Documentary and Government

Documentary filmmakers must become adept at bearing witness to events as they unfold, without influencing outcomes or forever disrupting the lives of individuals who aren’t seeking the limelight. The presence of a camera thrust into any of our lives could at best make us self-conscious, at worst, negatively and permanently expose our lives to unwarranted scrutiny and judgment. There is a delicate balance of trust that must exist between documenter and subject. How does an NGO find a voice for a issue or a situation that will meet the needs of a filmmaker to tell a compelling story that will be typically 60 – 90 minutes and likely seen on television worldwide or the internet? Understanding the dynamic complexities and length of this relationship are what make the difference between a public service announcement and a film anchoring an outreach campaign......

There's more invaluable insight, comment, film festival reviews and news for indie film makers at Filmmaker Magazine........

Incidentally, the above quote comes from the programme of Envision, "Addressing Global Issues through Documentaries". Envision is a two-day forum hosted by the IFP and the United Nations, to be held in New York on 14th & 15th May, in which film and both live and virtual discussion will be used to address significant global issues.


There will be 12 screenings, presentations and panel discussions "rooted in the UN’s Millennium Development Goals" - which include the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger; achieving universal primary education; promoting gender equality and empowerment of women; reduction of child mortality; improving maternal health, combatting HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; ensuring environmental sustainability; and developping a global partnership for development.

The fact that the film sector and government have come together to host this event is interesting, I think - particularly given that these are all our challenges in South Africa. A future DFO / KZNFC conference, perhaps??

Consumer Confidence in New Technology

If the news coming out of the USA is anything to go by, people are becoming more techno-savvy and computer literate. According to a recent report from the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) and CNET, while consumer confidence in the overal economy dipped in April, confidence in technology and consumer electronics climbed sharply.

The CEA-CNET Index of Consumer Technology Expectations (ICTE) rose to 77.4, up more than 10 points from March to reach its highest level since December.

If these stats are in any way replicated in South Africa, it bodes well for new media options for filmmakers when creating, marketing and distributing their films.

Doxumentary Filmmakers' Master Class

Learn the art of in-depth, hard-hitting, factual documentaries that challenge people’s points of view from highly acclaimed Jacques Pauw.....



This Documentary Filmmakers' Masterclass will take place in Johannesburg over five days, from Monday, 25th May to Friday, 29th May 2009. (Course hours are 09h00 to 16h00 each day.) The focus is on in-depth documentary production, how to research and how to make documentaries with substance.....

Applicants must have a commitment to documentary filmmaking and have experience in filmmaking.You are required to bring ideas you are working on, or would like to develop, to be workshopped in class and you can also bring short documentaries you have worked on for analysis and feedback.

Deadline for application is May 7th and only 14 candidates will be accepted. For more information / application requirements etc., contact Connie Mosegedi at Big Fish on 011 482 5599 or mosegedic@bigfish.org.za

London African Film Festival Call for Entries

The London African Film Festival has opened its call for submissions

The London African Film Festival is dedicated to promoting the exhibition of African feature films, shorts, animation and experimental films. Dates are 26 November – 3 December 2009. This year the festival will show a selection of recent films from all the regions of the continent.


The deadline for submissions is 31 July 2009

Entry forms can be downloaded at the website. For more information contact Keith Shiri at kshiri@boltblue.com or keithshiri@hotmail.com

Izulu Lami wins at IPAFF

KZN's own Izulu lami (My Secret Sky) has won the best feature film award at "International Pan African film festival", in Cannes, France



Directed by Madoda Ncayiyana, Izulu lami won the coveted DIKALO Best Feature Film prize at the recent International Pan African Film Festival, held in the city of Cannes between 1st and 5th April 2009.

Izulu Lami (My Secret Sky) follows the story of two young children who journey to the city from their rural homestead after their mother’s death. The film features a cast of mainly young children who had never acted professionally before, discovered through extensive casting by the director, from the townships, informal settlements of eThekwini Municipality to the rural areas of KwaZulu-Natal.

Audience Development

YouTube has begun testing a new social feature that lets users see what which videos their friends are watching, rating and commenting on in real-time.



DMW reports that the company has offered a limited number of invites to test the new YouTube RealTime feature, which aims to supplement the current widespread trading of YouTube videos via email, IM, blogs and social networks.

The feature functions as a toolbar at the bottom of the browser window, and provides updates of a user's friends' activities on YouTube in a news feed-type format.

Screenwriting

Unknown Screenwriter is a personal, sometimes very personal, blog about screenwriting. The list of links alone is priceless. I also like the quality of his ideas. His posting on hamartia is typical. Hamartia is a character’s great tragic flaw - and a great way to move a story forward.

Journalism Online

One of the fascinating challenges about New Media is how to monetise content online. I mean, all too often these days, we expect the internet to give us "stuff" for free - which doesn't bode particularly well for the film industry if we're hoping to use the internet as a dynamic means of distribution that cuts out the middleman. Fortunately we're not alone. The publishing business in particular has been hard hit by people wanting to read their news - for free - online.



So it's good to see a report on DMW that a trio of high flying media executives have announced the launch of a Journalism Online, a new venture that aims to help monetize online news publishing. The venture plans to create a distributable system that will allow publishers to charge annual or monthly subscriptions to view their content, as well as a portal where consumers could pay a single fee to access content from multiple participating publications.

Says co-founder Steven Brill: "We believe we have developed a strategy and a set of services that will establish that model by restoring a stream of circulation revenue to supplement advertising revenue, while taking advantage of the savings to be gained from producing and delivering content electronically."

Watch this space

Thinking Animation

The Thinking Animation blog is created to document and inspire all involved in bringing life to characters and inanimate objects. They cover everything from computer generated animation, VFX, stop motion and even puppets. The site includes a long list of really useful animation resources.

Locations Trade Show

The Durban Film Office is in Los Angeles this week as part of the official South African delegation at the Locations Trade Show.



The pre-eminent locations event on the international calendar, LTS is an opportunity for the best film destinations in the world to show off their talents to the Hollywood industry. This is particularly important for KZN, since more than 70% of the province's film income currently comes from Hollywood blockbusters. This is the tenth year that South Africa has attended the event, and the stand is funded by the NFVF and the South African Consulate General in LA.

NFVF Sediba Programme

EXTENSION OF DEADLINE - Closing Date is now 14 April 2009!!!!!



The Sediba Advanced International Financing Programme for Producers 2009 is a programme offered by the National Film and Video Foundation aimed at local Producers. This programme, which has been designed to run for three sessions over 8 months, will provide focused training to experienced Producers in international financing, packaging and distribution. Visit www.nfvf.co.za for more.

Writing Studio Screenwriter Training

If you’re an aspiring screenwriter with a vivid imagination whose ideas are larger than life, The Writing Studio has an exciting Weekend Workshop for Scriptwriters taking place at the SABC in Durban on April 18 and 19, running from 10am until 5pm each day.

Within ONE WEEKEND budding screenwriters will understand the principles of writing for a visual medium and what it takes to be screenwriter in South Africa.

The cost of the workshop is R900. If you are a registered student, scholar, or a pensioner, the cost of the workshop is R800. For more information visit www.thewritingstudio.co.za

Tyler Perry

Entertainment Weekly recently ran an article about “black america’s secret culture war”. Apparently it's all due to Tyler Perry: the playwright, author, filmmaker, and actor of Madea fame, who has created a franchise around his name and is also responsible for opening the first black-owned studio in the U.S. in October of last year. Culture war or no, Perry certainly sends sparks flying with the characters he puts on screen - some critics say they're lowest-common-denominator, stereotypical representations of black experience (ie. the complete opposite of the too-elite Cosby's).

What's as interesting is the loyal and resilient audience that Perry has developed for his films. In February, his latest, “Madea Goes to Jail” was the top film in the US, bringing in $41.1 million at the Box Office. Not bad for what was always thought of in Hollywood as a "niche" audience. It’s also worth mentioning that Tyler Perry owns it all, from the movies and video library (he’s sold 25 million DVDs of his plays) to his TV shows.

Read more at www.postbourgie.com

Wolverine saga continues

Fox News has fired Roger Friedman, a journalist who posted an online review of the unfinished and illegal copy of Gavin Hood's movie Wolverine.

DMW is running a poll - (given the significant piracy issues) do you think it's right that he was fired?

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is due to launch - officially - in SA on April 29th.

DVD Copying and Piracy Issues

In the United States, the National Consumers League has publiushed results of a new study conducted by Opinion Research showing that 90% of consumers believe they should be able to back up their DVDs to a hard drive or copy them to a portable device - and that they'd be willing to pay about $61 for a piece of software that helped them back up their collections. According to the survey:

• 55% of respondents are buying fewer DVDs today than they did a year ago.
• More than four in 10 (41%) expect to be buying fewer still a year from now.
• 41% said the ability to make back up copies would make their collections more valuable
• 40% said it might cause them to buy more DVDs.
• Households with kids have purchased an average of nearly 3 DVDs to replace those lost or damaged.
• Despite studio fears that back-up copying will lead to massive Internet piracy, only 18% of respondents reported ever having copied a DVD to a hard drive.
• Another 5% said they had tried but were unable to.
• The vast majority of respondents (79%) said they have no real interest in copying DVDs.

And, according to DMW, what have the studios come up with to deliver that value to their customers? Litigation against Kaleidescape Systems and RealDVD for providing tools that allow people to back up their DVD collections.

Cinema Audiences

Reuters is covering a Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) report that box office receipts around the world rose 5% to a record $28.1 billion in 2008, inspite of the economic turndown.



The United States and Canada markets reached $9.8 billion in 2008, a 1.7% increase over 2007, and a figure that accounts for 35% of the worldwide total. International box office sales hit a record $18.3 billion, up 7% over the previous year, and accounted for 65% of the global total. (so much for "runaway production.....")

The number of films released in 2008 increased slightly from the previous year to 610 compared to 599 in 2007.

Hood's Headaches

An unfinished "workprint" version of South African director Gavin Hood's next movie "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" has been leaked onto the BitTorrent file-sharing network,where it has already been downloaded more than 75,000 times. The video file is reportedly of high audio and video quality, but does not contain any of the special effects from the film, which is not due for release until May 1.

In the USA, the penalty for "pre-release" piracy of copyrighted content, under the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act of 2004, is up to three years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

Sediba Advanced International Financing Programme

The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF) has announced the launch of a brand new programme, the Sediba Advanced International Financing Programme, developed for South African Producers.



Aimed at providing to experienced producers focused training on international financing, packaging and distribution, the programme comes after the successes of the NFVF's Sediba Scriptwriting Training and Development Programme.

The programme will be headed by a range of global experts who have experience in buying, sourcing finance and selling at the world's leading markets including the American Film Market, the Cannes Film Festival and the Berlin Film Festival.

The programme will be held in three sessions with the first taking place on Tuesday, April 28, and the last session on Tuesday, August 18 2009. At the end of the programme the top two achievers will be selected to attend the Film London Production Finance Market in October 2009, where they will have an opportunity to pitch their projects to potential international financiers, sales agents and distributors.

The closing date for applications is April 6th 2009. For more information visit the NFVF website