The festival, as well as showcasing short films and animations, houses a wide variety masterclasses stretching from Lighting to working with actors, all taught by leading industry professionals. Also, every year has several overall themes. Dependent on the theme, table discussions are arranged where members of the creative media industry put across their views on certain issues. For 2015, one key topic was that of woman in the industry, the challenges they face and trying to break into a very male orientated medium.
I had a pass for Thursday and Friday which allowed me to get tickets for any films or masterclasses I wished to do/see. I personally tried to balance watching and learning. I felt it would be a waste not to see at least some short films while I was there, but I also wanted to learn for the best. As a class we had a few set activities which we did together, but for the rest of the day it was up to the individual.
Thursday
First on the agenda was a "London Film Academy Presents: Directing Actors Workshop". This was led by Carolina Giammetta, an actor director who has seen life from both sides of the camera. She has stared and worked on such shows as The Bill, Doctors, Causality and many many more. The biggest point she raised was making your actor feel comfortable. She made the point that fear will lead to a bad performance, so building repore is key. She did a variety of different exercises showing what it was like to receive bad direction and gave tons of fantastic tips and tricks. (See blog post entitled "IMP Director Chronicles- Working with actors")
Next was a panel discussion with the theme of women in the film industry entitled "Widening the Lens". Hosted by Joanna Coates, the discussion 'addressed the frequent contemporary stereotypes we often encountered on screen'. The panel also discussed "...what audiences, and the industry, can gain from a greater inclusion of more diverse voices and experience on screen alongside how underrepresented filmmakers are collaborating with one another to gain support and strength...". (see "widening the lens or not seeing the full picture"). The last thing we went to was a series of short films with the overall theme of "Life. Camera. Action". This was made up of 5 shorts ranging from 13 to 27 minutes in length. My personal favorites being Excursie (Excursion) and La Baracca (The Shack), two very different films. The first, Excursie followed the story of a child who borrows his fathers camera and goes out in search for aliens. With clever writing, great camera work and a fantastic conclusion it was a real highlight. La Baracca was a very different beast. Split between two very different styles of found footage and beautiful static wides which help establish the environment, the film feels extremely unique. Following the adventures of two young brothers who are sent to live with their grandma, the film progresses with them making friends and building a secret shack. The film is well paced, has some great writing and an ambiguous ending to tie it all together.
Friday
We started off the next day with a master class in cinematography hosted by the Bristol international festival of Cinematography. It was an eye opening experience watching a full professional crew hard at work. Seeing each role doing his/her part to bring the the scene to life.
Next up was another series of shorts, this time the overall theme being "Stranger than Fiction". The shorts includes a man being covered in bees 'in order to recover the environmental balance of the Yangtze Valley in Chóngqìng, China,' a 'compilation of film excerpts from the 1950s and 1960s' and 'a portrait of teen escort, Coco".
By far the film which stood above the rest was Rate me. It followed online reviews of the fictional teen escort, Coco. Darkly funny with some sick twists to boot it was a real stand out, not just from the series of shorts, but the whole festival. Each reviewer giving a very different take on what this "coco" character is like. Mix in some genius writing and you have Rate me.Another film which stood out to me was "Sieben mal am tag beklagen wir unser los und nachts stehen wir auf, um nicht zu träumen (seven times a day we bemoan our lot and at night we get up to avoid dreaming). This weird film made literally nonsense to me until the very end. It hit a personal cord with me as it addressed some things which I have gone through in my past.
Next up was a "workshop" with Director Adrian Sitaru. This was a low-point of our time at the festival. Adrians "Revolutionary" new directing style can be boiled down to one, single thing, laziness. He proposed telling the actors what to do before hand, giving them a general story line and letting them act it out. First take is what you use. What really annoyed me (and a number in the audience) was this, When asked what we would do different next time he replayed "I would stay at home, defiantly. There is little point in me being there so yea, I would stay at home". This is not directing. It did not deserve to be called a "directors workshop". At it's core it was a man trying to get away with doing the least amount of work while still being credited as a "Directed". This makes my blood boil as it undermines all the hard work directors put into a project and it teaches younger filmmakers that laziness is the best policy. To top it off his delivery was bland and boring. A waste of an hour and a half.
Luckily, we went from a low to a high. Ending the day off with are the final set of short films with the Theme of "About a girl". This was a collection of films with strong female leads. The standout film for me was a film by the Canadian filmmaker Pascal Plante in-titled "Blonde aux yeux bleus" (blue-eyed blonde). The story follows ''a Canadian mother (who) travels to Florida with her 4 year old daughter to take part in a mini-miss contest...". The film was heart felt and captured a child like sense of adventure from the little things in life. Truly great film making.
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