| Worshipping at the Church of Digital |
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I believe in the power of God, the beauty of basketball and the power of 35mm. Okay maybe just in the power of God and basketball. I used to be a follower of the church of 35mm and 16mm film. In my earlier days I sat and listened while their preachers fed me the fruit of life. On the top of Cape Town's Table Mountain, myself, like a number of other believers in the power of film, received the word. The word told us 'go ahead and teach the gospel, go ahead and heal the sick, do this in the name of 35mm and I will come back again to take you all home. As a member of the parish I went into the world armed with the belief that one day the good Lord will confer on me the holy spirit of the 35mm camera and I in turn will take that work of art and produce something that the world has been waiting for. People would hear of my mission and gather and watch it in amazement. People will come from far to see this miracle in a 120 seater movie theatre. And when they leave that holy place and put on their shoes at the entrance to the theatre they will know that they had seen the second coming. The burning bush within them would rage and they would go out and convert. For my first testimonial I chose a topic close to my heart. Frustrated with the negative portrayal of Nigerians in the South African press I decided to make a film that showcased not only Nigerians in a better light but also celebrate the beauty of our African brothers and sisters. Put them on the pedestal that they deserve. I humbly took my offering to the Lord and named my piece GOD IS AFRICAN. In order to realise the testimonial I needed disciples of my own. I also needed a 35mm camera. I thought back to the days when I worked on video and how I had upgraded myself into the brotherhood of film. What they didn't deliver on the sermon on the mountain was the cost of the camera. The cost of film. The cost of developing the film. I had never heard of telecine but whatever it was it cost a lot. I visited the temple of MCC (the Movie Camera Company) to look for a discount. The discount was still an account too large for me to comprehend. But I said this is part and parcel of the mission. Let this cup pass over me. I had to suffer before I reached salvation and salvation was standing on set in the form of an Arriflex 435 ES Camera, video playback by my side and the flicker free lights bringing the people out of the darkness and into the light. Around this time I started meeting other disciples and hearing tales of others still. Some guys in Europe had started something called Dogma films. They would shoot on a digital video camera and transfer it to film. What a strange religion I thought at the time. With the millennium around the corner I figured Y2K wasn't in the computers, it was in these filmmakers' heads. At a casual meeting towards the end of 1999, I met up with a friend of mine called David Newton. He spoke to me about the beauty of digital video. I spoke of the beauty of 35mm (never mind that we had three weeks before our shoot and I didn't have one roll of film). He challenged me on the fact that it was expensive. Here I was an independent filmmaker with hardly any cash to pay my rent let alone buy a roll of the precious 35mm. As far as I was concerned David was the devil. The devil shall take many guises and here was one of them. I had shot a short film on 16mm and I was itching to take my place on the right hand side of other filmmakers that had shot on 35mm. Of course I didn't pay for the 16mm but that's beside the point. I had eaten of the fruit and I was ready to know that I was naked and needed to be clothed in rolls of 35mm. But the devil reared his ugly head again. Producers that promised to come through with cash disappeared. Some never took my calls. The phone would start to ring, they would probably recognise my name on the phone and suddenly there was an engaged tone. I started turning up at their offices only to be turned back again. I became depressed. I turned to the Lord and asked why I had been forsaken? Ian Kerkoff looks like the devil. If I was casting a movie and I needed someone to play the devil I'd cast him. Ian Kerkoff is a brilliant filmmaker. A man for whom the world of filmmaking is an extension of him (and that's the way it should be). A man whose films I can't watch because his movies aren't designed for people like myself that aren't ready to confront the images he is presenting. One day I would be able to sit through a Kerkoff movie. And on that day hell will freeze over. At the shrine of Sithengi in 1999 a conversion happened to young Akin Omotoso. If I remembered correctly the angels were singing in the heavens that afternoon. On the pulpit were Ian Kerkoff and Mike Hammond. Both had shot stuff on digital and both were here to tell us about the digital revolution. Kerkoff spoke about the flexibility of the digital camera, it allowed you to get into areas 35 won't even be able to touch because it was a heavy camera. He spoke about the discovery of a new voice. He spoke about a technology still virgin(at the time) that people hadn't discovered its language. He preached about the beauty of not knowing what to expect from the camera. The fact that it was terrain that hadn't been walked. There were no boundaries. Someone from the pew asked "what about the noise that digital video carries?" He looked unto that unknowing student and said "that thing you refer to as noise to me is beautiful". I went back to GP with a new religion. A new faith. Firstly I had to convert my soldiers in the movie. The first soldier being Hakeem kae Kazim, my lead actor, because both of us had waxed lyrical about shooting our movie on 35. I had to go to him in the early hours of the morning lest the disciples of 35 saw me and crucified me. In the early hours of a November morning I converted Hakeem to realising the vision on digital. Yes it was cheaper than shooting on 35mm but more than that, I was seduced by walking into a terrain that hadn't been defined yet. I wanted to be part of the new school. If we had to use a digital camera to get the word out then that was the path that had been defined by the fathers of time. I didn't want to end up like most of my film-maker friends that were waiting by the tree of life to give them money so they could go and realise their visions on 35. The tree of life promised a lot but time waits for no one. I had seen talented filmmakers waiting for that moment to shoot their films. Some had won awards internationally yet at no time did it seem like the producers that hold this industry in a vice would throw down an apple from the tree of life. These filmmakers became depressed as each day passed and each spoke of the day, that one glorious day in the land of milk and honey when they would be shooting on film. As they dreamed years passed and I didn't want to wait. I wanted to experiment. I wasn't afraid to fail. I wanted to tell a story. A story that had begun to eat at me. I had to get it out and if the way to the Garden of Eden was through a digital camera then I was ready to be baptised. I left the other filmmakers standing by the tree of life waiting with their hands outstretched. Once my main soldier was convinced I went out and spread the word. I met other filmmakers and told them I was shooting on digital. Some laughed others stayed true "I am a film maker not a video maker" one said. I blocked that out and went to worship at the temple of Magus Vision (the home of digital in South Africa). GOD IS AFRICAN was shot on a DV Cam camera with a digital back in the summer of 2001. We spent 24 days in the wilderness realising this vision. When the angel David Newton visited me back in 1999 I was too blind to see. In the two years since that night, more people are turning to the digital camera. I have just taken part in a series of 1 minute movies shot on Mini DV. Yizo Yizo 2 was shot on the Sony 790. Somewhere out there in the wilderness a short film produced by Anant Singh was shot on High Definition. Most importantly I think is that MNET, one time preachers of the 35mm format are now saying that their New Directions Series will now be shot on digital. A few years ago they laughed at us. Around the world movie theatres are installing digital projectors, when o when will Ster Kinekor become hip to that? Festivals like Sundance are now accepting entries shot on digital. In 1997 when I made my first testimonial called The Kiss Of Milk on Betacam I couldn't enter it into certain festivals because it was shot on video. For less than R1,500 you can rent a digital camera and some lights. You can go and shoot over weekends. I acted in a short film last year called Breaking The Chains written by Nena Parbhoo and directed by my brother in digital Maynard Kraak. We shot it on digital over three months and only on weekends. On Tuesday the 17th of July in the year of our Lord 2001 it was screened at the 2nd Highgate Film Festival in London. Spike Lee's last film he used a digital camera. Shall I list the titles or the disciples of digital film? I don't think I have to. The word is out there. In the past if I wanted to make a film I would have to find the right film, worry about the camera, need a focus puller, a clapper loader etc. Now if I want to make a film I buy a tape from Stax, rent from Magus, get a redhead light or two call up my soldiers and say "guys it's on". Until the costs come down in relation to film digital is a way for African film makers to tell their stories. I believe in the power of God, the beauty of basketball and the miracle of the digital landscape. I will continue to testify now and forever. |
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