Sean McAllister » Page 11

Author: Sean McAllister

Documentary Filmmaker from Hull, England, specialises in giving the voiceless a voice

Berlin

25 April 2010

I am about to fly to Berlin to give a Masterclass for students at the Berlin Film Academy, called something like this in German – Deutsche Film – und Fernsehakademie Berlin (DFFB) .

I have been invited by my old friend Stefan, he was formally head of the ‘Shadow Festival’ in Amsterdam where I’d shown all my early work before being (finally) “acknowledged” by the IDFA (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam) where all my films play regularly now.

This is the first time I’ve been to Berlin since 1989 when I visited shortly after the wall came down, and I’m keen to see the place again. Stefan wants to show my early films ‘Working For The Enemy’ (his favourite) and ‘The Minders’ (his second favourite).

In a fun kind of way he refuses to acknowledge any of my recent films – I always get the feeling he thinks I’ve sold out by showing them at the IDFA – the mighty festival he competed against for so many years.

But I have brought them along just in case the young students want to see something more recent than films from 1996 and 1998. I will also catch up with doc film maker friend Petr Lom who has recently moved to Berlin and isn’t enjoying it that much, I shall try and cheer him up and hopefully combine a bit of work and play while I am there.

28 April 2010

I know I’ve taken the wrong train but I didn’t want to insult the nutter who told me to take this line – so I climbed on-board. It’s a tightly packed Berlin train, It has a slight feel of the East, and the grim old communist days. Why don’t Germans smile I wonder? I make a point of smiling at everyone. I enjoy being the nutty tourist with my map.

The clanky noisy doors slam open even before the train has stopped, they have a military clank to them, they look and sound like Japanese subway doors opening and closing to a military tune. Are the Germans the Japanese of Europe I wonder?

A blond girl opposite takes my attention, an older woman gets on and sits close to her, she makes a point of pulling her coat clear of the blond woman, the blond girl is offended by this and gives the older woman a very hard angry stare.

We move on to the next station. A scraggy looking woman climbs on wiping a tear from her eye, her boyfriend stands over her with a tattoo on his hand, they bicker and argue oblivious to the onlookers.

I get off at the wrong stop and wander up the road. Berlin isn’t so glitzy here, the streets are filled with immigrants and drunks, it feels dirty and poor, but so much more real and alive than the clean, posh end of town where I will be staying courtesy of the Berlin Film Academy.

I was last here in 89 after the wall had just come down. My romantic memories of Berlin are being slowly eroded the longer I remain here. It doesn’t feel like the same place somehow, maybe I’m at the wrong end of town. Or in the wrong mindset.

I make my way back to the hotel passing an amazing holocaust monument – a huge collection of graves of varying heights with narrow lanes between them. Strangely this sacred site is guarded by two security men. It is bizarre that we must guard a monument to 6 million killed. Who do they fear here?

I stop for a 5 star shit at the Ritz Carlton hotel. It’s the highlight of my day, I watch the rich eat quaint dainty cakes as I pass back through the bar from the luxury toilets. Then I bump into a man dressed in a red ‘Beefeater’ costume. His name is Robert, he is English, he has lived in Berlin for 40 years and laments the falling of the wall. “Berlin was safer when we had the wall, and cleaner, now they let in anyone”, said the foreigner dressed in a red costume and wearing a big hat.

The Window Cleaner

I am sat in a cafe in Brighton watching a window-cleaner wash down a dirty shop front. He has my complete attention, I watch his every wipe, each delicate stroke caressing the shop front, his vigorous scrubbing and mopping before finally rinsing down and brushing the street of any excess water. It is an art form and he is the artist.

Cleaning has become my obsession (along with cooking) whilst I am lost between films.

I sip on the Caffè macchiato in front of me, it is a short espresso with a dash of hot milk on top. I stare out of the window and take in the sun, my mind drifts to Damascus and the fantastic Costa coffee macchiato I first tasted there… why is it so much better than this one here in Brighton I ask myself?

But apprehension about my next trip is never far away, and I do anything to take my mind off it, opening too many wine bottles at home or propping up the local Weatherspoons bar or cooking curries and, of course, cleaning up.

I must go jogging. The thought reminds me of Dubai and a film I didn’t make. Was it the thing to do… To walk away?

In Dubai I was jogging everyday to try and escape the depression of living in hell.

But now, as another year has passed and I have nothing to show for it, I start to wonder if I should have stuck it out in Dubai. Part of me worries that there is no story in Syria, I mean a big story like there clearly would have been in Dubai.

Now that Nizam has set himself free to live his life without my camera recording his every move I am searching for a new soul-buddy, for a new obsession, for a new love.

The shop across the road is shining, its beauty lifts my day. The artist stands proud, wiping his brow and brushes, the shop owner brings his wife and daughter to view the finished work, everyone is smiling, everyone is happy.

I finish my coffee and head for the station, but as I walk I cannot stop myself looking over my shoulder again and again unable to take my eyes off the wonderful work of art which is shining magnificently in the midday Brighton sun.

I can’t wait

So here I am back in London in my local Weatherspoons soaking up their joyous beer festival and having a beautiful pint of real ale. It was about a week ago that I’d raced here whilst being filmed by Phil (a film-graduate friend) who has been helping me edit a ‘series trailer’ which would introduce people to all my films in one go.

We had the crazy idea of using me as the link that makes the films relevant to today’s world, so what better than the filmmaker relaxing having a pint. But then, just like now, as soon as my lips hit the beer glass I am finished for the day and all I want to do is relax, chat, and enjoy the drunks around me.

But today I am not being lazy, I am celebrating my ‘new’ film being commissioned by the BBC, though I still need to get more funding from other sources before they (BBC) will actually cough up their contribution.

As a result I’m hitting everyone in every direction. Today I have taken a small step by successfully completing ‘The Media Fund’ development application (worth 50k) form. The hard work wasn’t down to me though, it was thankfully the responsibility of my producer friend Fiona who is an expert in such matters. It has taken months to find all the required information, Fiona masterly made the application even designing a cute ‘Tenfoot Films’ logo in the process. Now the development application is in, we move onto making the production application. This is a big job in itself; forget filmmaking, I am now a full-time fund-raiser.

And, as well as fund-raising and form-filling I still had to get the ‘series trailer’ completed for my German sales agents who are pitching my new film (and my back catalogue) in Cannes this week at MIPCOM one of the biggest TV sales events of the year.

Plus I am also waiting to hear from the NHK, the Japanese broadcasters, they may be buying in on the new film; and if so I need to know when… All I want now is for another ‘funder’ to come on board and offer us a semi-serious wadge and hey-presto the BBC money will be released and before you can blink I will be out of here – lost to the Middle East again… I can’t wait.

This fucking film

I must write back to Nizam. He’s been asking what I am trying to get at with this film, cautious that his family may be exposed in some dangerous way. It is a question everyone I film asks at some point, but I find it very difficult to answer. The truth is I’ve got no idea; it is my endless curiosity and determination that motivates my films, I never know what will happen, nor do I want to, for me this is real film making with a true sense of adventure.

I seek a mutually understood relationship/friendship based on trust. The people in my films have to want to give, otherwise it just doesn’t work. And sometimes, for many reasons, some people can’t do it. In Japan I must have met over 10 potential characters for my film; sometimes filming for months on end only to realise, eventually, that for one reason or another, it just wasn’t right.

Now, as Nizam faces a crossroads in his life I feel I am becoming more of a problem than a release for him, and with the added pressures from a difficult marriage I wonder how we can progress.

I was so disappointed after my recent ‘filming’ trip to Bergen, I felt like the standard BBC guy trying to get his story rather than the friend I’d become over the year or so of filming with him. But Nizam was never confident at being the character and only really agreed because he wanted to learn from me about this supposed crazy life making films.

Now he worries about exposing himself and feels invaded by my camera. Having been filmed myself and not enjoyed it one little bit, I know the feeling, I feel his pain. Nizam wants to know when it will all end, and I want to know when it will start. So I must write him a reply and hopefully answer that difficult question, why am I making this film and what am I trying to get at?

If only I knew.

Waiting

Waiting for bloody Godot must have been easier than waiting for Nizam, my life seemingly revolves around waiting and waiting never knowing if he will show up or not. In Oslo he has a very busy work schedule and an extremely troubled family life, so he ends up bouncing from one to the other and now, he also has the problem of me and my needs thrown into the frantic mix. His partner is completely against us making this film and won’t even agree meet me. I sense, not surprisingly, that this added pressure is exactly what Nizam doesn’t need right now.

Torn between getting his family life back together and making a film with me he must obviously prioritise his home life, but when he said he was taking a vacation from Oslo to see a friend in Bergen it seemed a good time to catch-up and get some filming done.

For me it was also difficult to organize, I had my own kids to care about and managed to get my mother to come down to London, which allowed me to make a flying visit to Norway. Following my night-time arrival Nizam and I just sat and drank with his bubbly Iranian friend, I didn’t want to film on the first night and hoped to do some the next day but, as usual, I found myself imprisoned in my hostel waiting for his call.

Nizam eventually rang at 5 and we met in darkness at 8pm. I’d already given up the idea of filming this beautiful city with him, and anyway he wanted to cook something before taking off to a jam-night in a local bar. I saw a glimmer of hope, maybe I could at least film a cooking scene at his friends place, but this was short lived as he asked me to stop filming, he didn’t feel up to it.

So we ate the wonderful couscous he made and hit the bar, I tried filming but he wasn’t interested so I didn’t push it. Instead I watched the scenes we could have filmed. A great conversation with a Norwegian guy in the bar about the simple life he misses in Syria, followed by lots of Norwegians drinking and partying hard and then hordes of them drunk all along the streets as we headed home with my camera still locked in its bag.

Any-time soon I’m supposed to sign contracts with a German agent to sell this film, a film already commissioned by the BBC, nearly commissioned by the Japanese, and with a possibility of Norwegian TV coming on board too. Now I wonder what to do, do I push someone who isn’t interested in being filmed anymore, do I continue to try and convince Nizam of why he should be filmed, why it mattered to him and to me, or should I just cut my losses and call it a day?