The breakfast of champions: Constantine Costi’s latest film documents a world famous competition for porridge making

Every year Carrbridge, a small village in the Scottish Highlands, hosts the world porridge making championship. Porridge makers from all over the world come together to craft a blend of three key ingredients (water, oatmeal and salt) all to be in with a chance of winning The Golden Spurtle – a shiny award in the shape of the traditional porridge-stirring baton. If, like us, you were surprised to hear of such an event, I can assure you it does draw in quite a crowd. According to this recent Guardian article that follows the story of a former winner Chris Ormiston, thousands of people watch the competition every year, shouting at the telly, much like a football match. There are also professional judges to tell if things are too hot, too cold or just right. Apparently though, they don’t give feedback, so it’s hard to know what’s made an impression until a champion is crowned.

Constantine Costi, a director and storyteller originally from Sydney first came across this delightfully niche competition by coincidence. A friend of his mentioned the event in a passing conversation, and the filmmaker fell down a bit of a rabbit hole online. “The idea immediately struck me as delightfully quirky but also profoundly human,” he says. “Here was this small village in Scotland hosting a competition that on the surface seems light-hearted, but actually carries centuries of cultural tradition, pride, and community. That combination of eccentricity and sincerity felt like the perfect lens for a film.”

With the idea for a documentary somewhere on the horizon, Constantine travelled even further into his deep dive. The director spent a good deal of time watching old competition footage, reading everything that had been written about the event online and even reaching out to past competitors to hear about their experiences. As a creative whose journey began in the world of theatre and opera, Constantine’s curiosity for people and their stories has slowly drawn him to this kind of filmmaking over the years: “I’ve been exploring projects that shine a light on the unusual, the heartfelt, and the quietly extraordinary,” he shares.

His now award winning film The Golden Spurtle was no different. Following his research, the director went on to find a fair few characters to frame her take on the event: “competitors who had travelled from far away, locals who had been attending for decades, and the organisers who put so much heart into keeping it alive”. As a community run affair, entirely run by volunteers from Carrbridge, there was no shortage of characterful locals to draw on for personal stories that have shaped the porridge making scene.“The plan was to balance humour and eccentricity with a genuine respect for the people and the place. That meant spending time with them – not just filming the competition – but capturing “the rituals, the banter, and the quiet moments that reveal character”, Constantine says.

His portrait of the highland village at the height of its calendar is stripped back and raw — just like the competition’s ingredients list. Much of its warmth and humour comes from the local village itself, Constantine’s sharp eyed camera observations and a playful score. The inspiration for the directors cut came from both traditional documentaries and a range of more playful stylised works: “I was drawn to the theatricality of directors like Roy Andersson and Peter Greenaway, the paintings of Pieter Bruegel, and the radio play Under Milk Wood by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas,” he says.

The film is certainly a testament to the simplest of things being able to bring people together across cultures and generations alike, and it won’t allow you look at the humble breakfast the same again. “The film is, in many ways, about the beauty of traditions, how they evolve, how they hold communities together, and how joy and meaning can be found in the most ordinary of things,” Constantine ends. “My reflection is that, often, the ‘small stories’ (like a porridge competition in a Scottish village) are actually the ones that remind us most of our shared humanity.”