At Partners, we like to make training interesting, valuable and a bit of a laugh.

This year we’ve been getting everybody comfortable with film and film-making with a programme called Partners Productions. Which will culminate in teams of Partners people pitching their movie ideas (with 60 second trailers) to a hard-bitten panel of judges.

We’ve had illuminating talks from commercials director Theo Delaney and novelist R.N. Morris; with more to come from composers, editors and producers. And last week, we went to a mystery location for a whole day of film-based frolics.

The Luton Hoo Estate has been used as a location for countless TV dramas and will soon be seen as the backdrop in Spielberg’s production of  the hit stage play ‘War Horse’.  For our disparate teams of direct/digital natives, it hosted a recce treasure hunt, a fiendish movie quiz and the ‘live trailer challenge’ which gave our teams just a couple of hours to perform their take on the ideal trailer for famous movies, including Star Wars, Gosford Park, Juno, Finding Nemo and Grease. Armed only with a synopsis culled from Wikipedia, a few choice lines from their movie and props sourced from Poundworld, they set to work.

The results were – in every sense of the word – astonishing. Hitherto unknown skills in acting, costume design, set-building and choreography were brought to the fore. Epic prizes of Haribo were awarded, booze was consumed and a hog roasted.

And if anyone asks whether a pumpkin was pinched from the vegetable garden for the diner scene in Pulp Fiction, you ain’t seen us, right?

The writers' table - al fresco

If Harry Potter came from Streatham