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| Sunday, 3 October 2004 |
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Milla Soya (Boungiorno Italia) : Filming on a shoe-string budget Robert Crusz, the Sri Lankan writer and filmmaker, formerly on the Editorial boards of the UK based international film journals Screen and Framework, and a founder member of the Sankofa Film and Video Workshop (U.K.), takes a candid look at the background story and location experiences of the new Cinema Buddhi production).
Boodee Keerthisena's idol and mentor is the great John Cassavetes, who made those unique improvisational, gritty, 'cinema-verite' style films on a shoestring budget with friends and borrowed equipment. Boodee makes his films in a similar, non-commercial way, but he is his own person with his own unique style. With one successful movie under his belt (The veils of Maya 1995), and after a long film making adventure on the road in Sri Lanka and Italy, he has just completed his second feature - Boungiorno Italia (Milla Soya) - about young South Asians illegally and dangerously crossing European borders in search of a better life in the First World.
The illegal entry into the rich developed countries by the poor of the so-called Third World is colonisation in reverse. The young South Asian men and women who risk their lives to be smuggled into western Europe in the airless baggage compartments of coaches, inside container trucks, and on sinking boats, and those who walk dangerous miles across mountain passes in freezing snow with the help of ruthless 'mafia-type' middle-men from both sides of the borders, are searching for the mark, the franc, the lire, the peseta, (of course now, the Euro), the dollar and the pound. They have been 'abducted' by the vision of the good life offered by globalisation and the free-market. Boodee spent nearly seven years in a cinematic search for his generation who had been 'abducted' to Europe in this manner, especially to Italy. (Milla Soya) revolves around a group of young musicians - rock'n rollers who venerate Bob Marley and wish to become a famous band. But their lives on the lowest rungs of Sri Lankan society, with its poverty and violence, offer them little if no opportunities. Friends returning from Italy talk about the money to be made. But the journey there is not straightforward because it's not legal. The film follows them on their dangerous journey with all its hazards, its comradeship, its tears and laughter, and also death. When in Naples, Italy, the appalling conditions of their day-to-day living, the hard labour, but also the basic human frailties, strengths, loves and hates, are also shown. On returning to Sri Lanka, somehow they seem to be better equipped to survive either in Sri Lanka, or to return to Italy, this time as legal immigrants. How then was this film to be made? The search for funds was not easy. Starting out on an initial budget calculation of about US$ 100,000, which later escalated, the money came in bits and pieces. Boodee is a graduate of the School of Visual Arts, New York City, and he made many friends in the exciting independent filmmaking sector of the USA and Europe. Many of them came to his help, working only for expenses. In Sri Lanka, many personal friends among the acting and cinema technicians fraternity helped Boodee. Among them was the veteran Sri Lankan cinematographer K. A. Dharmasena - a man of vast experience and skills and a true lighting/camera artist. Boodee says he owes a lot to K.A. for the 'look' of the Sri Lanka sequences. Many big box office film stars also pitched in to work with Boodee. The Sri Lankan segment of the shooting was a cake walk when compared to the hazards the team faced in having to complete the Italian phase of the film, which had to be shot in the winter when there was snow on the mountains. It was not financially possible to take a large contingent of people and equipment to Italy. Hence all the equipment and ancillary crew had to be arranged in Italy. For this the Lankan 'emigres' in Naples, about whom this film was about, gave Boodee amazing support both in financial and practical terms. Some of them even acted in the film. They opened up their homes to the film crew - some of these homes were illegal squats! Accommodation was not the only problem on this two-week pre-production and two-week shoot in Italy. Being unable to hire professional Italian production managers who knew all the 'ropes', the team found themselves constantly falling over the bureaucratic obstacles of the Naples municipality when it came to filling in forms to obtain the necessary permissions to shoot a film on location in Italy. In many instances the desired locations were not made available. Other hazards followed People got ill. Time and money was running short. So the point was reached when parts of the original script had to be put aside, and Boodee and his team, started writing on the move. While preserving the basic concepts of the movie, scenes were improvised, actors acted on their instincts, and shots were grabbed thankfully without losing technical quality. Carefully hidden dialogue cue cards a la Brando littered the locations! Back in Sri Lanka the struggle to complete the film continued. Technical hiccups had to be sorted out, some scenes had to be re-shot, the animated cartoon sequences had to be completed, the music score finalized and worst of all, more money had to be found. But Boodee kept his cool - the guerilla filmmaker in him knew that the cash would come. Always bursting with new ideas he kept working, earning small amounts from television commercials and documentaries. 'Free-mind'
An unusual photo exhibition titled 'Free-mind' by award winning working journalist Yamuni Rashmika Perera ('Lanka' Newspaper) will be held at the Colombo Art Gallery on October 9-10. On display will be a collection of over 80 photographs encompassing a wide range of issues collected and published during the course of the photographers career as a photo-journalist.
The exhibition will open at 4.00 p.m. on October 8 with Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse as the guest of honour. The exhibition is sponsored by Fuji Film-Acme Photo, EAP Trust Investment, Nine Hearts and Mobitel.
Tjeerd - Mariken in concert The Sunera Foundation in collaboration with the Royal Netherlands Embassy will be presenting violinist Tjeerd Top and pianist Mariken Zandvliet in concert to raise funds for the foundation's successful programme of intergrating into the normal stream of life differently abled young persons. The concert will be held on Sunday October 10 at 7.00 p.m. at the Golden Ballroom of the Colombo Plaza. Tjeerd Top who started playing the violin at the age of eight graduated with honours from the Royal Conservatory of the Hague (Netherlands) in 2000. He was first prize winner of the Dutch National Violin Competition 'Oskar Back' 2001. As a soloist he has performed with several of the leading orchestras and conductors in key concert-halls of Europe. He made concert tours to Japan, South-America, and the Middle East. French born Mariken Zandvliet made her debut as a soloist at the age of fourteen with the 'Gewestelijk Orkest' of South Holland. Besides appearances as a soloist she has performed with various orchestras and chamber music ensembles and has toured Scandinavia, France, England, Germany, Morocco and China. She is also a member of the Bonnard Trio, the Trio Damase and the Basho Ensemble. Mariken Zandvliet teaches at the conservatories of Utrecht and Amsterdam. Tjeerd Top and Mariken Zandvliet made successful tours to Indonesia, Costa Rica, The Netherlands, Antilles and Argentina. The duo's repertory varies from classical to contemporary music. Their repertoire for the Sri Lankan concert will include Beethoven's Spring Sonata, works of Fritz Kreisler, Tchaikowsky, Mozart and Schubert as well as some contemporary pieces. Tickets are available at the Sunera Foundation Office, 65, Rosmead Place, Colombo 7, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Main Sponsors are the Royal Netherlands Embassy and The Colombo Plaza. |
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