Not very long ago, in a city not really that far away, this year’s Future Producers met at the Watershed in Bristol for their introductory weekend. There may not have been any princesses with pastry-inspired hair styles, planet-destroying space stations or scruffy-looking nerf-herders, but, nonetheless, I utterly adored my start to the Future Producer’s Programme!
So enough of the corny, Star Wars-related jokes and onto more serious matters. This weekend proved to be, as I hoped, a brilliant opportunity to meet some really talented and lovely people, as well as an exciting start to a fantastic, creative experience. It was great chatting to and hearing about some of your creative experiences so far, and I really am chuffed that I’m able to work along side my fellow Future Producers who are such impressive young people!
Our main task this weekend was in programming and selecting a collection of short films aimed at 12-19 year old for this year’s Fresh Flix as a part of Bristol’s international short film and animation festival, Encounters. We watched just over 3 hours worth of short films and animations in one of the Watershed’s intimate cinemas with the task of choosing an hour’s worth of films for the Fresh Flix programme. Needless to say, the task was an extremely challenging one, with so many talented, intriguing and entertaining applicants to choose from. It was amazing to see so many home grown shorts, as well as some brilliant international pieces; I really love seeing the products of budding film industries in countries outside of Europe and North America as it really brings home how creative humanity as a whole can be. I was particularly impressed by the amount of shorts that had been produced by female writers and directors, given how famously male-orientated the film industry currently is, with only one female director having ever achieved the Academy Award for Best Director (Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker) in the entire history of the Academy. I hope this is a trend that will continue and increase on into the feature film strand of film-making!
After spending an evening mulling over the films we had seen, and discussing our favourites in small groups, we were able to debate, discuss and decide our choices for the final programme of the event. I really am pleased with the programme we came up with as they are a brilliant selection of short films, and I hope our target audience will enjoy them too!
We were also treated to a workshop on pitching and presenting, which was a very useful and rewarding experience. It reminded me how presenting can be such a stressful ordeal for many people, myself included, but with the clear and helpful tips we were advised about during this session, I hope our stress levels will be somewhat alleviated in any future presentation situations.
This weekend has really got my mouth watering for some brilliant upcoming events in Bristol such as Bristol’s Encounters Short Film and Animation Festival, the BFI Gothic Season, and Electric December. I am particularly interested in working towards events for Encounters and the Gothic Season, as I’m passionate about the films we selected for Fresh Flix and have a long standing fascination with gothicism as an artistic movement. I would love to get into contact with some of the directors for the short films we selected in order to coordinate events for Fresh Flix such as directorial Q & A’s, and perhaps even with some of the casts, depending on their availability. It would also be interesting to combine the mediums of literature and film for the BFI Gothic Season by perhaps organizing readings or workshops around famous ghost and gothic stories such as the works of M.R. James, Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black, and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, followed by screenings of film adaptations of such works. The art of adapting written texts to the medium of film is of particular interest to me, and I would love to organize an event around such an interest to explore the origins and evolution of the gothic.
All in all, I’m thoroughly enjoying myself and can’t wait to continue!