Emma Darcy, best known for her role as Rhaenyra Targaryen in HBO’s “House of the Dragon,” has been cast in the British short film “The Last Train Home,” directed by Jesse Gatti. This short film is rooted in Gatti’s own experience battling incurable cancer.
Darcy plays Eve, who reunites with her childhood friend who is caught between the living and the dead. Spanning a hospice bed and a ghostly steam locomotive, the film is pitched by its makers as a story about the coming of death, an attempt to portray death not as a discrete event but as an extended, multifaceted human experience.
Gatch’s illness is the basis of the project. The 27-year-old was diagnosed with ovarian cancer that had spread to her liver and spleen in 2019, and underwent chemotherapy in a ward shared with terminally ill patients. When her illness returned and was declared incurable during the 2020 lockdown, she channeled her experience into a semi-autobiographical short film, The Forgotten C, directed by Molly Manning Walker, which received a BIFA nomination. Since then, she has been preoccupied with the question of how one can approach death spiritually without religious doctrine. In particular, I have studied the phenomenon of the dying, a widely documented experience in which dying people encounter visions of those who have already passed away.
The film crystallized during a two-week stay at Prospect Cottage in Dungeness, a remote coastal promontory that was the home of the late artist and director Derek Jarman. The location is Britain’s only desert, where sparse natural life and heavy industrial infrastructure blend together, providing both the visual setting and thematic undercurrent. German’s longtime collaborator Donna McKevitt, who co-wrote the album Translucent and contributed to the soundtrack for his last film, Blue, has been signed on to compose the music.
“The film almost completely avoids the death process, confining it to last gasps and acts of bloody violence,” said Gatti. “But death is layered, messy, terrifying, beautiful, and often deeply connected. This film exists because I’ve lived in that space, and there are few stories that can keep us there.”
The film is co-produced by Commonplace Films’ Cat Marshall and primetime actor and producer Victoria Emslie, under the banner Last Train Home Limited. The film has a budget of £72,000 ($97,000) and is currently in production financing.
“‘Last Train Home’ is more than just a movie. It’s an invitation to the freedom that comes from accepting your death and remembering how to live,” Emslie said. “One day, we will all get on the train home. By accepting this, we may finally be able to live without fear. Art makes it easier to hold these truths.”
Marshall added: “‘Last Train Home’ is a project that our entire team is passionate about, as it not only challenges perceptions of death and dying, one of the most difficult yet universal experiences we all face, but also challenges industry practices and norms.”
During the funding stage, the project was accepted into a financial sponsorship scheme run by Breaking Through the Lens, a non-profit organization that supports gender equality in film. The creative team was assembled to reflect that mission. Shaheen Baig, whose casting credits include Peaky Blinders and Adolescence, will serve as casting director. BAFTA Breakthrough 2025 winner Natalie Pitters is the cinematographer, Lucy Red is the production designer, Nce Ascuo is the editor, and Ines Adriana is the sound designer. Molinare is providing in-kind post-production support and Panavision is supplying camera equipment.
Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider serves as executive producer. Mr. Ungerleider is a former executive behind the Oscar-nominated documentaries “End Game” and “Extremis,” and the founder of endwellproject.org, a nonprofit focused on reimagining end-of-life care.
“Projects like Last Train Platform open up spaces that we rarely have access to,” Ungerleider said. “They challenge us to face death with curiosity, kindness, and humanity, rather than fear and distance.”
Daphne Schmon, CEO and founder of Breaking Through the Lens, said the film exemplified “brave, values-based filmmaking” and said Gatch brought “a rare tenderness and honesty to the dying process.”
Production also goes against the industry’s standard working conditions. Citing a survey by film and TV charity Looking Glass which found 80% of disabled respondents said they were considering leaving the industry due to mental health pressures, the team will be working with End of Life Doula UK to commit to 7+1 hour filming days and provide doula support for all cast and crew.
The filmmakers situate the project within a broader social resistance to confronting mortality. A 2023 UK survey found that a majority (58%) thought death and bereavement were too uncomfortable topics to be addressed, while a US survey found that death ranked below sex, money and religion in the ranking of topics people were willing to openly discuss, and only 32% were prepared to address it.
Gatti’s debut feature documentary Blue Has No Borders premiered in the International First Feature Competition at Sheffield Dockfest 2025 and was shortlisted for the BIFA Debut Documentary Director Award. Her debut feature novel, My Cells Are Trying to Kill Me, is produced by Loran Dunn at Delaval Film and is in development with the BFI. Last Train Home previously won The Pitch Fund’s Best Drama Award and was a finalist in both For the Silver Screen’s Analog Short Film Fund and Primetime’s Empowerment Fund.
