Filmmaker and activist Amani Simpson becomes an Into Film Ambassador

We are proud to announce that the inspirational Amani Simpson - award-winning filmmaker, youth coach, activist, and co-founder of AVIARD Inspires - has become our latest Into Film Ambassador.

We've admired Amani's work with young people for some time, especially the massive impact he's having raising aspirations and challenging mindsets. Over the last few years Amani has been a champion for empowering underrepresented youth to use film and creativity as a tool for positive social change. He is also a former student turned trustee of London's largest creative college, Big Creative Academy.

As part of Amani's work, he regularly visits youth and professional spaces sharing his heart-breaking lived experience of going from a child, nurtured and loved by his parents, to a bullied teenager who, after trying to fit in, was subsequently expelled from two schools, groomed to county lines and later attacked and stabbed seven times. He is a powerful example of someone who has turned his pain into purpose and is seeking to use his story to give hope to the current and future generations.

Amani is also a writer, director, and producer. His debut short film, the 2019 autobiographical, Amani, showcases his experience of surviving his stabbing attack and stars actor Joivan Wade (The First Purge, Bel Air and Shiro's Story). It received a million views in just four days on YouTube and has since passed 4 million views.

"I intentionally focus on the idea that young people are brilliant", explains Amani. "I believe that part of my purpose is to empower young people and therefore I want to show them, through the power of storytelling, inspirational projects and positive representation, that they can tell their own stories and strive to achieve their wildest dreams."

His 2023 follow-up film, Save Me, was co-produced with young people from Enfield. It advocates for active community bystanders and seeks to raise awareness about youth exploitation and grooming. It is now being used nationally as a tool to spark conversation and challenge biases around the experiences of young people.

On Save Me, Amani explains: "I wanted to create a film that would enable people in the community to have conversations around keeping young people safe and empower young people to speak up and be peer champions. As a youth coach, I wanted to make sure that the young people's engagement wasn't just tokenistic, they gave me so much information and context that just enabled me to write something that was authentic. It's not just about this being a piece of entertainment, it's about having something that is really long term."

Into Film CEO Paul Reeve commented: "We are delighted to welcome Amani as a new Into Film Ambassador. Amani's work is incredibly impressive, and he shares our commitment to giving young people from underserved and under-represented communities a voice through the films they make. We look forward to working with Amani, and to enabling many more children and young people to tell their own stories on screen."