood out to me as an actual movie was The Silent Child. It’s beautiful and it’s a real little movie. I loved it” – The Hollywood Reporter
As if winning an Oscar® wasn’t enough for The Silent Child, The Speech (in British Sign Language) really sparked some attention and got even more people talking and more importantly raised the profile of deafness once again on one of the biggest stages in the world. Over 33 million people witnessed Rachel sign her speech.
The Guardian wrote:
Much of the talk before Sunday’s Oscars ceremony was about Hollywood’s moral compass.
After 2016’s Oscars So White debacle and the Time’s Up movement, attention was particularly drawn towards how the awards show would approach diversity and, in particular, the equitable treatment of areas such as race and sex.
One of the issues that was in rather less sharp focus was disability in Hollywood films. That was until Sunday’s show was stolen by the stars of the Silent Child, a British production about a profoundly deaf child, which won best live-action short film.
The film tells the story of Libby, played by six-year-old Maisie Sly, who struggles to communicate until a social worker, played by Rachel Shenton, teaches her sign language.
Shenton, who also wrote the short, gave her acceptance speech on Sunday in British Sign Language (BSL), fulfilling a promise to Sly, who is profoundly deaf and was in the audience.
Later she said Sly had “held the Oscar, she said it was very heavy, she had her photograph taken with it and then said she wanted to go back and see her brothers and sisters, so she’s keeping it real.”
Prior to the awards ceremony, Sly was pictured on the film’s Twitter account holding a sign that read: “Disability is Diversity,” underlining Shenton’s point that the issue should not be excluded from Hollywood’s introspection.
In her acceptance speech, Shenton said: “This is happening. Millions of children all over the world live in silence and face communication barriers, and particularly access to education.”
Sly was born in Plymouth and when she was two her parents moved the family more than 100 miles to Swindon to gain better access to better specialist education for deaf children for her and her siblings.
She had never acted before but Shenton said Sly had “taken it all in her stride. She always said we’d win.”
Shenton began learning sign-language at the age of 12, after her father went deaf. “Deafness is a silent disability. You can’t see it and it’s not life-threatening, so I want to say the biggest of thank-yous to the academy for allowing us to put this in front of a mainstream audience.”
Rachel has been signing for 15 years so it is very normal for her to sign, although she said it was “truly heartwarming” to see the reaction and the impact that its had.