Veteran B-movie maker Sam Fuller once said that in order to make a movie youve obviously got to have money and in order to have money you gotta woo people with proverbial bullshit, but … the last thing in the world to be worried about is how to make the picture. After the money, the most important thing to worry about is the erection you get out of wanting to make a film …
Passion is what makes first-time film- makers, and ardent endurance keeps them going. Werner Herzog broke into a photographic shop and stole a Bolex to make his debut movie; Robert Rodriguez served time on medicinal clinic trials to earn the $7 000 he needed to make El Mariachi. Stanley Kubrick said if you want to learn how to make movies the only way is simply to just get out there and make them.
Locally, many young wannabe directors are doing just that. The Mail & Guardian Film Festival garnered over 300 short movies in the four years it ran a competition. Many cineastes who make music videos or inserts defiantly dream that one day theyll helm a feature film. They can. There are new initiatives like M-Nets New Directions; SABC2s Entsha Talente; Big World Cinemas Cutting Edge series; the Africa Dreaming series and UK Channel Fours financing of two 11-minute South African films encouraging local talent.
Deon Opperman and Garth Holmes run the South African School of Film, Television and Dramatic Art in Johannesburg. The school, only three-and-a-half-years old, focuses diligently on hands-on training tied with theory. Holmes says: We dont take a gung-ho approach to making films. We believe in integrating theory and skill. The student who comes to the school, seduced by the romantic idea of being a film-maker, will find him- or herself under enormous pressure.
Most trainers and producers agree there is the vast pool of untapped talent, especially of people from disadvantaged backgrounds. Black kids have a plak on life, theyve got the kind of rebel instinct that makes for great film-makers and the kind of subject matter that the rest of the world is interested in … I mean who cares about all this white northern suburbs american-imitation crap?
The Newtown Film School is going a long way to remedy the training of young black film- makers, but their resources and curriculum are not quite as rigorous as Opperman and Holmess operation.
With the second annual Film and Television Market running in Cape Town; the South African Scriptwriters Association producing four short movies; and the formation of a group dedicated to standards in the industry, theres a lot of nascent movie energy. With the current rate of spotty cinematic puberty we can look forward to a fine celluloid adulthood.