The UK Film Council'sDevelopment Fund has invested in six new feature projects, including RedRoad from Oscar winning director Andrea Arnold.

Arnold, who won this year'sOscar for Best Short Film with Wasp, has been awarded £10,962 for herfirst feature length project.

The film is the latestcollaboration between Glasgow-based Sigma Films and Lars von Trier's ZentropaFilms in Denmark. Red Rose was originallydeveloped by the Glasgow Film Office and is also funded by Scottish Screen. RedRoad is tale of obssession and forgiveness.

The Development Fund hasalso awarded British screenwriter Richard McBrien £65,437 of Lottery investmentwho is set to convert his successful TV film Trust to the bigscreen. Blueprint Picture's PeterCzernin and Graham Broadbent of Qwerty Films produce the romantic thriller.

Amongst other talent beingbacked by the Development Fund is Guy Hibbert, writer of the BAFTA awardwinning Omagh. His new film, Unscathed,for Granada and Feelgood Fiction is receiving £22,750 for development. The film is based on the autobiography'Unscathed' by Major Phil Ashby who spent six months in Sierra Leone with theUN to conduct one of its largest peacekeeping missions. The film is jointly developed and producedby Laurence Bowen at Feelgood Fiction and Andy Harries and Emma Benson at Granada.

Samuel Pepys: AnUnequalled Self written by AdrianHodges (Metroland, Tom & Viv) and produced by Christian Colson forCelador Films, is to receive £23,250 of funding from the UK Film Council. The film is adapted from Claire Tomalin'sbiography of Samuel Pepys , 'The Unequalled Self', and shadows the life of thefamous diarist and his tumultuous love affair with his wife.

Warp Developments' PlanetArse has received £7,000 from the Development fund. The film is written by Dave Ainley andproduced by Barry Ryan at Warp Films and tells the story of Billy, an aspiringcomic-book artist, who pretends to be a wheelchair user in order to gain theaffections of a girl who has been inflicted with MS and is herself confined toa wheelchair.

Director Hattie Dalton isreceiving £12,500 of investment for her first feature film Cry Out Loud. Dalton won this year's BAFTA for her shortfilm The Banker which was produced by Kelly Broad and funded by itsstar, Michael Sheen, and producer Trudie Styler.

Two new projects have alsosuccessfully won the latest round of the "25 Words or Less" project. Writer Matthew McGuchan's Hummingbird,which won in the 'Occult Horror' category, has been awarded £12,500 for it'stale of backpackers in Mexico who are targeted by a cult intent onreincarnating an Aztec deity. A further£12,500 was awarded to Chris Thompson and Peter Reynold's for their tale McNabwhich won the 'Fish out of Water' category with its story of a Shetlands Islesconstable who becomes head of the New York Police Department.