Before The Virgin Suicides and Priscilla, Sofia Coppola had already transformed onscreen portrayals of girlhood and female friendship in her first directorial outing. Ultra-cool 1990s outfits, a killer soundtrack, and dreamy 16mm imagery make this audacious short an instant classic of teenage ennui.

Following a pivotal week for long-time best friends Lilah and Coby (whose friendship is morphing into something far more venomous and toxic), a flower that once delicately bloomed proves to just as easily draw blood with its thorns…

This deeply personal short from Yann Mounir Demange is incandescent with love and vulnerability. Beautifully led by Riz Ahmed and featuring designs by fashion house AMI, Dammi conjures a uniquely transportive vision of Paris for its dreamlike exploration of cultural identity and family ties.

Thirteen years before beloved animator Hayao Miyazaki co-founded Studio Ghibli, he made a miniature pilot for an ultimately unmade TV series. Brisk but completely delightful, this five-minute short is an early example of his incredible talent in compassionate storytelling and vivid world-building.

Hollywood is wholly weird in this inescapably Lynchian, provocative debut short. Strap in for 15 fantastical minutes of offbeat, twisty pleasure, as two queer sex-worker starlets dare to take on a lecherous film-industry executive and marvellously remake cinema for themselves.

A surreal reverie laced with hallucinogenic imagery, Flóra Anna Buda’s animated Cannes prizewinner basks in the glorious messiness of young adulthood. Against the all-too-relatable reality of financial precarity and other grown-up blues, 27 liberates the mind through playfully raunchy fantasies.

In the summer heatwave of 2000, a gang of teenage girls in South London face strange sexual awakenings driven by gossip and the mysterious ritual of shagbands – small plastic bracelets representing the wearer’s sexual history.

Yorgos Lanthimos’s movies love to flirt – often comically – with horror: the fear that behind the façade of society is a gaping maw of existential terror. In this dastardly short, a shrewdly cast Matt Dillon realises that no role in life is irreplaceable. Suddenly, nothing is safe – not even ourselves.

The short follows Mark (Jude Carmichael), a teenaged Nigerian immigrant who is adapting to life in London when he is introduced to the world of the undercover Black Secret Service. 

Our full address is Aviva Studios, Water Street, Manchester M3 4JQ and the what3words is chop.feeds.chase.

You can approach Aviva Studios along Water Street (coming from Quay Street) or along Liverpool Road (coming from Deansgate or Castlefield). Both entrances to the building have double sets of glass doors.

Once inside Aviva Studios, there is step-free access to all areas of the venue. The flooring throughout the building is smooth concrete.

The Social has a range of seating, including those with arms and backs.

The bars in the Social and Hall Foyer have lowered accessible service points.

Our building is large. We have portable stools available to borrow if you would benefit from resting along the way during your visit.

We have wheelchair spaces and seats at standing events for all events.

There are accessible toilets on all public levels of our building.

Accessible toilets are located inside the main toilets space in the brick arches of the Social.

Here you’ll find a mixture of accessible cubicles with left- or right-hand transfer, towards the back of the space, as well as ambulant accessible cubicles with grab rails, as well as a Changing Places facility.

The toilets in the brick arches of the Social are split into male, female and gender neutral – all of which contain accessible cubicles. There are shared handwashing facilities in each arch – they have soap dispensers under the mirrors to your left and dryers to the right. There are separate handwashing facilities inside the accessible cubicles.

There are additional single-room accessible toilets located in both Hall Foyers, at stalls and circle level.

There are additional single-room accessible toilets located in the Warehouse Foyer.

You do not need a key to use the accessible toilets at Aviva Studios.

Assistance dogs are welcome in our building, and we can provide mats and water bowls on request, just ask a host when you arrive. We can also take care of your assistance dog if you do not want to take your dog into the performance space. Please also refer to our assistance dogs policy.

If you are bringing an assistance dog to a ticketed event, please let us know in advance by contacting access@factoryinternational.org or calling our access phone number: 0161 817 4531 (phone lines are open 10am to 6pm, Monday to Saturday).