Trainspotting director Danny Boyle is to take a starring role in a brand new £30m media school at Manchester Metropolitan University .

The Oscar-winning film guru from Bury will spearhead the creation of an International Screen School to help home-grown talent break into the creative industry.

It will work closely with the area’s existing media and arts institutions, including the BBC, HOME, ITV and Red Productions, to teach 1,000 students a year.

They will not just study film, but a whole range of creative skills including animation, applied games, special effects, sound design, software design and immersive media production.

The school will be be based in the heart of the Oxford Road corridor.

And Danny Boyle, whose smash-hit films have included the Trainspotting series and Slumdog Millionaire, will head up the school’s industry advisory board.

He said: “This is just what Manchester needs and I am delighted to be part of the International Screen School Manchester.

“Manchester is a prolific centre of media production already and the Screen School will create the talent needed in the north to create even more success.

“I’m really keen to see young people from all backgrounds given the opportunity to learn to be the filmmakers and media producers of the future, and to have the opportunity to tell their own stories - but in ways that we’ve never experienced before.”

The school will be half-funded by MMU and half by the region’s combined authority of 10 councils, through a pot of government money intended to help boost the economy.

That decision is expected to be signed off next week.

Manchester council leader Sir Richard Leese, who leads on the economy for the combined authority, said creative and digital industries are one of the fastest-growing sectors in the region.

Meanwhile the industry in Manchester itself is growing faster than anywhere else in the UK.

(Image: PA)

“Greater Manchester is determined to build on this success by working with industry and academic partners,” he said.

“The International Screen School Manchester will be a creative and digital skills powerhouse, supporting the creative and digital industries to secure the skills needed to drive innovation, growth and transformation.”

Professor Malcolm Press, vice-chancellor at MMU, said the university was delighted to be able to deliver such an ‘ambitious’ project, adding: “The Screen School will be part of MMU’s world-leading School of Art, ensuring that we form a strong bridge between creative media and digital production methods, informing critical thinking on how new media technologies can be expanded for other uses.

“We are excited about this opportunity to jointly invest in the future success of our city region.”

It is understood the school will open somewhere on the Oxford Road corridor - where MMU’s main campus is based - but so far details of the site have not been released.