Beatrice Ní Bhroin, London

Tuesday 6^th July saw the first of the volunteer meetings where the main agenda was to relay the pricing and programme plans to members to ensure we’re on track for an attractive festival. New expertise joining the team in the final months means there is a continued vibrancy in our ideas and we hope to neglect nothing in our planning.

Businesses local to ‘The Lost Theatre’ are being informed of the coming festival as we hope to encourage their participation, whether as a recommended place to eat between sessions or to mingle post films while residents from the area will also be offered a discount.

With the core of the films having passed through my hands at some point I am confident in the quality of content we’ll be able to share over the four days of the festival. Categorising sessions is next step and with the help of our viewing panellists I have been working with extensive feedback.

Next week’s meetings are dedicated to the festival’s marketing before the launch of tickets and events. It’s important for us to propagate the ethos of FD4W so that workshops and networking during the festival are productive. Celebrating women’s talent for story telling is only the first step as we aspire to establish a space to cultivate female talent in film beyond what little we’ve claimed thus far!

Posted in Blogs, Ruth's Rant on July 8th, 2010 | No Comments

In early June I did the excellent and intense weekend directing course with Ruth Torjussen which was held in Cardiff. The question always arises then-  how do you build on this kind of experience while it is fresh in your mind? Well, I had already  signed up for a Mini Masterpieces  summer program at Bristol University,   not quite knowing what to expect.  In short order I pitched a film, got it accepted and found myself directing this new short only a few streets away from where we had enjoyed the directing course just two weeks earlier !

Within a week we had shot, edited and done the post production necessary on  Infill, Noggin, Wattle & Daub, a little fiction (barely)  piece about an old courtyard on the brink of being re-developed…for something. But what? My film explored the visions of three pairs of interested parties and it premiered to an Open Day audience at the university just a few days after we shot it.

When gathering the crew, I was able to secure one of my fellow FD4W alumna, Anne-Marie Margerison as Director of Photography. We had a chance to work with a professional sound man, producer and editor on this project and  found the my FD4W course had prepared me better for this than I could have anticipated too.

The directing course was just so valuable in  giving me a bit of experience and confidence about what to watch out for and how to keep things moving on set.   Well, so much more too really. Three days can certainly make a difference!  It was a real pleasure to put the skills we had been taught to use so quickly.

Now it is less than a month since I took the course and aside from enjoying  the final edit Lynnwen Brown did on the little piece we all shared direction on that weekend, I have a new film done and dusted and entered for two festivals ( Encounters  in Bristol and Exposures in Manchester). I plan to help others met through the course on a couple of their projects in the near future and am in planning for a more ambitious project of my own to start later this summer!

-Teri Brewer

archaeoikon [at] me [dot] com

Cardiff

Infill, Noggin, Wattle & Daub and more will be up on my website soon.

http://www.archaeoikon.com/

Posted in Blogs, Ruth's Rant on July 1st, 2010 | No Comments

The petition passes the 500 mark and keeps on rising…

http://www.petitiononline.com/Cannes10/petition.html

Yesterday on BBC  World Service radio – I’m on at 29. 3o mins in.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p007g9z3/Newshour_11_05_2010/

In the Times on Monday…

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/cannes/article7121359.ece

Posted in Blogs, Ruth's Rant on May 12th, 2010 | No Comments

As you know just recently we’ve been celebrating the first short film completed by a student who had never directed before the Intro course.

Spanish actress Angeles completed the 6 week course in October and hasn’t wasted any time in writing, directing and producing ‘Call Centre’ so I asked her to write something for me that I can use for a press release.  Here’s the full statement to brighten your day and let me just confirm that the X-rated ‘Call Centre’ and indeed Angeles are heavily Almodovar influenced.  I love her!!

I have wanted to act for all of my 50 years (almost!) and obviously in such time I have had various parts and in more than one country. But I signed for Ruth’s course and when I was directing a movie I felt it was more “orgasmic” than acting, and I decided at my age that I want to write and direct films. The pleasure I got it from this is indescribable. The course was different to any course I’ve taken and all students had a bond; something difficult to attain considering our different cultures and we still see and help each other! I learned immensely from Ruth and the empowerment that gave is marvellous. Ruth inspired me like nobody has ever done to the point I was compelled to make a short film which I did!  Never could I imagine making a film. A new world opened.  So with my inexperience, I wrote my script for the short.  I chose mental health as the subject; it is based on true facts and I dedicated my film to all women suffering mental problems. I introduced a lot of humour into the film. It was a tragic snapshot of the life of these two women but it was mixed with good gags. I think nothing new has been invented in the cinema and we reflect on the genius I’ve seen. I would say I was particularly influenced by Almodovar.

It was my first short film; I had headaches and tears but at the same time I feel so proud that I have made this lasting thing. The big problem was money – it was my own money. People normally go to Bahamas, I do a short film instead. I was sure of my product, the script was good. But when I came to shoot, I had to change my plans because two actors did not turn up. So you have to pay equipment & location again and you become frightened till death that the actors will not turn up next time. Also, being an obvious novice, everybody noticed, but this  is the price you have to pay. I learned more doing this film than I reckon 5 masters in film making would have taught me and also I still have the urge to do more. I’m writing my first feature film and since I am very stubborn, I will do it. It is difficult to find funds, it’s also difficult to be a women in this business. It’s difficult but I’m passionate about film at the same time. It was difficult to be the director when all my crew had masters in film making, were younger and more experienced than I. The actors were fantastic. I loved all of then and in fact, how good they were, very good, it surprised me.  Everybody can do a film if I can. I read somebody did a film for 35 pence spent on a can of soup as a prop; I did not manage that as I paid for crew and equipment which cost me a lot added to which I had to change location and re-arrange equipment. There is said to be 6% of films directed by women; we have to increase this. We need more women directing and producing films and we need more funds to do it!  Thanks to Ruth for enabling me to have this enormous pleasure!

Well done Angeles . We wish you luck  getting in to other festivals and we’re all looking forward to seeing it at ours in September. (All films made by ex-students of our courses will be screened in a special section of the festival).

Posted in Blogs, Ruth's Rant on April 22nd, 2010 | 2 Comments

About flippin’ time!!  After 82 years of ignoring womens films – yes only three nominations in 82 years pretty much means ignoring – Kathryn Bigelow wins the Best Director Oscar for The Hurt Locker,  a low budget, brilliantly executed Iraq war movie. The fact that she is also trounces her ex James Cameron  and the £300 million dollar  Avatar (yawn) makes me even happier.

Even for those of us who don’t necessarily agree with the razzmataz and hype of the Oscars when they so often get it wrong, it feels so good when they get it right!

Thank you Kathryn for giving us all hope. We are so proud of you. It makes it a  lot easier to imagine a future where half the nominees are women. Where it doesn’t make any difference what the gender of the director is. That is what the future holds.

Now we just have to get there!

And given that none of the major female players who have directed such wonderful cinema this year, have projects planned for release  in 2010, the novelty of this historic day may quickly wear off.  Its back to reality which is still a dismal 6 – 9% of all films having a woman director.

But for now on this International Women’s Day, join me in congratulating Kathryn Bigelow and ‘The Hurt Locker’ on a well deserved and supremely welcome win.

As far as the website goes – we are getting there slowly but surely!! Within the next couple of months it will be stuffed full of really useful and inspiring stuff  so if you have any ideas /comments please let me know.

Posted in Blogs, Ruth's Rant on March 8th, 2010 | 1 Comment