A young woman arrives at a remote wellness retreat for Deaf people, but nothing is what it seems. If you don’t immediately recognize this set-up, you most likely haven’t seen Retreat, the genre-bending debut thriller from British writer-director Ted Evans that has left audiences guessing until the very end.
Billed as “the world’s first deaf thriller” and starring Anne Zander, James Joseph Boyle and Sophie Stone, Retreat, highlighted by THR as a hidden gem, is also a key reason for Evans to feature on the 2026 U.K. BAFTA Breakthrough list of rising talent, supported by Netflix, which was unveiled on Wednesday.
Among his past work, the creative directed the TV documentary Rose Ayling-Ellis: Signs for Change and short films.
THR talked to Evans about making a splash with his first feature, the short he made with the same title, making the BAFTA Breakthrough list, and what’s next.
Sorry to say that my sign language is not up to snuff. How exciting is it to be a BAFTA Breakthrough creative?
Oh, it is a huge honor. It was a big surprise just to be acknowledged and to be amongst these amazing creatives, especially my lead actress, Sophie Stone. To be alongside her for this honor is terrific.
How similar is the feature Retreat to your short film that had the same title?
It’s a long story. So I made a short film of the same name, and it was about a community. But it was a shoestring short I made for hardly any money at all about 14 years ago. That short did well within the community, but I wasn’t satisfied with it – there was so much more.
I then spent a decade excavating and developing something, and it became something completely different thematically. It has the same title, and Sophie was in the short as well, but they’re not really connected. The origin story is much more about us as filmmakers and actors coming together, and the project was born out of that.
How cool was it to have a film where all the lead cast members are deaf, and I heard behind the scenes there was also a special focus on the community.
Yeah, absolutely. As a deaf man, I grew up in this community, and I’m obviously very passionate about what I call “sign language cinema.” We all have stories ourselves. We’re all part of the human experience, and cinema is such a wonderful way to show the full diversity of what it means to be human. To bring deaf people, our languages, and our culture to cinema has been amazing.
We had such an amazing cast, and we did have some deaf talent behind the camera as well. We had sign language directors, assistant directors, and runners and stuff like that. So it was great.
And as a filmmaker, working with sign language, which is a visual language, taught me so much more about the medium.
Can you share some more insight on that?
If you think about continuity, you must make sure that with every shot, every take, there is a flow of continuity. And you think about rhythm and visual grammar. Working with sign language has helped me as a filmmaker understand filmmaking.
I’m not saying that spoken language films don’t [focus on the same things], but you can get away with ADR [Automated Dialogue Replacement], replacing dialogue in post. That is completely different when you’re working with sign language.
What are you hoping for from the BAFTA Breakthrough programs?
I have lots of ideas. I write, I direct. I’m looking forward to networking to meet people with a lot more experience and connections in the industry, just to work out the next chapter and what’s possible. Obviously, there are lots of pipe dreams, but you’ve got to be realistic in today’s world. Obviously, it’s not easy. I’m just going to be like a sponge, and I’m just excited to learn really and to make more connections.
You mentioned you have a lot of ideas. Is there any new film or series that you’re particularly focused on developing?
My slate is quite healthy. I’m allowed to say that I have a horror in development with BBC Film, which is in the very, very early stages. I’m really excited about that. I am hoping to work more inside the community as well as hopefully branch outwards. So, it’s an exciting time.
Retreat shows different types of sign languages, but the focus is British Sign Language (BSL). Can people from abroad understand that?
Really, American Sign Language is very different from British Sign Language, and actually, more countries are influenced by American Sign Language. In Australia, they have Auslan, which is related to BSL, but they’re all languages of their own. But yes, in fact, in Retreat, we have several languages, including German.
If you think about Native American tribes in America, they all had their own languages, but they had an actual sign language that was called Hand Talk, and it was a modality for people to trade between different communities.
What’s your hope for Retreat and its impact?
Ultimately, I always feel I have two audiences. I have my community, and then I have the rest of the world. For both of them, number one, you want them to go through a thrilling ride. You want them to enjoy the film, but then there are layers that they can go into.
I hope that it’s universal. I hope it’s not just about our experience. It’s about choice. It’s about understanding what makes you who you are, whether it’s your community or the experience you go through, and what happens when you take one of them out. Hopefully it makes people think. We’re releasing the film early next year into cinemas, which I’m really excited about. We’ve had an amazing year starting at Toronto with our world premiere, and we traveled around the world a lot. So, I just feel really blessed and honored.
