monthly newsletter of NISI MASA

más ymás

SHORT FILM M A K E R SODYSSEYSinterview:dağhan celayir

report: nisimazine

RIOportrait: lasse lecklin

oct09

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editorialO ctober is the month of picking the fruits for

NISI MASA. The fruits of our 8th Interna-tional Script Contest on the theme Taboo are fresh and juicy and waiting to be judged. In

the beginning of November, the jury members from NISI MASA member organisations in 20 different countries will meet in Brussels in order to choose the 12 finalists, who will participate in European Short Pitch 2010, where they will have a chance to develop their scripts together with professional tutors and pitch their project to Euro-pean producers. It’s a wonderful chance to be advised by some of the best screenwriting professionals in Europe and find a production company for your film.

Mas y Mas October issue focuses on the odysseys of short film makers. Now the days are getting slowly colder in Europe, a perfect setting forms itself to brood on new ideas for projects, to be developed in the dark and ready to be born when spring arrives. How their ideas materialized, what their first steps were, where they fell and how they grew up, is being reflected on by some colleagues who nurtured a short. Three young directors talk about their struggles (and joys); Polish

Mateusz Subieta's about his story called Tourist. Maya Vitkova from Bulgaria on her Stanka goes home and Sick and Melissa Suarez del Real from Spain relates how she was able to start shooting Furniture this coming january. Besides, you can read an interview with a Turkish short film maker Daghan Celayir, who tells his adventures on the way to produce his last short. And a mysterious Dutch contributor gives us an insight in the pitching pro-cess at the Dutch Film Fund.

The portrait this month is of true NISI MASA veteran and all weather resistant Lasse Lecklin. And on the spotlight page (save this one for a particularly chilly afternoon) you’ll see Nisimazine Rio, the latest film journalism workshop of NISI MASA in Brazil, where spring was just arriving!

Enjoy the October issue of Mas y Mas, on a park bench for example under coloured maple trees, with a warm cup of coffe in your mittened hands and try to not loose your energy! :)

by Anu Aun

European Short Pitch: Deadline for application

credits.

agenda25. oct.

EDITORIAL STAFF Coordinator Gülçin ŞahinDesignMaartje Alders

Contributors to this issue: Anu Aun, Joanna Gallardo, Silviu Pavel,Pinja Rosenberg, Melissa Suarez del Real, Gülçin Sahin,Dominika Uhrikova.

NISI MASA (European Office) 99 Rue du Faubourg Saint Denis75010, Paris, FranceTel/Fax: +33 (0)9 60 39 63 38+ 33 (0)6 32 61 70 26Email europe@nisimasa.com Website www.nisimasa.com

Mas y Mas is a monthly newsletter published by the association NISI MASA.

dossier3short film odysseys

What kinds of difficulties did you encounter for the pro-duction of your short film Tourists?The production of Tourists was a true odyssey. At the very beginning a few independent producers appeared, but no-

body was able to raise sufficient funds. Then I agreed with the production company that I work for, and we scheduled a shoot for the end of summer 2008. Two days before the shoot the weather turned very bad and the ar-rangements had to be cancelled. The shoot was postponed till the next year.

Did not you want to give it up?Not at all. In spring 2009 Leszek Rybarczyk, the president of the Odeon Film Studio, suggested me to produce the film and we agreed on the con-ditions. Bearing in mind my previous dramatic experience with the weath-er, I decided on a pre-shoot with no set design and lighting. We made an amateur version of the film which I later edited in order to check what to improve. This made me feel comfortable on the real set. Everything had

T his month you will read the odysseys of European young short film makers!You will learn how the short film production can turn into a nightmare and how did the film makers find a solution for all the difficulties that they faced

during the process. Also, what are the funding opportunities and support that they were able to find etc.And more…Enjoy! by Gülçin Şahin

been planned and went like clockwork despite further problems with the weather and we could complete the film. We worked smoothly with Agata Szymańska, the executive producer, who proved to be extremely professional. Paweł Tybora togeth-er with Paweł Krawczyk took beautiful shoots.

Which supports did you get?Nobody was seriously interested in supporting Tourists financially. In Poland there is not even a support programme for ten-minute films. I wanted to make a profes-sional film. If I had not agreed with the Odeon and Leszek Rybarczyk, I would have sacrificed my own apartment just to make that film. Fortunately, I didn’t have to do so...

What did you learn on the personal level?I greatly benefited from the European Short Pitch. First of all, it taught me how to synthesize my thoughts. The workshop and the NISI MASA award revived me – I had always wanted to work in film but I did not know anybody in this profession and I had a strange feeling that the film profession would never accept me. After a few years of frustration I finally understood that it is just a common dogma, and that the profession is actually me and a group of other enthusiasts with whom I work. I am very glad that I met people like Leszek, Agata and both Pawełs who helped me so much. As you can see, enthusiasm and joy taken in artistic creation may compensate for the lack of education and experience in film. The actors agreed that they had not worked in a set with such a friendly atmosphere for a long time.

What about your next projects?I have two new projects under draft names Rootstory and Mr. D. Both shall last from thirty to fifty minutes and are much more complex than Tourists. They deal with death, rebirth and the passage of time. I do recognize my imperfections, so I enrolled for the Stanisławski method workshops; I read a lot on films analyzing. Shooting of these projects, however, does not depend on the possible success of Tourists. I know I am going to make these films since I just cannot restrain myself from doing that.by Joanna Gallardo

Warsaw-based

MATEUSZ SUBIETA

was one of the three winners of the European

Script Contest 2006 on the theme ‘Tourists’. Three

years after he first wrote his script, he eventually

succeeded in making it to a film. He teaches us a true

lesson of perseverance...

dossier 4short film odysseys

Finding the FUN in FUNdingReport of a Dutch cineaste

S o there we were, as a collective, sitting in a comfy leather chair in a posh brownstone house

located in the Amsterdam’s Zuid district, nervously waiting for our turn to talk with the Dutch Film Fund. The beaming smiles of Achmed Akkabi and starlet Geor-gina Verbaan almost blinded us in their Colgate cleanliness, while the phrase: “Made with the support of the Dutch Film Fund!” kept drawing our attention. The film was vapid teenybopper crap. Then, all five of us are ushered into the inner sanc-tum of the Film fund to defend our request for a pile of dough to or-ganize our fresh-faced animation festival. We believed our chances were not too shabby: the Dutch Film Fund co-initiated a study on the state of Dutch animation that concluded the Netherlands was clearly lacking in platforms for animation. It also didn’t hurt that we rigorously picked apart and put together our request over the course of several months until we were sure it would stand any test.

“Why, there’s a whole lot of you!” ex-claimed a jolly member of the Film Fund. “So, what’s this request all about?” he asked jovially, leafing through the pages. Clearly, this was the first time he laid eyes on it. We were slightly flabbergasted, to say the least. We animatedly stated our case and did our best to prove that we were not some Mickey Mouse organization. At a certain point, the jovial member asked us: “So what is the cinematographic worth of your festival?” While we argued vehemently about the need for a platform for all those brilliant, unseen animated films, the blinking teeth of Achmed and Georgina still seemed to mock us on the way out. We received a token sum to pay drink away at the opening party.

An anonymous Dutch Cineaste

What did Europe-an Short Pitch and Script & Pitch bring re-

spectively to your projects Stanka Goes Home and Queen Viktoria?The short film project Stanka Goes Home, that I completed few days ago, had been select-ed for European Short Pitch in 2007. Thanks to the workshop I could go into the story and the script more deeply and found lots of new contacts. I’ve been to the Script&Pitch workshops with my feature film project Queen Viktoria in 2005. It helped a lot to develop the story and my personal writing skills. Things go so slow in this business if you decide to go all the way through the develop-ment and financing stages. The

production of Queen Viktoriawill start next year: it took me 5 years to realise this movie. This is why I started other projects. For example I was executive producer of Eastern Plays by Ka-men Kalev, screened at Cannes this year.

Is it difficult to be supported at the European level? I don’t know if it is difficult, but it surely takes a lot of time. The

only advice that I would give: do not wait for the big Euro-pean funding! If you feel like telling a story, doing a certain film, go for it and do it now! Don’t waste your time, it will take away the energy and the inspiration that you need. Also it won’t become a better or worse movie only because of the financing; there are other elements that matter more.

Does it help in Bulgaria to be supported by European foun-dation or institution?Nothing helps in Bulgaria… Stanka Goes Home was written by the award-winning Roma-nian filmmaker Radu Jude and selected for European Short Pitch, but the National Film Centre didn’t support the proj-ect. The most successful Bul-

garian film done lately, Eastern Plays, does not have govern-mental support, which is funny and sad at the same time. We’ll see how festivals will react to Stanka Goes Home. I hope it will prove the theory.by Joanna Gallardo

MAYA VITKOVA

is a Bulgarian writer/director who attended

European Short Pitch 2007 (with

her project Stanka Goes Home) and

Script&Pitch (in 2005)

She talks about her experiences in

searching funds and the develop-

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dossier5short film odysseys

Can you tell us about The One Note Man, how was the preparation pro-cess? I used to go to classical music concerts

with my parents when I was a child. During these concerts, the person who waits for long time to

Dağhan Celayir is a Turkish short film maker who is currently working on his first feature. He has directed 8 shorts since 2003. For his last short film Tek Notalık Adam (The One Note Man) he worked for three years as a “one man” production company and eventually rea-lised the film with a budget of 100.000 euros, which is an extraordinary amount for a short film in Turkey. We met him in Paris and talked about his short film production experiences.

play his “one note” at the back of the orchestra used to interest me very much… So I decided to make a film about the life of a musician of 'one note'. It was a hard job, to convince an or-chestra, making contracts with each musician, rent the music hall etc.

It is difficult to produce a short film in Turkey because of the lack of funding and support. I got 7% support from the Cultural Ministry of Turkey. It is more advantageous, to work with a production company because they get the equipment and staff for lower prices thanks to their network. Honestly I did not try very hard to convince any producer, I thought that being my own producer would allow me to act more independently, for example I would be free to choose the place, actors, technical staff etc. I wanted to have the experience of working with 35mm and I was planning to go to 42 festivals with the film. Finally the budget got bigger and bigger…So I decided to search for sponsors…

And did you find them?Yes, but it was really hard… I had prepared a folder, with all the information, CVs of the tech-nical staff, synopsis, my biography and awards, the festivals to be attended, the sponsorship rights etc. I made an appointment with 120 con-

tacts. But after each appointment I had to put an additional file to my presentation folder. For some enterprises firstly I had to explain what a short film is! Can you imagine this? I tried to convince the enterprises that it is worth it to fund this film. It took me a long time…

How did you distribute it? Some distributors they take commission on each sale, you know. I met a distributor in Spain; and we agreed on terms and conditions. I have already sold the film to Canal+ (Europe) and it will be broadcasted in November. I met the representative of Canal + at the Cannes Film Festival 2008. He took the DVD but I was worried that he would forget to watch it. I called him so often to attract his attention. Fur-thermore, I have sold the cell phone, internet download and airplane screening rights to sev-eral companies. The film has screened in sev-eral film festivals now and has been awarded. It has increased my visibility and this has helped for my next project.

What is your next project?I will realise my first feature film in one year. It is a story of a child who has emigrated to Belgium from Turkey with his family in the 90s. by Gülçin Şahin

I ’m a scriptwriter; that’s what is written on my business card. Even though I’ve been recently learning (and hopefully will learn a lot more) some production and direction

skills, still I am actually a scriptwriter. It means I can write and rewrite a story; but when it comes to get some action (real action) concerning find-ing actors, money, costumes, it turns out so dif-ficult, to solve the conflicts. But there are some positive points in this issue as well. Practicing on production skills can eliminate the disadvantage of the film school years, which have passed in front of a word processor, trying to figure out the

numbers of the letters in a dialog column.Even though I have already had a small budget to produce “Furniture” -which was awarded during the NISI MASA European Short Script Contest 2009- I just couldn’t organize the things and get in to action because of the lack of a pro-duction crew. Extra funding “season” was over, no producer answered any single email, and my rare professional film contacts in Madrid were already exhausted of me.

Surprisingly, while having a beer with old friends and complaining about the situation…What happened?Old friends who study in film school offered to get some free equipment for us. Old friends who are architects volunteered to find the piece of land with a fallen building that we need, thanks

to the pathology department in their university. Old friends also know good actors. Old friends just want to help.

At the end, the collective spirit of filmmaking is, at this time, working better than any produc-tion company for me. by Melissa Suarez del Real

With a little help from my friendsReport of a Spanish short film maker

INTERVIEW

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news 6

FILMINI3. version of Filmini International Short Film Festival which is organised by NISI MASA’s Bulgarian member organization, SEVEN, will be realised from 13th to 17th October in Sofia, Bulgaria.

EUROPEAN SHORT PITCH 2010's call for participantsThe call for participants for the 4th edition of Euro-pean Short Pitch is open. This 4th edition presents some novelties compared to the previous one. One rewriting session will be held from 18th to 23rd of January 2010 at the Moulin d’Andé (France) and the pitching session on the 17th of April 2010 in Bucarest (Romania).

The 4th edition in 4 points:

- improving the scripts and helping in the produc-tion of projects: pitching session will be organised in front of European producers;- out of 24 participants;- four professional tutors involved, managing the educational aspect;- open to all EU countries + Croatia, Norway and Switzerland.

Then, if you have a very good short film project you would like to develop, “European Short Pitch” is for you!The application from participants of the previous European Short Pitch's editions are not accepted. There is no theme. Age limit for participants : 35 years old.The script, the CV and a motivation letter have to be sent only in English.

Deadline for application:25th of October 2009.

For more information: shortpitch@nisimasa.com.

DOK Leipzig52nd International Leipzig Festival for Doc-umentary and Animated Film 26.10.- 1.11.2009 Leipzig, Germany

+ DOK Summits: Alternative Film Financing/ Pitching of VOD-Platforms With the DOK Summit panel discussions festival visitors have the opportunity to learn more about current trends in the in-ternational documentary film scene and to discuss them with international experts. This festival, two DOK Summits will look at alternative financing models for documentary films (28.10) and at the marketing of them via video-on-demand platforms (29.10). All festival visitors are invited to participate.

Dates: 28./ 29.10, 11:00-13:00, Zeitgeschichtliches Forum Leipzig, Grimmaische Straße 6

www.dok-leipzig.de

CALL FOR Bourges International Festival of Script Writers13. version of Bourges International Festival of Script Writers will be realised from 24th to 28th of March 2010.There are for chapters of competition in the festival that you can apply until 15th of November:

The short film script-writing marathon: 26 script-writers write 12 pages of scripts in 48h by the help of professional. A unique experience!

Forum of writers of fiction/animation and documentaries: This chapter is reserved for the scripts without producer or on due to search for producer.

Marathon for Bibles of television: It offers the opportunity to establish a precise diagnosis of the project (compared to itself, feasibility), and to strength its presentation. Sound Portraits: A training workshop about the sound that gives authors the opportunity to try a new approach to write the image by the combination of still images directly from the sounds of reality.

To register online: www.scenarioaulongcourt.com

screenings7

RUSSIARussian member organisation Moviement has organised the second edition of CINETRAIN workshop: CINETRAIN 2009, "Europe - Asia: Cultural Neigh-bouring" workshop with the col-laboration of Mirumir studios.

20 talented young filmmakers from 15 countries, travelled in several cities across 3 countries: Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Rus-sia, starting from Bishkek on the 25th of September and they shot 5 short documentary movies on their way to Moscow.

Produced documentaries will be screened on 19th of October, in SQUAT Café (Metro Kuznetski Most, Rojdestvenka Street 12/1) to a selected audience.

Monday 19.10.09

CZECH REP.

Between Dreams, one of the documentaries that were pro-duced during the Cinetrain (http://www.nisimasa.com/?q=node/218) workshop in 2008, will be screened in several festivals across Europe during October:

13th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival. (27 October – 1 November, in the competitive section Short Joy)www.dokument-festival.cz

Germany52nd International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Films,28th of October http://www.dok-leipzig.de/v2/cms/en/home/page92.html

Sweden28th Uppsala International Short Film Festival (19 - 25 October).http://www.shortfilmfestival.com/filmver2/files/eng_start.asp

NORway10th Bergen International Film Festival (21 -28 October)http://www.biff.no/2009/en/program/

CINETRAIN 2

spotlight 8ni

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o Nisimazine Rio workshop was realised during the 11th Festival do Rio from 24th September to 8th October 2009 in

brazil through a collabo-ration of NISI MASA and

festival do rio.4 European and 4 Latin Ameri-can participants made seven is-sues of Nisimazine. Here are the impressions of one of the par-ticipants of the workshop:

by Dominika Uhrikova, Slovakia

I had never before taken a transatlantic flight, so when I got on board I wondered whether such a winged behemoth can be really taken off from the ground. And,

actually, this was the smallest of my worries. I was so excited because of going to Rio, and also I couldn’t quite imagine how I would work together with a dozen other people whom I so far knew only through Skype and Facebook, and will fill up seven issues of Nisimazine in less than two weeks.

Not even the fantastic view of the Copacabana that opened itself in front of my eyes when I entered my hotel room completely washed away these fears. Not even the first of the MANY caipirinhas we took afterwards… It wasn’t still washed away until the first editorial meeting that I understood that it can be done, and that it can be done very well.

The reason was that I saw around the table a group of enthusiastic and ambitious young people who, despite having all completely diverse backgrounds, had a common passion for cinema and journalism. As I later found out, this had exactly been Nisimasa’s aim: the more mixed the team is, the more enriching is the experience for each member.

In addition, the setting itself incredibly con-tributed to the discovery aspect of the work-shop. Before arriving in Rio, I and my (Euro-pean) colleagues had received not only a rich set of vaccinations against typhus, hepatitis and some other mysterious diseases with Latin names, but also a high dose of horror tales about Brazil’s criminality and “strange” lifestyle illustrated with “unarguably true” inci-dents experienced by our cousins’ best friends’ acquaintances.

As it usually happens, none of these stories turned out to be probable, unless our cousins’ best friends’ acquaintances are very unlucky fellows. Most of the participants were, indeed, so charmed by the ciudad maravilhosa that I frequently heard them saying “Oh my gosh, I’m really gonna move to Rio!!!”. If you find such exclamations too theatrical, just click on some online photo albums showing the panorama from Sugarloaf or Corcovado.

But it was, of course, not on the tops of these two beautiful mountains where we spent most of our time in Rio. The place we called our sec-ond home was a former storehouse right in the city centre, the focal point of the 11th Festival do Rio. Here we took our meals, we slept in its

Photos by Silviu Pavel: L: Videoblogger Pierre-Anthony and critic Jorge Robinet, M: critic Zsuzsanna Kiraly, R: Director of publication Matthieu Darras

hyper-comfortable sofas, we watched and discussed films, we swore when our intervie-wees were running late and sometimes also worked on our assignments, when our poor bosses finally manage to gather us in the of-fice.

And then came the evenings, which mostly began when I normally go to bed. A quick dinner not to miss the last shuttle, two hours in the movies, a taxi to Academia da Cachaça or some other of Rio’s famous nightclubs, an early-morning walk on the beach, a three-hours’ blackout and a breakfast with bags under the eyes.

I don’t dare speak for the others which part of our programme was the most interesting. But I think I can safely say which one was the most hated and the most dreaded. It was the last day of our stay in Brazil, when we all took off with unforgettable memories in our lug-gage and with an uncertain “See you!” on our lips.

YOU CAN READ NISIMAZINE RIO ONLINE :

www.nisimazine.eu

portrait

I remember that I met with his hair (impres-sive, blond and very cool) for the first time at the Finnish Film Archive summer 2003, where we both worked for a short period. Early this

year we discovered our mutual interest to Istanbul and Turkish cinema. While talking enthusiastically about it, I realized how much I want to know him better.

If you don't remember his hair, you are probably familiar with the dozens of photographs that Lasse has taken for Nisimazines or other NISI MASA net-work purposes. "I have been wondering for years that what a photographer does in a group of all these film-makers. It has troubled me a lot, but it has also made me feel good, to be still able to make photos."

'Villes et Cinemas' was a French association orga-nising film-workshops for young people. One was organised at the Festival de La Rochelle and also Lasse took part. He remembers the programme leaflet's bizarre sounding high-light: "Personal en-counters between the participants on the beach". The huge NISI MASA network has actually grown from a small group of friends that met that day on that beach! Lasse became one of the founding members of both NISI MASA network and Euphoria Borealis, the Finnish member of NISI MASA. "I have been amazed to see how the network expand and to get contacts of really remote places -how did they heard of us?"

Paris, Cannes, Malmö, Kars, Alba, La Rochelle, Is-tanbul, Berlin, Courmayeur, Warsaw, Lyon, Sofia...Since early 2000 Lasse has been travelling around Europe taking part of all kinds of NISI MASA related meetings, workshops and other events. All these kept him busy for years, and "it was always a hassle trying to sort jobs and school out of the way to be able to go, hah-hah! There were so many great things that I have been lucky to participate. Now I have an inter-national network of friends that I’ve met during differ-ent film festivals in Europe. I can feel myself at home everywhere."

NISI MASA has taken Lasse to as far as Iran. He was part of the Nisimazine workshop at the Teheran Documentary Film Festival in 2008. Taking pictures outside the international and liberal atmosphere of the festival was of course a challenge. People

One of the founder members of NISI MASA network, LASSE LECKLIN has worked as Secretary General in the board since the beginning until 2009. We wanted to learn more about him by the conversation of Pinja Rosenberg.

on the street rarely even wanted to speak. "I was troubled by the extremes I encountered. Restrictions and control of the press, speech and people, espe-cially women… Then one evening I was invited to a party in a private villa behind guarded gates where everyone had a vodka-shot in hand and mini-skirts danced wildly." Taking part in the Teheran festival, there is one the most memorable things Lasse has ever experienced.

Lasse is interested in telling stories and it's been natural to do it with his camera. But he would like to go on with film-making as well. "I love the spontaneous nature of photography. When making a film everything has to be so carefully planned in pre-hand."

One of Lasse's favourite films and important mo-ments has been "The Band's visit" by the Israeli di-rector Eran Kolirin. "All the images in it seemed like perfectly composed photographs. The movie cam-era kept almost still and I was holding my breath. It

was a moment of great inspiration and a reminder: This could be my way of film-making. Film and pho-tography are not far from each other and I'm not the odd one among the film-makers."

It's weird now for Lasse to have so little NM-net-working and workshopping in schedule. How to spend all the freetime? "I have a new hobby", he reveals, "I want to learn to sail! I don't have my own boat, but I just love sailing. My master plan was to hang in the terraces near some yacht clubs hoping to get on board and get to sail a bit. Well it didn't quite work out. I figured that I might as well learn to navigate and then be on a boat one day."

The troubled photographer is turning into a skip-per and a film-maker. Will 2010 bring us a ciné-boat?

by Pinja Rosenberg

9

Photo by Lasse Lecklin