INTERVIEWS WITH KEY PLAYERS IN THE FILM INDUSTRY
INTERVIEW WITH DR. JULIUS SPENCER
Filmmaker and Managing Director of Premier Media Group
FO: I have read a lot about you, I have read about your work, your contributions, and the investments you have made in the industry yourself, so you are an obvious choice in Sierra Leone to talk about. Idriss, I am sure he is a young filmmaker you know, Velma is also a young creative who I am sure you must be familiar with. To me, the energy of what they are doing is what I have also tried to immerse myself in — to talk to the young people and ask them what they are doing, what do they wish, would happen. However, all of that is immaterial if I don’t get the background on where the industry has come from, what structures were put in place and how you see the industry in terms of how it can be stabilised. I want to break my conversation into three parts:
Part one would be in film and education building, the kind of structures that are on ground and the type that you think should be on the ground.
Secondly, in terms of funding for emerging filmmakers, after they get skills, they have to make films. How do they make those film, what should the structure of the funding be, who should administer the funding?
The third part is in terms of government regulations. Are there guilds, should there be guilds, are those guilds effective, will those guilds interfere with any intervention that is progressive in financial terms? And then government also along those lines, are there laws that need to be enacted, are there laws against outside intervention in terms of bringing in funding?
If you could introduce yourself and just give us a bit of a background: your contribution, your time in government, what you are doing now in the private sector, your media property and then give me a background of the film industry in Sierra Leone, where it came from and how you see what’s going on in the tribe now?
JS: I am Julius Spencer, currently Managing Director of Premier Media Group Limited as it is now called, it is used to be called Premier Media Consultancy Limited. My background is originally in theatre. I studied theatre arts at the University of Ibadan, I did a Masters and PhD there, taught in the school there, did some work on television in Nigeria as a means of survival, wrote some scripts, acted on television dramas in Ibadan and then came back home. I taught at the Njala University College for about three years and then transferred to Fuorabay College, taught English, taught Drama, then set up a small theatre company called Spence Productions and started doing live theatre. After a while I moved into radio drama, TV drama, documentaries and so on. Then I went on sabbatical to Boston University and sat in on some film and television production courses. Then the coup happened in Sierra Leone. I came back and set up a radio station for the government in exile called RADIO DEMOCRACY. After the government was restored, I became the Minister of Information, Communication, Tourism and Culture for about a year and after the signing of the peace agreement, the ministry was broken up and I became Minister of Information and Broadcasting. I left government in 2001 and I set up Premier Media Consultancy as a corporate profit making body. We started in a small space somewhere else and started doing the same kind of things that Spence Production was doing — the theatre, the radio drama, TV drama and so on and then we moved into public relations and events management. Then we set up a newspaper and a radio station. Now we are in the process of restructuring, so we now have Premier Media Group and we are going to have subsidiaries, premier PR and events, premier films, premier news corporation which should be the radio, the newspaper, the internet maybe at some point and the television hopefully. In the area of film production, my first effort was in 1994, and prior to that there had been a couple of attempts by others. There had been one in the late ‘80s directed by Pat Madi, in fact I think it was some Nigerians who came and wanted to do production linked up with a playwright who had done this play and they tried to convert it to a film but it didn’t work — but that was the first attempt, it was in 1988 or 1989. Around the same time, we did our first film, it was 94awa and there was also another one which was done by another group, it was called wan bone and pikin by the Bell brothers. Those were the earliest efforts. After we did that one in 1994, we then did another one in 1995, Off to America and after that we stopped because we had huge challenges with marketing. We could not recover investments. We did another one in 2008, it was shot in 2005 but released in 2008, it is called Crack and it did better than the earlier ones. In fact, by that time obviously, I had acquired more skills as a director. The other person who I believe has done a lot of work in film is Jimmy Bangura (jimmy b), who I hope you will be talking to because he has done a number of movies, worked with Nigerians, Ghanaians and his movies are screened on DSTV and so on. Generally I will say in a way that catalogues the history of filmmaking here,I think in the past a year or two years, there has been some kind of massive interest in filmmaking in Sierra Leone. A lot of movies are being produced now. We have about one every two weeks being released, most of them are of very poor quality because the filmmakers don’t know anything about film production, but they are enthusiastic.
There is also a huge interest from the public. Right now there has been such an interest in Sierra Leonean movies that people are no longer buying Nigerian movies. They want to buy Sierra Leone movies. So if you look around the streets, you will see all these posters of movies all over the place. There’s also a new copyright law which was established early last year. It is a much better legal regime for copyright issues such as penalties and so forth. That has helped in terms of marketing movies. On the side of training, there is very little or nothing. I know Balanta Academy at some point was trying to do something but I don’t know if they are still doing it, and there is nothing at the university. There is really nowhere you can go to study film production. Fuorabay College has a mass communication programme, they do some TV production, but it is a weak programme. In fact, I taught in it for a couple of years after I left government but I didn’t have enough time so I gave up teaching. So, training, I think it’s critical. We need a lot of training. In the area of documentary film production, I think there is a bit more competence because of television but even that is very limited. The quality of local documentary production you see on television is rather weak. I think there are a few people who are trying to produce documentaries. We have done a few but we only do documentaries if somebody hires us to do them and we have done quite a few for companies, government departments and so on. In a nutshell, I think that there is a great need for training.
I am not aware of any legal regime that prohibits funding coming in or assistance of any form. We do not have a censorship board or film classification board, it doesn’t exist. We used to have one long ago but it’s moribund. In fact, I had a discussion with the minister a couple of weeks ago and raised the issue that we need to establish film classification because some of the movies that some people are trying to produce now… some people are moving into quite a bit of explicit sex in the movies. I don’t have anything against that but it needs to be classified so that people will know that this kind of movie, kids are not allow to watch it etc. The minister liked the idea. I am suppose to send him some proposals which I have not yet gotten around to doing. They have training also and I have proposed some short time training courses which I am prepared to lead. I also spoke to the university vice chancellor about the university getting involved and partnering so that whatever training we organise can be certificated by the university and he liked the idea and he was going to pass it on to the Dean of Arts. Again, I haven’t followed up, so basically that’s where we are.
FO: Thank you very much. I want to just ask a few questions because really you are like an elder statesman. Strangely enough, I did a documentary once and it’s amazing how many of the African cultural intelligentia had spent time in Ibadan. I wanted to ask… why you think African stories, the experience of Africans, remains so untold in their own voice. Why is the global information order as of today so disadvantageous to the experiences of Africans as a whole?
JS: I think it is a combination of factors. First of all, maybe because we live in it, we do not always see it and we do not recognise the need to tell the story. We sit around ourselves and tell the story and at times we turn it into jokes, especially in Sierra Leone. We tell the stories to ourselves but we do not recognise the importance of telling the story to others.
Secondly, there is a lack of skill sets. In a way, we do not have enough people with the skills to be able to tell the story effectively and to be able to get into the international media. You have to be able to achieve a certain quality and format which not many Africans are competent with.
Then there are the bread and butter issues, many of us are so engaged with just making a living, just being able to get the basics, we do not have time… For example, I have ideas to do documentaries that I have been toying with for years. I will not be able to get down to doing it because I just do not have the time, even to write my own memoirs. I have lived a very interesting life — I have been to prison, I have been in the war front, I have carried a weapon myself, I have done all kinds of things. I have not been able to sit down and write it because my days are taken up with just being able to make a living in this part of the world. If I were to have maybe three months where I didn’t have to worry about where I am going to make my next whatever. I’d write. I would have written long ago — it’s been more than ten years and I haven’t written anything. I haven’t even been able to sit down and read for leisure. I don’t have the time because I am working. I come here in the morning and at times I am in this office till 9 or 10 at night. I think that also is a factor.
The knowledge and the ability to access funding is also an issue. Most of us either do not know where to go to get the funds or do not have the skills to be able to do the proposals that will attract the funding to be able to do the work that needs to be done. I think it’s a combination of factors. Also, non-Africans come into Africa and some of the things we take for granted, they see. I’ll give you an example. I grew up in Sierra Leone, all my schooling was in Sierra Leone, my first degree was in Sierra Leone, and then I went to Nigeria. It was while I was in Nigeria doing research for my PhD that I discovered publications about Sierra Leoneans. That was when I came home on vacation and I heard for the first time about somebody who is famous in America. He is not quite famous in Sierra Leone. He was a guy called Sengbe Pieh who staged a mutiny on a slave ship and that group of Sierra Leoneans eventually landed in America. They are credited with having inspired the abolitionist movement and helping to end slavery. I knew nothing about him and it took an American lecturing at Fuorabay College…A friend of mine was in that course and fortunately he recorded the lecture and he gave it to me and he said, “Go listen to this”, and I went home that night and I decided to listen to it. It was on cassette then and I couldn’t believe my ears. I couldn’t sleep and was spellbound listening to the story of this Sierra Leonean that I had never heard about. Another famous Sierra Leonean Bai Bureh, whom we grew up singing derogatory songs about staged a revolt against colonialism called the Hut Tax War (1898) and eventually he was sent into exile. We had these derogatory songs we learned as children and it was when I was in Nigeria doing my research that
I came across some of the dispatches from the British governor about him and I came to understand what had really happened to him and I ended up writing a play about him later. I eventually wrote an article that led me to travel and lecture in different countries. While I was doing my research for my PhD, I was of the impression that as far as theatre in Sierra Leone is concerned, it emerged during the colonial period with peasant African gatherings, but while I was in Nigeria I discovered an article written by a German about a Mende story teller in Sierra Leone which was pure theatre. I came back home and I searched for the man, I found him. I observed some of his performances and I wrote this article called the Mende story telling theatre which became quite widely circulated. It was published in Theatre Quarterly, a major theatre magazine. The amazing thing for me was that I had lived all my life here, yet I did not know about these things because they were not taught in schools. Our education was tailored in the white man’s image so the history we were taught was from the white man’s perspective. It is only recently that Africans have been writing history books that tell it from our perspective.
There are all of these factors ,which is why I think that we have not yet been able to tell our own stories effectively. Some of those problems are disappearing with the histories being almost re-written and more people are understanding the issue but the other challenges still remain.
FO: I need to ask about the civil war and the impact on the cultural landscape. I see all these young people who are now creating and trying to express themselves. The accessibility of digital media is empowering younger people, they don’t need big equipment to create things anymore. Their laptops, their software and DSLR cameras liberate them to tell a story. As someone who has lived through several stages of Sierra Leonean history, what do you think the impact of that period is on this new generation? As someone who was in government before, what are your feelings about how this whole cultural industry is beginning to emerge and what do you see going into the future with this particular generation?
JS: I think that the generation that were either very young or grown up during the war, particularly those who directly experienced the war have a different kind of attitude towards life than those of us who knew Sierra Leone before the war. There is quite a bit more aggression, there is a propensity to violence but also there is quite a bit of anger largely because we have not been able to, in a way, provide for them. Many young people missed out on their childhood. They missed out on education at a certain stage so they are disadvantaged in many ways. In terms of the creative industries, I think that what has been happening in Sierra Leone has been happening without any real support from government. Music blossomed in Sierra Leone in early 2000 and there was a time when you could go to parties, you could go to night clubs and Sierra Leone music was being played. Then there was a reversal. But it is better now than it was before and you have a lot of young people who want to get involved in the performing arts. When the music industry blossomed, everybody wanted to be a musician but now everybody wants to be an actor or an actress. If I were to call an audition here now, this whole building would not be big enough. We have auditioned for a month and the place was full everyday and people were paying to go register to audition but I never knew that it would be like that. Every day, I receive calls about the movies that will be released and everyday, I receive several calls with people asking, “How can I join your industry?” I tell them to come to the office with their picture or leave their contact details and I tell them that if we have anything, we will call you.
So interestingly, it is the females that seem to be desperate to go on screen. I think they have this idea of glamour and so on, so there is a huge enthusiasm among young people to get involved in the performing arts. Unfortunately, successive governments have not yet recognised the importance of the creative industry and what they can do for this country. I have had discussions with the last government and this government. We developed a cultural policy with help from UNESCO. It’s been sitting now for about five years and nothing has happened with it and in fact, they did another validation workshop conference and the cabinet of the last government in their last few weeks approved it. It was supposed to go for legislation to create a council or commission for arts and culture but nothing happened. This government came in, and I raised the matter with them. They said they were going to do something but nothing happened and after a while, they said they need to revalidate it. They did another validation conference, and then nothing happened again.
Without a cultural policy in place, without an institution that has a responsibility to harness the power of the cultural industry, to be able to help them develop we are not really going to make much headway. All that has been happening has been happening by individual efforts without any support from government, without even a frame of being in place. I think some of these things need to be put in place for things to really happen. Any time I talk to anybody in government, I raise the issue about the work we should be doing with the cultural industry. We could create jobs for young people. Young people will not only be able to make a living, they will become wealthy. Look at what Hollywood has done for America, look at what Bollywood has done for India, look at what Nollywood is doing for Nigeria, look at the music industry in Nigeria, look at Ghana. Somehow, people don’t seem to see the importance of that. So you have all these young people who have some talents. They need some training, they need support, they need guidance, which they are not getting, so some of them who have talent try, they start and then they get frustrated and move on to doing something else. We have lot of people who want to do something in the performing arts but they don’t have the opportunity, they don’t have the support, they don’t have access to training opportunities, so after a while, it fizzles out. They have a few who make it even without any of that kind of support but if the support were available, they would do even better than they are doing. I am not quite sure of what the future holds. I think until and unless we can establish a council or commission for arts and culture, and task it with helping this sector develop, nothing much will happen. Some of us will do what we can as individuals, some of us have been trying, and quite a number of people have been doing the best they can but it gets to a point where without some kind of support, without some kind of establishment that can help structure things, nothing happens.
Then there is the copyright law. For the copyright law to be effective, there has to be a collection society. It has not been established because really left to ourselves, we don’t seem to be able to get together and organise things. This is partly because the majority of us do not have the technical or intellectual background to be able to structure these things properly and to set up what needs to be set up and do it right. Everybody has their own ideas. The vast majority of Sierra Leonean artists have had no exposure, no training, and everybody believes he or she is an expert, and so there we are.
FO: If there is going to be intervention, how do you suggest that it be structured? What strategies, in your opinion, will be imperative for the intervention to have the widest impact and the most positive outcomes?
JS: I think that some organisation needs to be set up or needs to get together, maybe like a guild of producers. Maybe that will be the first thing that we need to get together — a guild of producers that could get together and have a proper structure and whatever support could then come through that guild. There has to be some training component and there has to be some equipment support. I think those would be the two main things that need to be in place . There is some in terms of copyright. We also need to probably encourage and maybe support government to establish the censorship or film classification board. I think that if we have the film classification board in place and we have the guild of producers in place, we can then provide the leadership for whatever organisation needs to be put in place and then the training could probably be linked up with the university.
I think that kind of coordinated triumvirate — film classification board, guild of producers, university should be able to make things move. If you have that in place and then technical support for the training for some period, maybe even somebody coming to administer the guild for a while… also for the film classification because as far as I know, I don’t think anybody is still alive who served on the film censorship board in those days but in terms of people who have had some experience of running that kind of institution, I don’t think there are many people in this country. When it comes to appointments which are done by government, you can almost be sure that the right people are unlikely to get appointed. So we may have an institution set up which doesn’t have the capacity to do what it needs to do, because the right people are not there, and it does not have the support.
If we have a new set-up and appointments are made, there must be at least one technical person who has the skills and knowledge, and who can provide the guidance to the institution. Then it could work, and for the producer’s guild as well. Part of the problem is that we are all too busy to do the kind of administrative work that is necessary. So we need a structure with the right people.
FO: I just want to ask you a final question about your work as an entrepreneur. Where do you think the opportunities lie? You clearly have the resources, the business plan, the structure… how is business?
JS: Bad (laughs), we don’t have the resources. I think because of public relations we are able to create the impression that we have the resources. Our major problem is financing. In the area of film production, I believe that we have a great future both in documentary production and feature film, etc., so I am working on raising finances to be able to do that. In fact, my idea is to basically be almost like a production company, but first of all we need to have enough people who know what to do. I used the models that I used for Spence Productions which was a theatre company. We had a small team. In fact, I only had one full time employee at a time and when we wanted to do a production, we’d hire people then.
In the area of film production, to hire people, you have to have people who know what to do — cameramen, directors, actors and actresses, lighting technicians, etc. Scriptwriters are the major area where we have a problem. Premier Media cannot produce enough movies on its own to satisfy the market. Julius Spencer can only direct so many movies, so we need so many people who can direct properly, we need more people who can write good scripts etc. We could be producing five movies at the same time, but we need qualified crew and actors and actresses who can act for movies rather than the stage.
Financing is a major issue. I have been talking to banks, even investment funds and they are not yet convinced that a movie is what they should invest in. They think there is too much risk attached to it. I keep telling them there is no risk for producing movies in Sierra Leone now. I can produce a movie in Sierra Leone for five thousand dollars. A big budget here for a movie would be ten to fifteen thousand dollars. I can produce that movie if I have set up the marketing properly, and then I can get it on TV right here, I can get it screened in the UK, I can get it on to other channels in Africa, I can sell DVDs in Sierra Leone, ten thousand copies, fifteen thousand copies, I can get it into Nigeria, I can sell copies in the UK and in America. Fifteen thousand dollars, a big budget movie for Sierra Leone, and I can make the money back in three months — but they do not yet see that. So access to financing is still a challenge.
To be able to set up distribution properly, one needs to have the financing to set up the distribution network and so on. There are marketers now and some of them are doing a fairly good job. To make the DVDs costs four thousand Leones, you sell it at six thousand or six thousand five hundred to the marketers, they sell it to somebody else and by the time it gets in to the market, the streets, it is ten thousand. So you who have invested in the movie only get two thousand, or two thousand five hundred Leones off of it.. Those who duplicate films get four thousand and well, they have costs, of course, for the material and those who sell probably get more than you do. If you can sell large volumes, you make your money back, but it would be better if we can establish a distribution network which is not dictated by the marketers. In Nigeria at some point, and I don’t know if it has changed, the marketers were determining what sort of movies were being made. They thought they knew what people would buy, so they told producers who they wanted in the movies. I don’t want us to get to that point here. In fact, we have already started that here because there are one or two marketers who have started financing movies. Thank God they have not started producing good quality yet. Professional filmmakers need to be in control. If we do not take control quickly enough, we stand the risk of having the people with the money taking over and telling us what to do.
I think that the professionals need to get together at some point, but right now there is some unpleasantness. For example, jimmy B — and I keep saying he is the most successful Sierra Leonean filmmaker to date because his movies have gotten released, and he has produced more than anybody else in terms of numbers — started using “Sollywood” for Sierra Leone movies. I don’t like the name because it sounds like soil to me. Then a group of young people from the eastern part of the city got together and they have set up what they call SunValley films. Now they are trying to get everybody to start using “SunValley”.
I keep insisting that we should produce quality movies, let people see them and let them name what is coming out of Sierra Leone. We have no business arguing who we should be or whether we should call ourselves SunValley or Sollywood, etc. So there is some kind of divide. Some of us are trying to bridge the divide but some people have their own ideas. Some of it is being fuelled by marketers as well. That’s why I think that we need to get a proper structure in place pretty soon and be able to do things properly.
FO: Are you positive about the future…what hope do you have?
JS: I am very positive and I think that Premier Media has the potential to influence things in a positive way. As I said, I have been talking to government officials and the response has been positive. I just need to find a time to put things on paper and take it further. They said that the film classification board, training and even a movie that we want to produce was getting support from the military and that everything is positive. There is a lot of enthusiasm among young people to do movies, both to produce and to act in movies, so I think we are at a watershed now where we have many positive things in place. We need to be able to harness them now or pretty soon so that we can move things in the right direction. I think that there is a lot of potential here and I am positive that things will work out. I think we have learned some lessons from the music industry and some of us are determined that things should move in the right direction. I think we would be able to achieve a lot in the next few months but it may take a little longer than that. Maybe after the elections, we will be able to have certain structure in place.
FO: Thank you so much Dr. Spencer. I really appreciate it.
JS: You are welcome.
INTERVIEW WITH THE PERMANENT SECRETARY TO THE MINISTRY OF INFORMATION IN SIERRA LEONE,
SHEKU TAMU & DENNIS STREETER
Events Manager
FO: Thank you very much sir for accepting to see me. The main reason I asked to see you is to find out:
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What are the statutory pillars of the film industry and I hate to say film industry, I am more interested in the creative industry e. the things driving the new generation — What are the statutory or legal frameworks around which they operate?
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Are there any laws or legal protections for intellectual property?
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What is the government currently doing to encourage this incredibly interesting lucrative industry that is going on across Africa and across the same generation?
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I also want to know if there are any any legal restrictions to funding coming into the country to support the filmmaking community? So basically, what are the things that government has put down as the rules of the game for those in the creative industry? That is really what I need to know from you
ST: From the point of view of government, we encourage freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and we almost let them go unhindered. We have the Ministry of Information. The film industry or the creative industry falls under the arm of the Ministry of Information. The film industry is growing but it has not developed yet and what we try to ensure is that films are morally acceptable for kids, school children, who watch them. We are not really censoring them, but we are trying to ensure that the films are good, that the films have no immoral aspect, and if they have, they should be rated for adults. We do not prevent any company, any industry from getting funding from outside. It is free, you can fund them directly or you can fund them through the government.
FO: Are there any kinds of government regulations for guilds and foundations, to be sure they’re legitimate?
ST: I understand what you mean, because if safeguards are not put in place, and perhaps you deal with an institution directly, you don’t know much about their background, the money may not be used for the purpose which it is given. If monies come through the government, then it can be stated who the beneficiaries are, and the government will see to it that they go to the right place. If monies are to go through other institutions, we would have to look into it and try to come up with safeguard measures. As of now, we haven’t had any experience of somebody trying to support the film industry.
FO: One last question concerning film education. One of the things I have heard over and over again from everybody is the need for skills, education. I mean the guys who are making film are passionate in everything but they need education, they need some skills transferred, they need equipment, and I understand there is, as we speak, no university or institution that has a curriculum, even though I understand from Dr. Spencer that there have been conversations about creating one. Just specifically from government, do you have the details of any kind of plan already in development for this
ST: I think government is not averse to having a curriculum that deals with art, performing arts, acting and the like. That falls under the arm of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology. From the point of view of Information, we will be very supportive of it, and the moment they hash out the ideas, do the research, get the details, write a cabinet paper, cabinet approves and it becomes a government policy — it will be followed through.
FO: If someone were to come with a fund, who do they talk to in government?
DS: The structures that you are actually looking for, we cannot guarantee that those are well made. You have come at a point in time when the eggs have almost been hatched. All the enthusiasm that is spilling out is this new enigma that has just hatched up in the society, so you have pockets of people producing here, unions competing there, and all of that as far as I am concerned is because of a lot of ignorance about how the whole thing operates. So from your point of view, your interest in terms of safeguards, you are looking at something. At least yo safeguards: there should be a commission that is in charge, a body that will give you a guarantee that if we stamp this officially, then you know this company or that one is okay. It is only now that we are putting all of these things together. I happen to be a producer, actor, director in my own small corner. We have just completed the production of another movie. We had our director from Ghana and artists from Nigeria, Tanzania, Gambia, Ghana. You know that kind of collaboration, but as I said, the administrative angle of the film industry is yet to be consolidated. There are still misconceptions, and misunderstandings as to what we are doing.
It’s just like the music industry and how it started. Once one was successful, everybody jumped out of their house that day and we are all going to the studios and we are all rappers overnight. After a space of time, we came to realise that you can have a union registered with bargaining power and then the guilds come in, then the union, then the actor’s forum, then the board, and the censorship level.
Now, because this thing has become catchy, the bush fire is on in the harmattan. It’s now that we are realising these are structures we need to even control the quality of the production and to safeguard the interest of the buying public. We need to have a stamp of authority so we can feel confidence as buyers that this is a worthwhile home video, that it does not contain content that will shock our children, and so forth. Up til now it’s been the private sector dealing with all this, but because of the dimension it is taking now, the regulatory and administrative side ought to be looked after. But even before it gets to that point, we as practitioners and stake holders in the industry need to get our act together and make the necessary recommendations for government.
ST: I think that is the issue, it is a growing industry, iand perhaps government needs to start paying more attention to it and get it focused just like when these mobile companies started coming. It took time and when government realised that there needed to be a regulatory body, then we did set up the National Telecommunications Commission to regulate them. I think with time, within the shortest possible time, government should focus attention on it and perhaps your interview is a trigger in the right direction because I will inform my minister and we will start putting measures in place.
FO: Thank you both.
INTERVIEW WITH IDRISS KPANGE
TV JOURNALIST
AND CEO OF CONCEPT MULTIMEDIA
FO: I’m just going to ask you to identify yourself.
IK: My name is Idriss Kpange and I am a filmmaker and a TV journalist.
FO: So how do you operate here, you as a filmmaker, what are the things that you do?
IK: For me, I started this whole thing as a television journalist and during that time I was focused on doing a lot of documentaries, news pieces, documentary style for news, so it was over those years that I developed a passion to actually start doing my own stories which are not news based stories but human stories.
So that was how it started, but the platform for making those kinds of film is really not there so young and upcoming filmmakers like us have to struggle.Obviously there is no fund, there has never been any kind of funding from government or from any institution. So if you want to make your film, you have to fund it yourself or if you are lucky you can fund it with one of those overseas funding people. All of the good films that have been made, like documentaries in this country, have been made by foreign people. People who get funding from their country and then they come and they make films here. It’s been difficult. That’s the reason why people are really not interested in becoming documentary filmmakers here, because what’s the point?
FO: I understand the difficulty for filmmakers but in terms of audience are documentaries something they want to consume, do they have any understanding of how important documentaries may be for them? Even if only for entertainment, do they watch on television, how are documentaries distributed?
IK: Well, there is no network first of all in terms of distributing documentaries, but obviously people do watch documentaries that have been made over the years by different people. For instance, there is a film called Fambul Tok (Family Talk). You know, after the war they set up the truth and reconciliation commission but they didn’t really go down to the community level where people still hold grudges over the whole thing that happened. Some people were never forgiven because of what they did during the war, so these filmmakers came in and took the reconciliation process to the community level wherein people would come in and sit round the fire and then discuss and say, “This guy did this to me and I was never asked and he didn’t say he was sorry”.
It’s a very powerful film where people came together at the community level and said, “Sorry, I killed your mother, I killed your father”, but at the community level. It really had very good reviews internationally and people are watching that here like they really understand. So there is an audience obviously on TV and people understand the story once it relates to them. Recently we also started a film festival here. We showed a lot of documentaries that were made by some small filmmakers and some other international films. People were really interested. It was the first time we had a huge turn out and lot of people came.
FO: You need to talk to me about the festival in a second, but let me just try and locate the environment in which you are working. How many across Sierra Leone would you say are known filmmakers and documentary filmmakers? How many people are even trying to do any work in that genre?
IK: I don’t think there are up to ten really serious people who are interested in making documentary film, but for dramas and local films, there are a lot of people who are into those.
FO: Let us talk about the film industry as a whole. How big is it here, the local film industry itself? How are they distributing their work, because that’s also somewhere I want to go. I want to be able to visit a cinema here. If they sell it in the market, I want to see where they sell it, and to look at what the figures are in terms of general filmmaking here.
IK: The distribution is through marketers. I make my films and take it to a marketer and we negotiate a price and say ok, I want five thousand dollars for it and then the marketer gives me my five thousand dollars and takes the film, makes copies of it and sells them. Now people are becoming more interested in Sierra Leonean local films. It’s really growing now. Every single day four to five new films come out. Just like Nollywood.
I think that’s the trend. People are doing a lot of films every single day. If you go around town, you will see posters everywhere for new films coming out but the distribution is only done through the marketing stake — the people who sell the V-CDs or DVDs.
FO: So what happened to the cinemas?
IK: The cinemas all got run down, and there is no cinema culture anymore. For instance, one cinema was sold, the space was sold and used as a store and what they focus more on is showing the English Premier League and people come to pay and watch the Premier League. But now it’s shifting a bit. People go to movie premieres and the local movie cinemas to see the films that are out and sometimes they announce the movies that they are going to show. There is one cinema, Porsche cinema, but they mostly target expats who work in Sierra Leone and most of the films they show there are western films and not really our own local films that are produced here.
FO: In terms of the larger industry, do you think a marketer will buy a documentary? Do you think there is a chance that distributing a documentary through the same channel would work here?
IK: I think if the story relates to the people, if it is a story they are interested in, yes they will. You know, people are becoming more aware and interested in real issues, not just drama and other genres, especially young people coming from the university or young people from high school. There is also a surge in people becoming interested in becoming filmmakers because I think they see it — through local dramas that are being produced here — they see it as an art they want to be involved in. A lot of people are opting to becoming filmmakers so I think with time, things are really going to change. I think we are the last country that is really trying to catch up with the rest of West Africa in terms of film and cinema. No Sierra Leonean has ever made a big movie here that has gone out and made a lot of noise. For instance, Newton Aduka, he did Ezra, a Sierra Leonean story, he went to FESPACO and he won a lot of awards for that film, but Newton is not a Sierra Leonean. Blood Diamond is another classic example so I think there is a lot that needs to be done in the industry here.
FO: In terms of funding, if for instance there were to be a structured funding for filmmakers here, how do you see that operating?
IK: I think the first thing we need if there is ever going to be funding is to build capacity of filmmakers before you start dishing out money because right now, a lot of the people don’t understand how it works in terms of story telling. People may just become interested in becoming a filmmaker but they need to know the process, how it works, what the local and international markets are looking for, how you can match the standard of other people. So they need a lot of training in a lot of areas first of all.
FO: So are there any film training schools?
IK: No
FO: None at all?
IK: There is one that someone started a few months ago. He is trying to bring that kind of system into the education system and it has been very difficult because people don’t just get it.
FO: So you think in terms of intervention, you think the most important thing right now is film education and proper training?
IK: Yes, I think so. Some people have made very good films but they don’t understand how the business works. For instance, they go into the festivals with their movies or try to approach international distributors but they don’t know how, so I think they need a lot of education in that direction too — when you have your film, what to do, where to take it to and who to take it to.
FO: From the government angle, how focused is government on the film industry itself and what opportunities is government creating?
IK: Government has never been focused on filmmaking. They have never supported filmmaking. The government is more focused on the mining contracts, roads and other infrastructures, but film? No. A couple of years ago the universities started the mass communication departments wherein some students went to study television. The equipment that they were given almost ten years ago is the same equipment that they are still using and there are really no teachers to actually to teach TV. All they are given is theory. They just read about it and then they come out of college. Some people go and work in newspapers or the radio or they become public relations officers or work in an advertising company.
I think Sierra Leone needs a lot of help in that direction. I think people are putting a lot of money in different areas and are completely forgetting and ignoring this other part of the art. I have stayed in this country and I have travelled overseas. I have seen what other people are doing, and I have decided to come back. I can say that I want to really do this and I want to do it here. It is really difficult and challenging.
FO: Are the TV stations here not funded by government? How does it work if you make a film and you would like to broadcast it?
IK: There are no structures. The TV is government owned. They changed it into a corporation but it is still a 100% government controlled station and the content on TV is really not good. They prefer to play a lot of western movies and Nollywood films or some Chinese kung fu movies. The TV is terrible and there is only one TV station.
The broadcaster doesn’t pay for anything – but they just passed a new copyright law and it’s coming into existence now. Before I could take your work and do whatever I wanted to do with it and there was nothing that would really happen to me because there was no law.
I think the national TV needs to step up their game in terms of promoting the Sierra Leonean artists and filmmakers who are trying to do something. Then again, the TV is only interested in money. They only show something when you pay for it, even if it is your work. You can give them something and say, “Show this, educate the people”, and they will ask you, “Are you going to pay for it?” So that’s how it works.
FO: If you have to put a number to it, if someone should say, “I’m going to create a training programme for filmmakers, how many people do you estimate would attend such a programme, in terms of intakes, in terms of impact, how many people will such a programme impact immediately?
IK: I think a lot of people will come for the first few weeks, then some will leave because they maybe find it boring. But regardless, many people will be come and stay interested. They can give you the best training but it is up to you to decide what you want to do with that, how passionate you are and what you want to use it for. A couple of years ago, the British Council sponsored the project with Scriptnet. Scriptnet came here and they trained scriptwriters how to write short films and that workshop went on for a couple of months in different stages — the writing stage, the scripting, then production. These guys had no prior film education but all of them were very serious people who went to that workshop and they learned a lot and produced some of the films. Some films went into festivals and they won awards. Most of the people really interested in filmmaking left, everybody is gone.
FO: I’m sure Sierra Leone is not just Freetown. There must be several parts to Sierra Leone. Where are the cultural centers or the centers where film making is likely to thrive or where emerging filmmakers are very active?
IK: I think it’s Freetown, and once Freetown kicks off it will spill over to other parts of the country because this is a very small country. People up country are always interested in what people are doing in Freetown and then start copying what they do.
FO: To what extent does what is happening here influence what happens in Liberia? If something was being done here, is it likely to spill over to Liberia, for instance, or vice-versa? Can it be combined? If something is happening in one country, is the other country impacted in some way?
IK: Yes, definitely because these West African countries especially these five countries, they all share a lot of things in common. Liberia, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Ghana, we all share a lot of culture. We have things in common. With the music, there has always been that kind of thing. They make music in Liberia and when it comes to Sierra Leone it has a very huge impact. Then it happens the same way with the Gambians and in other countries, even Nigerian music is hitting with videos and everything.
I think there is this artist who switched off to become a filmmaker named Jimmy B. What he has been doing is making Nollywood kind of movies. He goes to Nigeria, works with the artist there, takes the artist from Nigeria, brings them here and they make a film. So there is that collaborative kind of thing going on, even Desmond Elliot (Nigerian actor) is currently here doing a film with Sierra Leonean actors and producers.
FO: You guys have basically the same history as Nigeria in terms of what the British, the colonizer, did in regard to how they used cinema as a basic political tool. I wanted to ask you about archives. Did they leave a lot of films here in archive in terms of the history of Sierra Leone, in terms of perhaps what happened in the colonial days? Because we don’t have anything, we have an archive that has nothing in it.
IK: Well, unfortunately, no. The national broadcaster used to have all these archives during the colonial day. During the war the whole library was burned down and so I think that was the only the national archive in terms of images that we had on film and TV. That was completely destroyed, and so no, there is nothing. I once worked with the Commonwealth in London and I was going through the archives and I saw a lot of those materials. They still have them there but we don’t have any.
FO: Talking about the war, what was the impact of the say on filmmaking in Sierra Leone?
IK: I think during the war, people were really not interested in filmmaking. People were thinking maybe there was something the foreigners could do. The only Sierra Leonean that ever tried to make a film that I remember was Hilton Fyle. He did a documentary on the NPRC — the military guys that overthrew the former APC government back in the ‘90s. He did a film about Captain Valentine Strasser because he was the youngest president in the world. That film really had a huge impact. This was 20 years ago, but before the war? No. I think most of what was going on was just drama — stage plays. We have a professor Pat Madi who tried to make a film even before Hilton Fyle. He had gone to school with Wole Soyinka. They were in school together and he was the director of most plays that they wrote in school. He tried to make a film then but it didn’t work out because they didn’t have the technology. Later on Dr. Julius Spencer came in and tried to do a lot of films. They shot television series and that was really how things started to progress. It was when the war was ending that people were starting to go into films.
FO: How much structure was in place for film before the war and how much of that remained after the war?
IK: Nothing, there was no structure. There has not really been any education about film in the curriculum of the university or other institutions.
FO: I find that traumatic events like a war creates a lot of stories for filmmakers. People need to come to terms with what happened, people need to hear inspirational stories of how people survived the war and usually you need the artistic industry, you need dramas and documentaries to bring closure to those things for people emotionally. Are filmmakers here looking at that? And if there was a capacity, or a capability or the funding, what kind of stories do you think people would find interesting?
IK: I think with the war a lot of people have stories that they want to tell, but they don’t just have a platform. A lot of people went through hell and they have stories that they haven’t told anybody. Even filmmakers have stories because everybody was part of it, but some of those stories, you can’t really express. These small dramas that they do need to be a real life story. The only way you can tell that story is to probably use a documentary style of filmmaking.
FO: Where were you during the war?
IK: Here, in Freetown.
FO: And how did you survive the war?
IK: I was hiding, place to place, going under bunkers, and like that…and sweet talk. People who knew how to talk better than me were killed.
FO: As a filmmaker, do you have memories of that era that you would like to commit to film?
IK: I wish I could re-enact some of those things that I saw during the war. I wish I could bring them back to life and then I would be able to tell those stories through film. For instance, I have a film that I am working on but I have been looking for two thousand dollars for five years and nobody will give me two thousand dollars. That’s how serious it is. I have cameras, and I want to do the film in Guinea. I have every other resource and it is just something to facilitate my movement. I have been asking everybody and nobody is giving me the money, so that’s just it. I think it’s frustrating for people like us to go through this. When you go to other countries, especially the Francophone countries, they have lots of arts and cultural centers and it might not be that much but at least there is something. Go to Ouagadougou. I have been to FESPACO and if you go you will see their institution and their film schools there. There is an international Film School in Ouagadougou and people from all over the world come there. There is this big festival, a lot of arts, a lot of cultural centers and there is money for filmmakers. I think we also need that kind of structure. Since the colonial masters didn’t do anything, we are trying to do it for ourselves now.
FO: What’s the government’s attitude (the current government in place) towards the industry itself?
IK: I really don’t know what their attitude is but I think to some extent they are supporting filmmakers. Some guys did a film a couple of months ago and when they needed some military hardware the government was able to give all the military hardware for the crew to use. That’s a plus, but if I wanted to tell a very critical story of the government in a film, I don’t really know how they would take it or whether they would say, “He is just trying to express himself through that kind medium”. We are also doing some legal education drama now for one NGO. We are using the police station and the police cells, the court and the police and the inspector general of police gave us everything and they have been supportive of the project. So I think to some extent they will support filmmaking and filmmakers?
FO: Are there legislations, laws, legal instruments that support the industry to grow? Is there any legislation against piracy, and is there any legislation that allocates a part of the budget into supporting the growth of the arts or cinema or documentary?
IK: In terms of budgeting, no. When they announce the national budget there is nothing about that that goes to the Ministry of Culture on film. There is nothing like that or maybe they have it and they are being corrupt. In terms of legislation for piracy, they just passed a new piracy act that has come into law now and at least to some extent they have reduced the piracy right now with the music and the films. That is why there is a surge now with the Sierra Leonean films competing with the Nollywood movies. Before, when it was purely Nollywood movies, it could take 2 to 3 years before one Sierra Leonean movie came out.
FO: So, right now you have a lot of Sierra Leonean filmmakers working with Nigerian filmmakers and vice-versa?
IK: Yes.
FO: I want to know the truth about the two guilds.
IK: Ian Noah is a Sierra Leonean but he was born in England. He grew up in England so he does not understand the culture. He speaks good English, so sometimes when he speaks, they don’t understand what he is saying because he rolls his tongue and he has that strong accent and it disturbs them. They think it is humiliating sometimes, or they just can’t get what he is saying but the guild actually started through his effort. Ian put together a very professional structure for the guild as it should be, so just because they were not too supportive of Ian’s vision they almost killed the dream of having the guild. Then they went and formed the union but they are not even like a proper government registered group. The guild has a trade union certificate, the guild has a proper constitution, the guild has a website and the guild has more skilful people. For the others, it’s just about marketing and they have a lot of people in the east, so they are using this to market their movies. That’s the idea, that’s the whole thing.
FO: What kinds of cameras do you use?
IK: I have a SONY FI, I have the SONY Z1 and Z7 and I have a CANON 5D MACH 2 and I also added a camera to them, the GOPRO It’s a really tiny camera, a study kind of camera for action.It’s water proof, full HD, full resolution, it’s good for doing time lapse and you can attach it to a car.
FO: And it will create it for you?
IK: Yes, I can show you some of the time lapse sequences I created with it — very good speed and it’s two hundred and fifty pounds.
FO: So you are basically kitted up to do your documentary?
IK: You know I have a production facility which I am trying to put together which over my last 7 years working as a TV journalist for Reuters I managed tosave some of that money and put into this facility but still, it is struggling. It’s growing little by little. We have mostly focused on doing commercial work at this stage because…
FO: How is that business?
IK: Well, it is moving but it’s difficult because other people are trying to do the same thing, but we are properly set up and it is good.
FO: How much business is here for somebody doing commercials for instance?
IK: You will have a lot if you know what you are doing and you will have contact, because here it is all about knowing people.It’s about who you know and how best you convince people in the company to do what you want.
FO: In terms of…obviously you have got a production company, in terms of training young people, how are the people that surround you? I assume that if you have put it together that there is room for training. But for you to find crew, how do you manage?
IK: Yes, a lot of people that I work with manage to get their training from me because we are trying to help build capacity for camera crew, editors, and sound people. All that is in the pipeline because recently I went to America, through the US embassy there and they have this multi-regional programme for film in the US. They take people from all over the world. I was part of the fifteen people that went from all over — even from Jordan, Latvia, Sudan, India, Palestine, and a lot of other countries. I was part of that group and we went across the US meeting different people in film.We went to Hollywood, met executive producers there, and went to film schools. We met people in the African Film Festival office, I went to a lot of festivals and I went to Texas to the SXSW (South by Southwest) Film Festival there.
I want to get support from those contacts. We need a little support to build capacity here in filmmaking and we have started something. If you can maybe help us get used equipment, whatever video production or film making equipment that you can support us with, you are free to do it through the US embassy here. I am sure if we get anybody to support any of our projects the US embassy will be willing to bring things over. I was also in touch with a professor in California who is willing to come and do training with filmmakers and mass communication classes.
FO: I know the difficulty of trying to run a production company in an African environment and trying to run your own project. You run a production company because you are desperate to get some money so you can do your own project and sometimes you find out that you end up in the reverse, leaving your own project to support the production company. Have you been to Nigeria? Have you collaborated with anybody?
IK: I haven’t. I was really supposed to be in Nigeria a couple of weeks ago but the deal didn’t work out. There is a guy named Ayo Johnson and he is on TV all the time, a Sierra Leonean/Nigerian based in the UK. He was in Nigeria doing some documentary on Boko Haram, Shell and all these crazy people, so I was supposed to go film for him, but then I was asking all these questions about insurance and security but the station couldn’t handle all of that. I thought that there was no story that was worth more than my life.
FO: You started out as a camera man for Reuters?
IK: Yes.
FO: You have worked in very stressful interventions, war zones and things like that?
IK: Yes, I’ve covered that kind of stuff
FO: … and usually when you cover, are you covering by yourself or …?
IK: It’s a one man thing. I go, I film, I return, I edit, I file, I sell the story, I write the script, and then I see it.
FO: Is Reuters still effective in that kind of set up?
IK: They are really not too active. Again, after I have done it for seven years they are only interested when it is a hot spot. Now they are becoming more interested because they have heard that some western companies want to start oil exploration here. They have these huge business section of Reuters and do news for this huge financial corporations. There is a company that wants to start investing in the possible oil deals and exploring if it is commercially viable, so they are looking into that kind of thing right now.
INTERVIEW WITH PASTOR AIAH MOMOH PRESIDENT OF THE SIERRA LEONE NATIONAL FILM UNION (SUNALLEY)
FO: Since yesterday, I have been talking to filmmakers, production company people, we have just come back from speaking to the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry and we thought it would be important to talk also to the film guild, the unions and get a bit of your own perspective, to see whatever it is that you wish to say or to contribute to the conversation. So first and foremost, maybe you should introduce yourself and then give me a sense of history of this union, why was it formed, how was it formed, who are the executives, what are its goals, and what are its activities so far?
PA: Thank you. I am Pastor Aiah Momoh, I am the president for the Sierra Leonean National Film Union, the acronym is SUN VALLEY, that is the most common all over the country. I am also the CEO and director for THE USHERS FILM COMPANY. I have been around doing film for a very long time, by the grace of God. We have established this union called Sun Valley because we see the need as filmmakers to operate under a union.
There was a need for unionism because before now, films were not selling in the country. People were doing films back in the ‘80s but Sierra Leonean films are not too popular. When we formed this union, we tried by to put certain things in place and now if you go to the streets of Freetown, you will see Sierra Leonean films all over. Before, it was Nigerian films, and Ghanaian films, but now we have Sierra Leonean films that are selling. The union started two years ago on November 17, so it’s not that old, but since then we have had positive strikes. We have been organizing workshops, we have ensured that we settle problems of distribution and marketing in the country and as I said, if you move around now, you will see Sierra Leonean films all over the place. We also trying to create awareness for people to know that there is an industry in this country. So far these are the things we have been doing.
FO: Before the Sun Valley, there was a guild. What happened to the guild and why did you feel there was a need to create another body?
PA: Before we started the Sun Valley, as you said, there was a guild indeed and I was also part of it. Most of us were part of it. I would not want to say it died down, but along the line it stopped functioning. The whole guild was not moving the way we expected and because of the passion some of us had, we decided to set up a new movement and so we came together as members of the industry in this country — people who are making films, some from the east and some from the west. Then we reasoned that since the guild was not moving the way it should, we should organise something else. In fact, we started this organisation two years after the guild was not functioning well and so we came together and started our meetings. Then we came up with a name, that’s how it happened.
FO: In terms of what you will consider the success of the union apart from distribution…and I will come to you helping me to define better how you solved what you called the distribution problem…what are other things that the union has achieved or aims to achieve in this journey that you have started?
PA: We have achieved a lot. First, we organised a film festival alongside We Own TV. We did it at the Miatta Garden here and it was a big success and a whole lot of people attended. We have also established a website that is popular for Sierra Leoneans and non-Sierra Leoneans to be informed about what is happening in the country regarding filming as far as the industry is concerned.
We’ve also been able to help filmmakers to produce their films because one of the problems we have been having is finding sponsors and people to come on board and serve as executive producers. It’s been a big problem. As a union we have been coming on board, helping people to produce their films. We are now working on setting up a censor board to make sure we begin to censor some of these films. We have worked with international organisations and with other NGOs that are based here as well.
FO: Do you have the power to censor? I mean when you say the union wants to censor, I’m concerned because this is a creative environment, an industry where people are doing their things. Isn’t the union about empowering filmmakers, whether they are part of your group or not?
PA: We are not saying that you come with your film to us and we decide whether this film goes or not. Within ourselves, within the union, we will look at your script, and say, “ Alright, there is a mistake at this point. The plotting is not good…etc.”, to help the films that are coming out. In a broader sense, we are looking at working with some other people who are not part of the union, who are yet to come on board to see how we can work together to establish a better censor board.
FO: Tell me about distribution; the model of distribution that you are running is almost like that of Nigeria…the open markets, street sales… How have you been able to structure it, is there any difference from the model in Nigeria or Ghana and what are the dangers for the filmmaker in terms of their intellectual property here?
PA: To be honest, the very first thing we were fighting for was to get the people to buy our films, so what we did was to make them available. We look out for people who we know are competent, people who we know can market the films, people who are ready to put their money into the whole thing. We spoke to them and they accepted the proposal and they began to produce the films with their own money. So that was how the whole thing started, because before now people did their films but they didn’t have money to produce, so now we talk to these people and they are ready to produce, they are ready to print our films and posters without paying upfront and so by the end of the day, we now have a lot of Sierra Leonean films flooding the market because we have settled the problem of raising a huge sum of money to take them to Nigeria. We used to send all of our printing to Nigeria but now the union has successfully organised a structure wherein you don’t need to raise ten thousand dollars. All you need to do is to make the film and when it comes to the post production we have people who can handle it and we begin to flood the market. We are working on some other things to see how we will get a better structure, but as of now we like the way things are going, because before now films were not selling. The whole thing is progressive. We have reached the first point which is the awareness that we have an industry in this country. They are doing well. Let us begin to buy their films — Nigerian films should not dominate our market, Ghanaian films should not dominate our market. This is the strategy.
Before now, the Nigerian films were selling heavily. Nobody looked at our films but now I can take you to places where people sell Nigerian films. We have the Sierra Leonean shops and we also have the Nigerian shops, but you will see people go to the Sierra Leonean shops to pick the Sierra Leonean movies. For now, we are successful and we are planning as a union to do something else.
FO: What other activities are you involved with as a union beyond distribution, what are you activities in term of training? What are your activities in term of creating funding structures, how are you collaborating with government to protect intellectual property?
PA: Let’s start with the intellectual property. The union is part of it. Since the whole thing started, we have been part of it. We’ve attended the meetings several times and we came up with the idea that there should be a workshop. Now that it has become a law, there should be a workshop wherein people will be trained and those people that have been trained will go out to train other people, so it’s like training the trainers. The union was part of that. We have been monitoring the system with regards to piracy. As I am talking to you, we also have our own team in the union that goes around from time to time because we know where the pirates are. The police don’t know but we know because we are in it. We know the holes. We have been catching some of them. Two weeks back, two of them were captured by the police and last month we caught some of them again. We have been making sure that we go the extra mile to protect our members and their rights, and we have been working with government.
For instance, we had a lady from Canada who was here when we organised the programme. It is called Faces of Sierra Leone Movie Stars. When you go to Nigeria or you go to Ghana, it is easy to identify their actors. If you are talking about movies, you can point at Genevieve, Omotola or Emeka but when you come to Sierra Leone, it’s difficult to find them, so what we did as a union was to advertise our actors so that it would be easy to identify them. We organised the programme and I can assure you it has not been done anywhere else in the world. People called from outside Sierra Leone when they heard about it and they wanted to know what the whole thing was about.
Somebody from Canada said if they had this kind of opportunity, the American actors would not overshadow them in Canada, so it is a plus for our actors. We organised that programme at the swimming pool and we collaborated with the Ministry of Tourism, Youth and Sport and also the Youth Commission and other government parastatals and it was a success. We presented thirty actors and categorized them into three: silver, gold and platinum and these people, as far as we are concerned as a union, are the best in the country. Now we have projects that are green lighted already for these thirty people — they are our movie stars. As a union we believe that because they went through a process and they succeeded the public learned about them. We had about two hundred people or so who applied for that but only thirty succeeded.
FO: They applied to be known as stars?
PA: No, to be known — to go through the process. They are actors, they were auditioned, we interviewed them, we asked them to do one or two things, just to get the best out of them because we want to showcase our actors, we want to add to their profile and at the end of the day, we had thirty who were able to make it so that programme was a big success in this country.
FO: In terms of documentary, how well is that sector of the film industry doing in your opinion?
PA: Well, you see the Nigerian films actually stole the attention of people with regards to documentary.
People were used to feature length films because of the Nigerian films that were flooding the country, but you have a particular group who love documentary films. They are glued to it but with We Own TV and some other groups around, they have been pressing. If you call them to your programme, they will show you short films and documentaries and gradually, people are getting fond of documentary in this country. I believe there is a market for it. The only problem is that it is not common. You have a specific set of people doing documentary like the young man behind you Mr Idriss. Mr Arthur here is well known for that, but it is not as rampant as the feature length films.
If you have good documentaries, people can go for it. For instance, the SLBC are looking for documentaries but they do not want to put money in it, they want you to do it and bring it to them.
FO: Why is the union not advocating for broadcasters, or for people who are using this content to commission creation of content? It is the same problem in Nigeria… you know where the broadcaster wants you to create the film, and then wants you to pay him to show the film. I was once president of the producers association in Nigeria so I faced the same thing. I just want to know what strategies are you using or is it something you have considered at all that you can be in front, trying to create that consciousness for TV stations to rethink their approach to this?
PA: Before now I could not tell you it was possible, but now I can confidently tell you it is possible. The union is getting stronger. When we knock on any door, the door remains open to us. Before this it was not so. You cannot build a house in a day and I have a lot on my desk, a lot to accomplish, so I am taking things one at a time. We have successfully done FACES and now I am into something else — a project. We are also working with the SLBC. We intend to have one hour on SLBC, and they have given us the one hour. It was not easy. We started the fight last year for this one hour and because they are beginning to see the strength of the union and what we have been doing, they have given us the one hour. We are yet to do the first production. When we start and they find the whole thing interesting, the next step is that we can broach the subject of documentaries. I remembered Arthur Pratt (WeOwnTV) and I visited them the other day and we told them we wanted to be doing soap operas and they said it was good and we could do it together.
FO: If there was an outside intervention in the industry, in your opinion what area should that support focus on?
PA: Some people are doing substandard films, but it is not because they want to do it. As I said and like you are also saying, the support is not there. We would want support in the area of equipment, because equipment is kind of expensive here. It takes people like some of us to hire a Mach 2 camera. We are working on it actually to see how we can solicit to get funding for equipment, I would want you to help me with some equipment for the union.
Money is important, yes, but if we have the equipment, then we can make money.
FO: Freetown is where maybe most of the activity is, but are there filmmaking activities in any other part of Sierra Leone? In Ghana there are different kinds of industries across the country that are sort of almost divided according to tribe. It is the same thing in Nigeria, where you’ve got Nollywood, but there is also the Hausa film industry which is totally different, then you’ve got the Yoruba film industry as well. I was wondering if…
PA: As you said, you asked whether there was another guild before the union started. I said yes, there was one before us, some of us were part of it and it is still functioning now. I am saying we have nothing against them.
We have filmmaking going on in the provinces and most of those people are part of the union. The union is established in Lungi, Makeni, Kenema, Bo and Port Loko. As I said, it is a gradual process. We do one thing at a time.
FO: Assuming that there is an intervention, how would you want it structured? You told me what you would like an intervention in but the question is what would the structure be? Is it the sort of thing that will be a collaborative thing with government, is it the sort of thing that the union wants to be the one organising, or is it something every individual filmmaker should have access to?
PA: For me I do not matters concerning the industry should be handled by the government. They have a lot of work to do. Let them concentrate on their work. However, if we as filmmakers are in control of our own situation, when the equipment comes, by God’s grace, we are in charge of it and we put the structures in place. As I said, the whole thing is progressive. You will never go to Hollywood and see every thing in place and you will never go to Nollywood and see everything in place. As the situation arises they create room for it. Wherever you go, as long you are a progressive person, as the situation arises you create room for it.
I know if the equipment comes we are going to establish a well structured body to run the affairs of that so that people, filmmakers, not only filmmakers of the union, when they are ready to shoot their films, they will not produce substandard quality films. People will not only get access to it but we will be able to establish something that we will be able to get other funds from to get some more equipment, so I know what to do when the equipment comes.
FO: What is the structure of the union right now, who are its officers, what is the constitutional structure?
PA: A union like this is responsible and there is no way we can function without a well structured body. I have been hearing some of the things people say like, “Don’t go to those guys, they are not structured”, but how can that be possible?
We have a structure. We have the President, that’s me, and then we have the Vice President. There is the Secretary General, Arthur Pratt, there is the CLC, the Cinematographic Liaison Coordinator, and he is in charge of everything. Now we were talking about equipment and when the equipment comes, he is the man in charge. Whatever pertains to filming, for instance, if there is a dispute between two groups, this is the man that is supposed to handle it. Whatever it is — the artistic side, the technical side — he is in charge of it.
For the guilds, we have the producer’s guild, the actor’s guild and the director’s guild. We are planning to establish the writer’s guild, because that is the beginning of the whole thing. If the script is not good, you can have a very good camera man with very good equipment, but if the script is not good then, at the end of the day, the whole thing will be a problem.
The union has a very good structure like I said. And in those places that I mentioned, we are trying to establish regional coodinators in charge of their own territory, but they are subject to the national executive. We do check in on them from time to time and they send in reports. That is how we operate. Now if you want to go to Bo, all I need to do is make a call, say I have someone coming, treat him with respect. Otherwise, when you go, you will spend all of your money in vain and no one will listen to you.
FO: When I was asking about structure, what I really need to know is the executive, is it elected, is it appointed, what are the terms of that executive, the offices, what are the chances other filmmakers are not excluded? That is really where I am heading. I understand very well the structures and I am really happy that you guys have got that in place but it is also important that the creative industry is democratic and that everybody has access to such a support.
PA: Yes it a democratic one, but since the whole thing was established we are yet to have an election, because you can’t talk about elections when things are not in place. The term should be 4 years and then we have another election, but according to the constitution, we elect our executive, we do not select them. For example, last year, we had one election for the actor’s guild.
FO: Who are the people in the other guild?
PA: I didn’t want to say this, but I will. It is not that I am bragging, but I know some people belonging to film guilds and they have been coming to me asking
for help. I have been helping them with the printing of their posters and connected them to a marketer that I know will be able to market their films. When some of them are finished with their job, they still come with it and ask me to take a look at it. On the whole there is a cordial relationship. I know some people who are a part of SUNVALLEY, members who go to the film guild, members who lend equipment and some of our members are friends. The only problem we are having, and that is easy to settle, is the problem of the name. The guild has been there for some time and they are not prepared to dissolve. And the union is now in place and we are not prepared to dissolve. So we agree that there is more than one union and more than one functional body.
We will see what we can do, this is our country and we will settle it, but there is no way we are going to dissolve our structure and there is no way they will dissolve their own because the visions are not the same. I cannot force a man to dissolve or to merge when I know he has his own line of operation. They are not the same. If I try to do that then I am not being fair and there is no way it will work. It will create more problems at the end of the day.
FO: What is the registration process? For instance, how do I become a member of SUNVALLEY?
PA: If you come in as an individual, the registration is a bit different from the group registration. If you come in as a producer, then we send you to the producer’s guild, you register with them for a sum of Le100,000 and you will be given your ID card and other documents. If you are coming in with a group, you come straight to this office and register with Le 100,000 as well for your group, your group will be given a certificate.
FO: It is the same amount of money to register a group and an individual, why?
PA: When this whole thing started, I told you there was no money, so if you ask people to pay 1M you will not be able to gather a group. We looked at all of these things and decided. There will come a time, the money will shoot up, its obvious, so registration per group is Le 100,000.
FO: So a group comes, pays 100,000, a single person comes as well, pays 100,000?
PA: I am not finished. Let me explain. If you come with your group and then you pay 100,000, then the actors within your group are sent to the actor’s guild where they register as individuals. The director of that group will go into the director’s guild and registers with the director’s guild.
FO: For Le 100,000 each?
PA: No they have different…I can’t disclose that now, but they have different fees that they pay. If you are coming in with your group, your producer goes to the producer’s guild, the actors goes to the actor’s guild, and then the group pays Le100,000 and all these small, small amounts to the other…that is how we organise our own registration. If you are just coming in as an individual, then there is no need for you to pay the group registration fee, you will pay the individual registration fee, because we have some actors who do not belong to any group or company at all.
FO: Are you a real pastor or is it like a creative thing?
PA: I am an ordained reverend and an assistant pastor. I preach the gospel through movies. The name of my company is THE USHERS, which basically means showing the way, showing people what to do and where to go.
FO: Do you work in the Christian film genre?
PA: Yes I do, but as of now, we don’t have that kind of body. We are all the same. Yes, my films have Christian values, but the way I package them you will not know, because some people will never sit down and listen to “Jesus loves you”, so I do my own to entertain, but when you look at the films you will learn a lot of lessons and I can communicate my gospel to you in a very easy manner. The head for the producer’s guild is a pastor; we have more than one pastor with us.
FO: Thank you.
TRANSCRIPT OF VISIT TO CONCEPT MULTIMEDIA STUDIOS
Idriss Kpange: Founder and General Manager
Valona Taylor: In-house Producer
Abu Bakarr Sallu: (AB4U): Sound Engineer
VT: My name is Valona Taylor and I work at Concept Multimedia as a producer. Concept Multimedia was set up about three years ago by Idriss Kpange, Emmanuel Hayes, AB4U and a few others. They were able to pull a few people together and they basically built Concept Multimedia by themselves. They had no one backing them at the time and I’m sure people living in Sierra Leone realise that the film industry is a difficult industry for a group of young men coming together to start something so unique and fresh. It was difficult at the time.
The place where they actually built this media house used to be a store room, so they really had to come up with a plan on how to set up the place to make it look like a studio. The intention was to have an audio studio along with a video studio at the same time and to make it a one stop shop where artists, or where anyone who is interested in media could come in, record their audio and at the same time do their video while getting quality at the same time.
Obviously in the first year it was difficult to set up and I think the guys spent the first year mainly going out and doing odd jobs. I joined them in early 2012 and when I came in as a producer I could see there was a lot of creativity in the team but they were kind of missing a producer who would come in and tie the whole project together.
When we get projects or people come in with jobs, I help with the writing, which then goes to Idriss who works as the chief editor and the camera operator. We then get the sound engineer AB4U and we all sit down together to discuss the idea and see how best we can work with it.
One thing they kind of lack in this town is a team of professionals that can come together. We use Concept Multimedia as a platform for people who want to come in and see how we set it up, because there is a lot of, I wouldn’t like to say expectation, but people expect so much from us. They believe that Concept Multimedia is laying the tracks.
We invite people to come in and see what we do and how we can help them, so we have a lot of people coming in just to find out how they can go about doing their projects. We get a range of people coming into this office asking for various things, from event coverage to videos. As I mentioned before, there is an audio studio, so we get a lot of artists who come in. AB4U and Sound Boy Ritchie work in the audio studio. We also get documentaries from NGOs, and international people coming in looking to make short films about projects that they are doing.
FO: How long have you been a producer?
VT: I have worked for the last three years as a producer. I studied at Brighton University for two years doing Broadcast Media and then I transferred over to Greenwich University London, where I studied Digital Media in the final year of my degree. I knew at the time that even though I was technically able to do the work, I was more inclined to produce because of the way I like to work, so I spent a year getting work experience in studios as a young producer.
I decided it was best that I was in Sierra Leone. I got in touch with Idriss and he told me about the studio and it was one of the perfect places to come and get some experience.
FO: How many you documentaries have you produced while working with Concept Media?
VT: We haven’t produced any documentaries per se but we have been called on to film documentaries. One thing that we are deeply involved in is the four-part series we are doing for Advocates in Sierra Leone about people’s rights — because information is lacking in the society. What Advocates is doing is using this documentary as a platform for people to know their rights in terms of themselves and the police. We are also doing a documentary for PLANN, an NGO in Sierra Leone and I believe the documentary is about Girls in the Media.
FO: How many jobs have you produced in your tenure as a producer here?
VT: We have produced three or four short programmes and then the short documentaries that we’re working on.
FO: Are you interested in documentaries and do you think there is a market for documentary filmmaking in Sierra Leone?
VT: Yes, my passion is documentaries. I believe there is a market for documentaries in Sierra Leone because, as you can see, there is a lot of talent here but they don’t have the platform to get those ideas and those stories out. In the last few years we’ve seen that people come from outside, to make award winning documentaries about the country while the people themselves don’t have the tools to make documentaries.
FO: Are there any film schools in Sierra Leone
VT: Not that I know of.
FO: If an organization were to decide to allocate money to aid documentary filmmaking in Sierra Leone in which area do you think this money would be useful?
VT: I think most importantly it would be in education. Documentary filmmaking is different from filmmaking. The way you tell a story in documentary filmmaking is not the same way you tell a story in fiction filmmaking. If money is coming in, I believe it should be put into basic training. There is a desperate need for that.
FO: What are the challenges you face that are unique to your environment?
VT: The challenge is in the lack of respect for media. People don’t understand the importance of media and the weight if you have the media behind you. As a producer, what would make me great would be my contacts, which would lead to future investments and funding. The culture of investing in films and seeing it as a business is not clear to the people yet, so as a producer, that kind of limits me and makes me think of new ways to approach people and say, “I’ve got this brilliant idea and if you give me this amount of money I will be able to do this and several other things”
FO: Do you have challenges in terms of equipment?
VT: That is a huge challenge, but I must admit I feel lucky to be with Concept Multimedia because even though we don’t have all of the equipment we can make use of at the studio, we still have a wide range of equipment. So in that respect, for me personally, I feel quite blessed I’m with the team. I know as a wider picture, it is a struggle to get equipment. For example, if anything was to break here or if we hired out our equipment to someone and it broke, getting the same quality equipment would be almost impossible. There is a huge gap and a huge need for equipment and equipment management as well.
FO: Is it easy for you to get equipment in the country or do you have to go out of the country to get it?
VT: You have to go out of the country to get standard equipment. They have good enough equipment here but I haven’t seen any one push to get industry standard equipment.
FO: What are the goals of Concept Media? Let’s say five years down the road, what are you guys going to be doing?
VT: In five years time we probably will be looking into our first major film but until that time I see us doing a few music videos and I see us really getting into documentary filmmaking because it is the passion of the team. It’s just that at the moment, the right tools are not in place right now to do a documentary. So in five years I believe we would have made a few more documentaries and I also believe we would have made major extensions to the studio.
FO: Do you plan on having a teaching facility?
VT: Yes we do.
FO: What is your take on the Broadcast Media in Sierra Leone? Do they hinder or do they help with your work?
VT: They hinder the work we do majorly. The reason I say that is because of what I am seeing: professional channels being downgraded to the kind of student-level quality we did while learning in university. That’s my honest opinion…although they have made improvements!
FO: If you could change things in the industry what would you change?
VT: Information. Information is key. Although where I got my training, you learn every day through research and watching other people work. If you want to be a director, you have to know who your director is and what your style is. I believe that once you give people information, and then you give them a little basics, then they can then go on and do things. That is what filmmaking and documentary filmmaking is all about. Just knowing the basics, taking the cameras, taking equipment and doing what you need to do.
FO: Are you aware if there are any archives in Sierra Leone for documentary films?
AB4U: Idriss Kpange used to be a Reuters TV correspondent in Sierra Leone so there is a lot of footage that we at Concept Multimedia have that even SLBC the government station does not have.
FO: So what you are saying is that there is a documentary archive in this studio?
AB4U/VT/IK: Yes.
FO: Do you share that information and why?
IK: Not at this stage, no. We haven’t gotten a request to share it and also we haven’t properly catalogued it yet in digital files.
FO: Is there any government funding available for filmmakers in Sierra Leone?
AB4U/VT/IK: None at all.
FO: What about legal standards? Are there any laws in place that aid filmmakers?
IK: I think the government has gone so far as to introduce the new copyright law, which is why a lot of people are interested in filmmaking…just because of that one step. Imagine what would happen if the government did more? There are just 5 million people and maybe 200 people are interested in filmmaking. I’m sure the government could support filmmaking in this country if they were less corrupt and if only they would direct some of the funds that they put into their overall budget. Maybe the Ministry of Culture has a fund for filmmakers. I think the government can do it, I just think people are laid back. They don’t really understand. As I said, that education is lacking. Even the politicians don’t know how to market themselves.
AB4U: There is one point that I always see in Sierra Leone. It is the fact that people don’t actually know how to use media, just as Valona said. Watching SLBC is like watching some secondary school kids put together programmes. There is a lack of understanding of what broadcast should be. If you listen to the radio, a DJ will just play music for hours on end without trailing what radio station people are listening to. The culture is just not there. We have been to the Ministry of Tourism and Culture. They talk the talk but they don’t walk the walk.
Education is key and general sensitization of what the media is and what it does.
IK: Let me give you a classic example. You were talking about archiving…. The National Electoral Commission is running after us right now to give them footage from last year’s election. We have a lot of this information on video, properly shot and well kept for the last 5 years. They came here and they have seen it. When we told them we had footage their response was, “Oh, lets film it on our mobile phones”.
So, you see even if I wanted to give them my footage, that makes me sit back and think that these people are not serious. The education needs to go beyond the filmmakers. It needs to actually teach people the essence of media. It has to be a general sensitization. The president, the ministers, all these people do not know how to market themselves.
FOCUS GROUP
A Focus Group meeting was held featuring representatives of the industry stakeholders.
Lansana Mansaray, aka Barmmy Boy: An accomplished musician and filmmaker, Lansana Mansaray, aka Barmmy Boy exemplifies the talent and potential of his generation. Gifted at engaging his peers in creative collaboration, he is a natural mentor and instructor. Barmmy Boy assists in coordinating the commissioned productions produced by We Own TV: Sierra Leone. He has participated in media projects with iEarn, War Child Canada, cafesociety.org and has been honored by youth groups and the British Council for his film/video work.
Arthur Pratt: As a drama teacher, filmmaker, youth organiser and pastor living in Freetown, Arthur Pratt
leads the ongoing We Own TV efforts in Sierra Leone. A respected leader in his community, he has a longtime commitment to working with underprivileged youth. Arthur is a compassionate and deeply motivating mentor. He has toured throughout the country performing original productions of Shakespeare. His credits also include numerous short films and plays created in collaboration with the youth he serves.
Papa Shaw: An editor, producer and also a camera operator. He is an independent filmmaker in Sierra Leone.
Kadie Sesay: An actress and a producer. Benjamin Dominic: A writer and a producer. Brima Sheriff: A writer and director.
Ibrahim Sorie Samura: An actor and director.
Mohamed Foday Kamara: Owner of production company Bintumani Pictures.
Augustus O. Thomas: A director.
FOCUS GROUP MEETING FEATURING REPRESENTATIVES OF INDUSTRY STAKEHOLDERS
FOCUS GROUP 1
Interview with members of The Sierra Leone Film Industry Labor and Marketing Guild (S.L.F.L.M)
Papa Shaw: An editor, producer, camera operator and an independent filmmaker in Sierra Leone.
Kadie Sesay: An actress and a producer.
Benjamin Dominic: A writer and a producer.
Brima Sheriff: A writer and director.
Ibrahim Sorie Samura: An actor and director
Mohamed Foday Kamara: Owner of a production company, Bintumani Pictures.
PS: My name is Papa Shaw, commonly known as Edwin in the media world. I am an editor, producer and also a camera operator. I am an independent filmmaker in Sierra Leone. With my experience as a filmmaker, I can say that filmmaking in Sierra Leone is not that easy. There are a lot of things you have to go through to get your film done. Concerning the challenges I face in editing, I think we need a proper training facility so that we can get our films cut very well. We get our training from the experience we get from friends and international people that come to Sierra Leone make movies. The experience we get is the experience that we implement in making our own films. Also, as a camera operator, I got my experience from an international organisation called I RUN SIERRA LEONE, where I started camera operating and I was taught by a filmmaker from New York. He basically taught me how to use the camera. From there I decided to go into filmmaking. I started filmmaking because I believe it to be my career and I believe I can make a living as a filmmaker.
KS: My name is Kadie Baihe Sesay and I am an actress and a producer. I ventured once into producing a movie and until now I haven’t finished producin. It was not a good experience though because we funded that movie on our own. My friends and I went out and scouted for money and tried to produce the movie, but up to this point we haven’t produced it yet, so I cannot say I am a full producer. Acting, however, has been my passion since childhood. In Sierra Leone it is so sad, because even if they call you to act a movie, they cannot pay you because there are no funds or budgets for it. So you go and act freely and even after sales, they do not call you to give you something — not even a Coke for the role you played in the movie. It has been a series of ups and downs. There is no story to write home about the movie industry in Sierra Leone.
BD: My name is Benjamin Dominic; I am a writer and a producer. My experience as producer so far is that the film industry in Sierra Leone is very young. Some of the constraints that we have start with the actors. Most of them are not trained and there are no institutions to train them in Sierra Leone, so it is always a big effort for someone who wants to do a movie to take up that challenge.
In the area of actually making the films it is sometimes not easy for us to sort out our locations because most people here do not really understand what films are all about. They do shy away sometimes from giving us locations for our movies and even when we meet institutions that are already established, they sometimes find it difficult to give us some of the things we need in films, such as props. One of my friends had this experience. They wanted to use police uniforms, guns, and the like in making his film. It wasn’t easy. He had to go through a lot of protocols to do so. This at times derails your story. If you have a story that talks about police, the vans, the guns, etc., the actual process of shooting it becomes difficult because they do not understand why they should give you their materials to do your films.
Another constraint that we face in the industry is funding. To raise funds to make films in an environment where filmmaking is new it is not easy. Not everybody knows much about filmmaking, so they look at it as something that is not lucrative. So, funding has been a problem. With most of the films we do here, the actors who have a passion for filmmaking come together and raise funds to do films. When the actors themselves are raising funds to do their movies, that just tells you what the film is going to look like
Lastly, I just want to say that workshops would really help all of us in filmmaking but we are not getting workshops that will train the actors and filmmakers in totality. That includes cinematographers and cameramen, DOP, sound engineers and all the departments that come together to make a film. I want to believe that if all these things are put in place we would do better.
BS: My name is Brima Sheriff and I am a writer and director. I’ll tell you about my experience when I ventured into filmmaking in 2005. I did my first movie which primarily focused on female genital mutilation. I come from a very deprived community and as a result I used to write a lot of poems and songs as a way of consoling the soul. Then I became a member of an theater group and when I joined Amnesty International my capacity was further built by the human rights training that I got, so most of my movies are really tied to human rights issues. That’s how I ventured into the first movie.
The challenges were that the actors were not trained and I was not equally and adequately trained. So then the very first thing I had to do was most of my training online by going on to the internet, studying about how to direct a movie and learning what it entails to do a movie. So that’s how I did it. I was responsible for funding the movie and transportation for rehearsals. I worked with a location manager and gave him transport to find locations. I was responsible for paying the editor. I was responsible for producing the entire movie. It was a real challenge because by 2005 Sierra Leone was at its embryonic stage of movie making and people were not appreciative of Sierra Leone movies. I also faced challenges with sound. I didn’t know how to direct my cameraman and he was not an expert in doing that. He was a television producer and we used him for the very first film. These were the key challenges I faced in 2005.
After that, I ventured into a second movie and unfortunately I could not release it. It was supposed to be released on June 16, but my house got burned down in January this year and I lost all my equipment. Still, I think I gained a lot of experience with the first challenge.
First, I know that making a movie is a business. It is not anything that has to do with fun. Secondly, I noticed that with doing a movie, you need a certain capacity, so what I had to do was talk to other directors, look for other people who had experience and most times I’d call peer discussion meetings and I would share my ideas with colleagues. I got a lot of capacity out of that. Generally, making movies in Sierra Leone is very expensive. It is very difficult.
Another big challenge is that there is still a dissenting voice in Sierra Leone in terms of who is an expert in making movies and who is not an expert. I have noticed that we are divided along this line. There are a group of people who just believe that without them being involved, films are not good in this country. I think that’s the challenge. They have the expertise and we do recognise the expertise, but there is a very big block between them and most of us with not really very strong capacities who are interested in doing movies.
ISS: My name is Ibrahim Sorie Samura. I’m an actor and a DOP. My experience in the movie world in Sierra Leone is not that good because I have encountered a lot of problems. Initially, when I came into the industry, I wanted to be an actor but I found it so hard and it was difficult for me to make it acting, so I decided to go to the back of the camera and learn to be a camera operator. When I took that step, it was not an easy task for me again,and it was only through the help of God that I met a German who was a documentary filmmaker. He had come to do a film called Lost Identity and I spoke with him and told him that I wanted to learn from him because there was no film school in Sierra Leone. He said he would teach me how to operate the camera.
After that, we went on the first project which was Breaking the Rules. There I started gaining experience operating the camera. We did another which was Lost Identity where I served as the second cameraman, operating the second camera with him working side by side. He was teaching me to know the angles with which I should take my shot and which I should not take my shot.
I was of the opinion that there were no professionals in Sierra Leone, but then I got in touch with the Sierra Leone Film Guild. I met people in the movie world, got close to them and gained experience from them. I have learned a lot and now I can say I can do a movie on my own with all the experience I have from producers, writers, directors, actors and actresses in the guilds.
Initially we called on the government to aid with funding as there was no funding and then there was nobody responsible for film and so the government had no one they could entrust with funds. After forming this guild, and I believe it has all the experienced filmmakers in Sierra Leone, we went back to the government and they tried to award a certificate to the guild which was a good step. It was something that I appreciated because I believe it will help the industry in terms of providing funds and encouraging investors to come in and invest their resources in the movie world. I was very happy the day they awarded the certificate to us.
In filmmaking we are having problems with locations and using people’s houses. It is ridiculous for people in this country not to give their houses to people like us who are passionate about doing movies. Maybe it’s because we just came from the rebel war so no one trusts each other. I believe in this peaceful environment that we have known and they should be the ones helping us with locations and other things for us to climb up in the film industry.
To round up, I would like to call on investors to come in to help with film schools, to help the film guild so that we can groom more people and also so we can be trained to make more professional movies.
MFK: My name is Mohamed Foday Kamara, popularly known as Meddf. I am a proud member of the Sierra Leone Film Guild, co-founder and owner of production company Bintumani Pictures. I started my filming career some 8 years ago as an actor and over the years I have metamorphosed into different things in the making of films. Initially when I started as an actor, writing was on my mind and I had a passion for writing so I taught myself how to write a script from a template I got from the internet. Over the years I have been writing scripts that people have been looking forward to for productions, but unfortunately it is just a hobby, because after writing a script you hardly get a producer who will say I like this thing, let me make a movie out of it. I once had a guy tell me that he wanted to give me less than 100 USD for a script which I wrote, and I told him no because I know what it takes. That took me to another level. I decided to start producing.
Just like many filmmakers in this country the experience is a bitter one. The country is not open to filmmaking yet. People are not that interested. I’m not talking about those with the talent, I am talking about investors. It is hard to find someone who could be an executive producer or a company that will invest. They are not interested.
I co-wrote and produced Breaking the Rules. It was a hit in the country because it sold aver 20,000 copies, which is considered a big deal in Sierra Leone, but when you go to the internet and see how many copies are sold worldwide 20,000 copies is just too small.
Honestly being a producer…. It’s a shame I am saying this on tape but, the person who ended up doing the marketing for the film ended up giving me the producer, Le500 for a tape which is something like 0.1 dollars. I could not even pay my actors, but I spoke to them and some of them understood and some of them are still after me and honestly I have nothing to say to them. The shameful part of it is that my film is still selling but I’m not getting any royalties for it.
The marketing structure in this country is so poor, that people are not willing to invest, and the few who do come on board will do so only after the production. They will market your product and you get almost nothing for it. If you say you are not giving it to them, then you might as well just keep it in your cupboard for eternity because you are not a marketer and you do not have the knowhow to market your product in this country. The only option you have is them and they will use, misuse and abuse you because they are the only option.
However, we are not relenting. For some of us it is a hobby. We are doing it because we like what we do. Still, we are not getting anything.
Some of the constraints that I faced as a filmmaker, were that I had to teach myself how to write a script and how to direct. With directing you cannot read from the internet and go and direct just like that, but I have managed over the years. It has been successful locally even though I have not been able to break barriers outside Sierra Leone. At least I can walk the streets of Freetown and someone will recognise me as a filmmaker even though I am not known outside Sierra Leone.
To get a unifying voice that will speak for the film industry in Sierra Leone has been a major challenge. We see ourselves as rivals, not in a healthy atmosphere but as enemies. I remember very well, about 5 or 6 years ago when the Sierra Leone Film Guild started and it was promising, but people started looking at the guild like a production company, saying why must I join another production company when I already have one. We have seen people breaking from this guild and forming other groups with the same aims and ambitions as the one they broke from saying, “Why can’t we just come together for our own good?” Almost every day you will see people coming into this country doing documentaries, and feature length films and we are not benefiting from it. It is only recently, about 2 years ago, that I could proudly say that I was a filmmaker, but before then, filmmaking was looked at something only dropouts from school did.
If I was asked what I wanted to see in the Sierra Leonean film industry, I would say a structured body that would regulate the affairs of filmmakers in this country, beginning with those who are writers, producers and including all the key players in the industry. I would also like to see learning institutions in this country. I say this because many of us did not formally learn our craft except by reading about it on the internet.
FO: We have talked about the problems from personal perspectives. Can we now talk about the strategies for overcoming these problems? Money is hard to find everywhere. How much is the biggest amount that a film is made with here?
IK: The highest is I think 20,000 USD.
FO: If the highest is 20,000 USD, what is the average cost of making films?
IK: 5,000 USD/3,000 USD. Some people can even squeeze 1000 USD and they can make a film.
BS: That is because we have not been costing the amount of energy, the time we spend, the resources we put into it. We do not cost the human resources, the unplanned expenditures. That is why you say that.
FO: What is the average cost of a cast? Don’t you have actors, don’t you pay for locations, and don’t you have transport?
KS: When I was producing my own movie, the main actor was T.J.Cole and we paid him 2 million Leones. He told us that without that money he would not do the movie and we needed him, so we paid. In my production we paid all the cast members. Nobody will say that we didn’t, but then we ran out of money. Our editor and camera men…. (Sighing)
FO: What did they do?
KS: What did they do? Hmmm — it is a long story. Truly, it is not anything to write home about…we rent equipments, pay cast…there is no readily available amount that you can use to do a movie. We spent over 20million Leones producing that movie, that’s about 5,000USD and we have nothing to show for it.
FO: On average in terms of income, the audience pays about what Le10, 000 for a DVD?
PS: Well, the marketers sell it to the hawkers for about Le6,000 and the hawkers then sell it for about Le10,000 and most times the hawkers gain more than the producers. The producer gets Le2,000 in terms of royalty and the hawkers get Le4,000.
FO: So why are you not hawking and letting someone else make the movie?
BD: The marketers here are a big problem. As my colleague said, making some movies average 5,000 USD. This money is mainly provided by the cast, the director and the producer. By the time they finish producing the movie, they move to the next stage, where the movie has to be mass produced, posters have to be put up for advertisement and you realise that the cast and the producers have exhausted their pockets.
These people called marketers will now come in and offer to mass produce and print the movie and they offer you Le2,000 per copy. With this amount it will be very hard for you to get your investment back in 6 months, let alone pay your actors and this is the reason why we haven’t been paying our actors.
FO: If you don’t pay the actors, how will you get the actors to sign release forms, do you get their permission to use their image?
ISS: Frankly, Sierra Leone is very different from other countries. Filming is very embryonic here. It is more like a club thing, not a professional institute, not like the way big film companies operate. We reach an agreement that they receive x% if the movies is successful. If it isn’t, then we all bear the loss.
FO: So, it’s like Le 2,000 per DVD? How do you share Le2,000 per DVD amongst everybody? I am trying to understand the accounts here because one thing leads to another. If the hawkers make more than the person making the film then there is a structural problem.
ISS: It is very rare to see production companies paying their actors. They would rather say if the film is successful after production then we will give you a certain amount.
FO: You still haven’t answered the question, which is how you do get someone to sign a contract that releases them to use their image in a film if you don’t pay them?
PS: You reach an understanding, a gentleman’s agreement.
FO: How do the actors….because they are actually spending time to do this, a film, which means you are going to be there for a day or two. That means you are not elsewhere, you are working and leveraging your talent. How do they eat?
BS: Take my experience. When I was doing my movie, a village film, the entire crew moved to a village. What we did first was to pay our own cost for food, every cast member paid their own cost for food and for accommodation. I am explaining this because there are two things that are happening. First, there is enthusiasm, determination and there is willingness on the part of people to become movie stars, so they do not ask for costs. We took it as our own project, it is a project owned by us, including the determination of the people who wanted to be a part of the movie. No, there wasn’t a contract by 2005. By 2011 when I was doing another movie and I had that problem, I developed consent forms. Because of my human rights background I knew there had to be consent forms and so I developed a consent form that they signed. I was responsible for costumes and I was responsible for transportation to go to locations. We projected the contracts, saying this is the cost that you will pay me, as my colleague said, IF the movie is successful.
FO: How do you know the movie will be successful?
BS: It is only a fool that will go to sleep when his ass is on fire. These people are a part of the entire production system. They know what it takes to print and how to distribute. They know the costs involved and sometimes they are even part of the public relations team.
FO: Can you tell me more about the actual filmmaking? When you say you made a film for a thousand dollars, describe it to me. Who knows anything about the equipment that you use.
PS: We are using HDV cameras, Z5, Z1 and then even the X-F 300 Canon. That is the recent camera as of now in town. We pay 100 USD to rent it for a day.
FO: Does the writer get paid? And, do they actually write out a proper script or is it something you explain to them?
PS: Not at all. Most times the writers are also the directors.
BD: In some cases the scripts are being purchased, but in the case of the producer or the director writing the script, he will have to explain everything to the actors and have rehearsals where they will rehearse with the script until he feels his actors are ready to shoot.
FO: How do you do your post-production?
BD: In post-production, the cameraman and editor do not compromise Even if they are part of your group, they will break out of your group if you do not pay them. In post-production, you take your movie to the editor and you have to pay him. Where we have the problem is with marketing, after post-production.
FO: Why do you not take this film to the theatres?
BD: We do take these films out to the theatre, but let me break it down for you. I have done two premieres and to be frank with you, it does not pay. For instance, if you want to take your movie to the cinemas, your group will have to write out invitation cards for patrons, chief patrons and your ordinary cards. There are also expenses at the cinema. The halls are not that cheap. You pay like a million plus in some cases….
FO: Do you promote these films?
BD: Promoting our films also lies in the hands of the people we call marketers because we do not have the money to promote the film.
FO: In Nigeria, the marketer will provide the budget for the film. You cannot get a free actor anywhere in Nigeria. You cannot get a free anything. You have to pay for everything. The marketer gives you money to make the film, the marketer promotes the film, and the marketer pays for the premiere. So is it a question of your marketers getting away with a lot here, because if you pay for the film and the marketer just sits and collects it and makes equal amounts of money because he just makes copies, and even the hawker makes more, is that not a structural problem?
PS: People like the ones you are describing are coming around. We have a marketer now. Let’s say for example, there’s a script, and I want to do a film. The marketer will ask, “What is the budget for the movie?” If it is low budget, then I will sponsor it and then I will do the marketing. So yes, I think we are starting to get those kinds of marketers and I think they are foreign. What they do in other countries is what they are trying to implement here.
FO: Is there anything the Television Company is doing to support the industry?
BD: I would like to say that the television people are not doing much to support the industry because when we do our movie trailers, with which we advertise, they charge us exorbitantly and they don’t compromise.
FO: Has the TV station ever commissioned a film?
Everybody: In our own case we have never been commissioned to do a movie or a documentary.
FO: So what is the film guild doing? That’s where I am going. You have a guild and the purpose of this guild is to protect the individual filmmaker by creating environments interfacing with institutions to create a situation where you make films profitably and make films comfortably. What’s the film guild about?
PS: We just set up the film guild. In the past there was no guild, there was no structure.
FO: So why did someone say 5 years ago?
MFK: It came into existence around that time, but it was never active, simply because we filmmakers were not united. It was only recently that a few of us decided to give life to something that was dying. Now we have succeeded in getting government recognition. We have a certificate. Back then, we were just like a club.
FO: The film guild is recognised by government. Is the film union recognised by government?
MFK: They are registered to exist in the country, just like any group, but they do not have the license to act as a trade union for filmmakers.
FO: Why do you say that?
MFK: It is because the trade union policy in this country is that the certificate is given to only one entity.
FO: What is the advantage of being registered in the government?
MFK: When you are known by the government, then the body becomes a legal one, which can sue and be sued when it goes against the laws of the country, or when someone infringes on the right of someone in the film industry that is registered in the guild.
FO: So what is the guild doing about this woman’s film that she says has not been completed?
MFK: : The guild became active again this year and this woman’s film was 2 years ago. The guild is still a baby and it’s still growing.
BD: The truth about this is we all have a passion to do film, but we do not have, nor know, the structure. With this guild, we are trying to see how we can use our knowledge and fight for its members. We are looking at the guilds also having workshops, training and the like to help filmmakers.
FO: So basically it is all about skills and structure in the industry?
EVERYBODY: Yes, skills and structure.
FO: Are any of you doing documentary films? Is there a market for documentary films?
PS: I do a documentary and I send it out there for competition in Europe and America. There are a few international filmmakers that I know and sometimes they ask me if I can do a documentary about certain topics.
AOT: Most filmmakers do not have an interest in documentary filmmaking. Very few do. Feature length is the concern, so I do not believe there is enough initiative for documentary films or short films. Only a few individuals are concentrating on making documentaries and feature length movies.
I don’t think we have any market for documentaries. Perhaps it’s hidden and we can’t see it, unless someone opens our eyes and says this is the market. (laughing)
MFK: Honestly I don’t know of any market in this country, it’s just a passion. Recently I was in the Koinadugu district and I went to the Loma Mountains, the second highest mountain in the country. This is all about passion and wanting to tell a story.
FO: Finally, can we talk about broadcasting — there is SLBC. Is there anyone making television programming, soap operas?
AOT: In the past couple of years, a few people have tried to make soap operas — Julius Spencer, Premier Media, Talking Drum Studios…
BD: The reason why people are not interested in this is, for instance, if I am taking a trailer to the SLBC to play it and they’re charging me for it, what would happen when it comes to soap operas and things like that?
BS: To give you an insight from an office perspective, we were doing work on Maternal Health in Sierra Leone and we wanted to collaborate with SLBC. We did a proposal and the director is a very close friend of mine. He worked as a journalist for Human Rights, while I am the Director for Amnesty International. Their operational plan was not able to accommodate what we wanted to do and they were not flexible, so we had a problem and the organisation had to take on everything. Even when we did the documentaries, we were asked to pay if we wanted to air them on SLBC.
FO: In a situation where you are not able to continue with the structure you have now, where everybody just chips in, do you still see a viable market? If a film starts to cost you 20,000 USD to make, which is what is going to happen by the time you start paying people, no matter how small, assume that an average cost comes out to 15/20,000 USD. Do you see the possibility of turning a profit? What’s important is not to bring an outside structure into the environment and then the environment cannot sustain it and everything collapses, because once you start paying people you can’t stop. What are your thoughts about that?
AS: Actually I believe we can sustain it because even though right now Sierra Leone is a virgin country, if we work as a team it can be done.
KS: Yes we can. In the first instance what the film guild or whatever organisation will try to do is to break the barrier between us and the government, because if we can get the government on board then without them sponsoring us financially, we can get them to sponsor us through contacts for SLBC. If we have SLBC on board and they air our trailers frequently, that can help sales of movies in this town.
When they shot Blood Diamond, that movie made a lot of money in this town. I was a part of that group that went around Bo, Kono and Makeni areas. I know the amount of money made at that time. So, if we start doing that, launching movies in different parts of the town, you will make twice what you spent making the movie.
FO: Why is the guild not organising forums and discussing strategies, exactly the same thing we are doing here now?
KS: The guild is now working. It has been together for the past 6 months, working on strategies, the acts, policies, regulations and all of that. It is a work in progress and we will get to that point.
Apart from that, as you rightly said, it is the legislation and if we have a legislation that says SLBC, you have to play a Sierra Leone movie trailer, free of charge, that will go a long way to advertise a movie. If there was a legislation that said that, then the marketers, and in fact the marketers right now are above the guilds, let me be frank with you. In fact, the last time I went there I was told, “Whether you like it or not, what we decide to pay you guys is what we are going to pay you”.
BS: Without a structure sustaining the film industry, it is going to haphazard, it is going to be uncoordinated, and people will continue to suffer from making films and not benefiting. Just listen to his experience – marketers who can turn to guilds and say “whether you like it or not.”
This goes a very long way to show that until we have a structure which regulates the activity of every player within the film sector, sustaining the film industry will still be a challenge. There are a lot of people forming groups. These groups are a very clear manifestation that people need to organise themselves to make a profit out of this entire process. Therefore, I am of the very strong opinion that until we have a structure, a formidable structure that protects the interests of every player within the film sector, it’s going to be difficult especially for the filmmakers. Meanwhile, the marketers are going to be waiting to take advantage of the very fragile situation.
FO: What do you see as a path to the structure, who’s responsible for creating this structure?
BS: I think that the Sierra Leone Film Guild has a very big responsibility, we have the legal background. What we lack to some extent are the skills and the capabilities to move this process forward. First are the skills and the capabilities and once we know how to run such a process, I am pretty sure we can access funding. By then we would be sure of what we want to do, how we want to do it and then we can move on from there.
I think that the Sierra Leone Film Guild and any other film organisation out there needs to be structured. We need to take responsibility and it needs to be something serious.
Sometimes we’ve called meetings and even the executive members have not come. I drafted a communications strategy that I shared with the team, and up until this moment that communications strategy has not taken effect.
So, that’s the problem, even within ourselves. Executives within the Film Guild do not take the work seriously. That is the problem. Until we move forward and we believe that the Film Guild has a responsibility to contribute to the success of filmmaking in this country, then it remains an illusion.
FO: Thank you.
FOCUS GROUP 2
TRANSCRIPT OF VISIT TO WE OWN TV HOUSE
LM: My name is Lansana Mansaray. That’s my real name, but most people know me as Bammy Boy. I am the production manager for We Own TV and I’m also a filmmaker. I used to do rap music a long time ago and I’m still interested in music, but for now I’m working with We Own TV. I have done a lot of work for youth groups, NGOs, TV stations and the rest.
AP: My name is Arthur Pratt; I am also working at We Own TV as the manager and I am in charge of education. I am a Pastor and a freelance journalist as well. I am 35 years old.
IK: My name is Idriss Kpange. I am a filmmaker and a TV journalist.
FO: What do you do for sound? Are you the main editor here?
LM: Yes I am the main editor here. For sound what we basically do is…you see this microphone here, this is what we use for voiceovers and other things just in case we have problems with the original sound, but with the cameras that we use the sound we get is pretty good. (taking out a camera and showing it) This is the online edit suite, where I do my work. It is the main editing facility, it has both Mac and PC for both Final Cut and Premiere.
FO: Wow! You are basically using the same kind of camera that we are using. What kind of work are you guys doing, where do you get funding?
AP: Basically we focus on producing.
LM: Most of the content we produce here is creative content for young people and our funding comes from donors around the world. We have a creative director who is based in San Francisco called Banker White. I don’t know if you’ve heard of the Sierra Leone Refugee All-Stars — it’s about a band of musicians, Sierra Leoneans. They formed a band in the refugee camp in Guinea and he followed them through their success. It was one of the biggest documentaries to come out of this country and it was done by Banker White and Zach Niles. When they did the documentary it was so successful that they thought that they could something with young filmmakers here in Sierra Leone. They decided to come up with an initiative to see how they could best empower young filmmakers. That’s basically a summary of how We Own TV came into being.
They did do some scouting before that, across the country in Kono, Makeni, and of course in Freetown, trying to spotlight interested filmmakers they could train and that had potential in the country. We were among the people they found, among a couple of other people in the east, six in Kono and two in Makeni.These young people include ex-combatants, unfortunate young people living on their own in the streets. Yes, this is the bunch that makes up We Own TV.
The center is available to them at any time. With the little equipment and know-how that we have, we are able to pass on ideas to them and in turn hope that they will go on in the world and do their creative work.
I personally am not involved in making Sierra Leone soap operas, or in making Sierra Leone movies. I am more focused on producing content for NGOs and documentaries. That is what I do, and of course, part of our own work also involves doing freelance work for other NGOS and international people.
FO: How much work did the NGOs actually bring in terms of the volume of work in the documentary genre?
LM: Some of the work that groups like UNICEF and British Council used to hire expats to do, is now coming to us. It opens the door for us to make headway with various NGOs. As a Sierra Leonean it is not that easy and Idriss will attest to the fact. There is no funding here or encouragement for young filmmakers to make or produce their own films, or use their own ideas to make their own documentaries.
It really is difficult. There is no funding available here. For instance, if I have an idea and I want to produce a documentary, the state television will not commission it. There is nothing like that happening here. So we are just doing it out of love and passion. Some of us who are making headway with these local NGOs are starting to see a bit of light because of the work that we do.
FO: My question is, Can you say you are doing it for love if you are working with NGOs?
LM: (Overriding) I am properly paid if I’m working for people like The British Council and UNICEF. I am properly paid for it. That is why some of the equipment I have is not donor’s equipment. When I get paid I use it to upgrade myself. I don’t call that work, I just call that promotional stuff I do for NGOs.
FO: As a filmmaker what kind of films or documentaries do you guys want to be making?
AP: For most of us here at We Own TV, we do short films and also we are looking at films that express situations with topical themes such as corruption. Presently we are working on something called African Ninja. It’s a comedy that is looking at one man’s fight against corruption, which we know is very strong in Africa and in Sierra Leone.
In terms of documentaries, they cover all types of topics. I am doing a documentary on the elections now. Bammy is also covering the making of the African Ninja, and Michaela is doing a documentary on child labor. We are working on different things. We are also working on a documentary on disabled people and looking at how they live in Sierra Leone.
FO: How are you funding these documentaries?
LM: As you know it is not very easy. For instance, the production of the documentary Africa Ninja is being helped by Banker White who is the creative director of We Own TV, but most of the other work we do on our own because of the love and the passion we have for making films. It is part of what we do. The backbone of We Own TV is creative work.
FO: What is the structure of We Own TV? How did it come about?
AP: Basically We Own TV started in 2009 when Banker White and Zach Niles came to town. They were working Sierra Leone Refugee All-Stars so they saw the aftermath of the war, they saw the situation and they decided to do something about it. When they met us, we had discussions with them and they decided to work on the aspect of self-expression, using video. We started in 2009 by taking 22 or so young people for a workshop in Lungi which lasted for a whole month. After the workshop, they left us with equipment — cameras and laptops. For a whole year we were working at our various houses. We were responsible for moving around the different towns conducting workshops — Kono, Makeni — trying to get them to do something until 2010 when we rented this place. We started this office 2011.
FO: Is there a market out there for documentaries?
AP/ LM: (Answer simultaneously) In Sierra Leone? No!
(Laughing)
AP: There is basically no market for documentary films in Sierra Leone. The problem with us in Sierra Leone is that we somehow don’t value records. We don’t have respect for archives and so you find out that you are losing lots and lots of information that we are supposed to be storing. Take for example the 50th anniversary, nothing much was done about it. No strong documentary. Nothing came out about how Sierra Leone moved towards being 50 years old. Look at the political trend in Sierra Leone. Things are changing rapidly but nobody wants to sponsor documentaries. There is no market — absolutely none for documentaries in Sierra Leone.
This is the reason why the independent filmmakers we see around are releasing feature length films. They are following the Nigerian trend because that’s where the money is. They try to sell out to people who will buy their films in the street, but if I do a documentary now and take it out there, it won’t sell. Even with NGOs you hardly get NGOs that commission local people like us to do documentaries. It’s not easy. It all started with them calling on us to cover their workshops and we kept records for them, and seeing the quality of the work and the video, they took the risk and asked us to do some work for them.
FO: Let me ask you this. When you say there is no space for documentary or that the demand for documentary is low, what is happening with the TV stations? Why aren’t they showing documentaries?
LM: They are not interested, basically. What should I say? It’s difficult. As Arthur just said, there is no market for documentaries here, because documentary is not a day or a month’s job and for someone like us trying to develop ourselves to take up this job and say we have this idea or we want to follow this idea, we need something commissioned, even partially covered, so that we can go out there and do what we have to do. Here TV stations are not interested in commissioning young filmmakers to make documentaries.
AP: The thing is, the people running the television stations are only thinking about themselves and their pocket. They are thinking about how they make money for themselves every blessed day. That’s the whole idea. So, when they work within the station, they make sure that everything is confined within the station. For example, look at the quality of work SLBC is doing. The quality is poor. For instance, they insist that all musical videos should be of High Definition quality, and SLBC cannot even import — they cannot even broadcast it. So you understand the problem. The game is that they grab everything for themselves.
There was a time when we were doing a programme called In Focus, which mainly focused on our local folklore and storytelling. We started the programme with SLBC and before long we started having problems with them and later I found out that most of them wanted to grab programmes and do it themselves, within the SLBC. They didn’t have the technical know-how to go about doing these programmes and they ended up doing nothing. There was a time when I heard that the SLBC was given a grant by the United Nations to sponsor documentaries or short stories, culture and other things. I don’t remember the actual date but it was during the time of In Focus and nothing came out.We heard nothing about it again.
FO: How do you see your career panning out in this environment? What do you see as a way forward in the future and what are the kinds of things you think should happen to make a change?
LM: I think things will definitely take a u-turn and change. The industry is still growing and is still trying to take a strong stand here. I mean, before now, there was absolutely nothing. There was no Bammy, there was no Arthur, and there was no Idriss and that was 10 years ago. It’s just because of the civil war and when the civil war ended a lot of young people like me were desperate to do something, desperate to move on in life and we thought we could use filmmaking. Of course I was doing music at some point to express our ideas about things affecting us locally and globally in our own local communities.
That was basically what brought me into the industry (laughs) and as I started up, there was no help. The only way I could be a part of it was to follow people that had equipment, go along with them and watch what they did. That was the only way I could learn about this and from there I was mainly interested in whatever came up about film. I always made sure I would go there and be a part of it, because by then there was no school that you could go to that could teach you how to edit, teach you how to use a camera, or how to adjust this or that. There was nothing!
The only way was to go down there and learn it yourself by using VHS, so that is how I started. For the future of the industry I see a light at the end of the tunnel. I see that things are starting to develop. Before now, take for example, the market — the movies there were all Nigerian and Ghanaian movies, but now if you go round the streets of Sierra Leone, you see that Sierra Leonean movies are starting to be on top and that they are much more expensive than a Nigerian movie. You will see Sierra Leoneans now buying Sierra Leonean movies and you also notice former theatre groups are turning to movie making and also companies trying to produce movies because they are starting to see the light. For us at the other side of things, we are starting to see the same — not only from the government but also from private corporations, from the NGOs, not only locally but also internationally. We are doing it relentlessly, come rain or shine, pushing hard to make things happen for us.
Last year I went to the Sheffield Documentary Film Festival in the UK to pitch a documentary called They Call Me Savior. It was not shot by me but I was the assistant producer. It was done by these guys called Nova Studios.
These are things that were not happening before and even for people like UNICEF, The British Council or CONCERN to give me a job — it wasn’t happening before. They would rather call expats to come in and do the jobs that we are doing now and then they’d pay them and they’d leave after finishing. Now you see them giving us the job and it is the same hope I have in the area of producing creative content like documentaries. For people like the TV stations, I don’t know, but I see things changing for the better. It is not that promising but we will see how it goes.
FO: What is your biggest need in terms of the industry as a young filmmaker? I spoke to Idriss and he was talking about the importance of education….Do you agree with him?
LM: I totally agree with him. That is one of our biggest problems here in the industry. The basics always lay the foundation. It is the stepping stone for whatever you want to do in life and I believe that what is lacking in this industry is — a big thing is equipment of course — but the main one is the skill. What we do here is out of simple common understanding, just basic things, common knowledge and the little training that we have.
Again, I totally agree with him. Until kow I’ve only heard of a school, I don’t know if you have heard of that school….
AP: It’s not even functioning now.
LM: There is nothing. If you go to other places you can learn. For most of us we have a passion to learn new things but the only way that we learn is by people coming here to teach or train, and maybe when we travel outside the country. I think there is much more we can do if we have more technical skills to do what we want to do, and equipment.
FO: What do you see as the biggest need to go from where you are to where you might want to be?
LM: If I could just say something, let me give you an example. You look at the movie industry and the way things are going and you will find out that most of what is being portrayed in the movies is Nigerian Culture. The problem with that is that we don’t even understand our own culture and how we can sell it. That knowledge is lacking. You can’t sell a computer if you do not know much about the computer and that is a big problem. That comes with knowledge and learning, which is is also responsible for the growth of the industry and the growth of a lot of filmmakers, like myself, in Sierra Leone.
FO: Let’s talk about the knowledge.
AP: Well, I don’t think it’s far from what Bammy (Lansana) has said. The basic problem that we have here in Sierra Leone is, first of all, our attitude toward learning. There are many times when we think we know and we really don’t know and we want to do something because we think we know and then what we end up doing ends up being not satisfactory.
As Bammy (Lansana) said, if you watch Nigerian Films and then you watch Sierra Leonean Films, most if not all are copy cats of what you will see in Nigerian films, Ghanaian films and even Western Movies, just because we are refusing to learn. We don’t have any film schools or film institutions here that will actually teach you the art of scriptwriting, or the art of storytelling, or the art of using video to tell stories. We don’t have that here. Most of us learn from watching films and we have a little basic training from white guys who have come into the country and given us this basic training.
I wouldn’t say anyone is a “professional” only because they have gone through school and graduated. I think we should first of all desire to learn, which also means through experience. Learning is there it starts, and then something can happen. I think we need a school. We need people to teach us properly so that at the end of the day, the quality of production that will be coming out of Sierra Leone will be very good. Also again, we have a problem with our governmental system. The government seems to be neglecting developing industries such as the music industry, for exanple. When the music industry in Sierra Leone started developing, when it started showing a new face, it was completely neglected until it bounced back against the government and until it started releasing songs that were anti-government songs. Then the government began to take them seriously, but even when the government takes them seriously, we still saw very little education within that area. They are still not being trained properly in a way that will help them emerge as proper musicians. Also, even when it comes to sound engineers, there are very few professional sound engineers in Sierra Leone. I wonder if there more than 4 or 5. We have very few people who can sit down and do live music properly.
The same thing is reflected in the film industry. We have very few people who know how to do their work properly and the government does not seem to see this as a way of creating employment, which is very important.
Filmmaking, for me, is very important and creating employment is a way of preserving our traditions. They are not seeing it like that, so it is being neglected, and if they are neglecting it, then they are neglecting a whole industry which has the capability of selling the whole country to the rest of the world, as well as giving local youth work to do to put some money in their pocket.
So I think the government and even NGOs should begin to turn their attention to the talent industry. The government came out one day and said they were looking at re-branding Sierra Leone, but how can you re-brand Sierra Leone and forget about the youth? You forget about the films that are coming out of Sierra Leone with the ability to sell the country and you forget about the music? You cannot re-brand your country without this. Let us take a look at what is happening in the Indian film industry. Indian films are being encouraged to screen outside India and to be shot in places like Australia, just so that they can be used as a tool to bring tourists to these areas. Why are they neglecting us? Since after the war, tourists have not come to Sierra Leone. Still today, we are struggling with tourism. They are making a lot of noise, but the evidence is on the ground. Go out to the beaches, to the hotels and they will tell you that tourism has virtually fainted or has become unconscious. This is because there is nothing new to show. We are neglecting the talent industry, and if the talent industry is being neglected then you are neglecting the youths because for any country that lacks jobs, the youths begin to turn to their talent to provide for them with no help from the government. The government needs to come onboard and help the talent industry to grow.
Take for example what is happening now on SLBC. They are showing a programme, Second Chance, which is a foreign film that is aired over SLBC and that is sponsored by Airtel Telecommunications Company, but Airtel has refused to sponsor the very first film festival that was done in Sierra Leone.
They refused to sponsor it as well as efforts made by the Sierra Leone National Film Union. They did a programme called Faces of Sierra Leone to help the actors grow in Sierra Leone and they failed to sponsor it, but they are sponsoring foreign films over the national television even though we are the ones that are buying their recharge cards, that are pouring our money into their businesses.
Last year after we did the film festival, Idriss came up with another film festival on human health. Now these festivals are needed if we are to build this industry properly. For example, if we are to create a market for documentaries, we need to encourage the people to see the importance of documentaries and show them why they need to go out and buy these documentaries and why they need to have them. They need to understand that these documentaries are real stories. They are references that they can go back to at any time. It informs and helps them. We need to cajole the people and the only way we can do this is when we have the film festival and the national broadcaster SLBC encouraging these things, and when we have the private sector investing in some of these things. However, they are not. investing in them. They are going outside.
They do all their adverts outside. It was only early this year that we started seeing Airtel using our local faces on their billboards. They were going down to South Africa, to Ghana, and bringing pictures of people outside Sierra Leone to advertise here. So you see, at the end of the day, as Bammy said, “There is light at the end of the tunnel”, because this industry is going to go big. I know for sure that this industry is going to be big because since last year, the films that came out cannot be equated to what we have now. Their quality of these films may be questionable and they are not all that good, but you can see the effort and the talent. This shows that we just need to have help to groom ourselves and then we will reach the peak.
FO: Tell me about your film festival. Idriss, describe your own and then you guys after him. I want to know the name of the festival, when it’s held, the theme, why it was held, how many people were there and how many films did you show? Give me a rundown of what happened at the festival.
IK: My own festival that we created is called Opin Yu Yi (Open Your Eyes). It only focuses on Human Rights. The reason why we used the theme “open your eyes” is because we want to raise awareness on human rights issues. We see a lot of human rights abuses being conducted every single day in Sierra Leone and as filmmakers we thought that if we use film to communicate positive human rights messages then people would understand properly and really fast because the stories relate directly to them — such as the theme of domestic violence. It is global. If someone sits in China and watches a domestic violent film about a man beating a woman, it’s the same as if they go to Russia or they go to Japan — it’s global. Also, part of it was that we used some powerful international films to send out the messages on human rights, a lot of people came and we screened in different locations. We had an opening and then we moved to a different location, such as the slum, where a lot of abuses happen. I think there is a need for that. As Arthur was saying, we don’t really have a market for documentaries but if we start creating these kinds of platforms then people will start understanding that these films are also good and it’s not just about the drama they do.
The festival had its own impact on people, because the feedback we got after the festival was really good. So, we are doing it every March and we are doing another one next year. Now we are giving incentives to filmmakers because we are doing a film competition and because we want filmmakers to come up with their own ten minute short films on Human Rights and present them. There is a jury that will judge and we want to give them a prize. We want to give them an incentive so when other filmmakers see that, it will be an incentive for them to go out and do more.
FO: How do you sustain the energy of that festival? Are you online, do you have a website?
IK: Yes we do have a website. It is www.Opin Yu Yi.org and Opin Yu Yi on Facebook. We got support from the British High Commission, The British Council and Christian Aid and then in partnership with my media house, Concept Multimedia, we managed to… The money that we got was basically for advertising, printing banners, paying for a lot of printed materials and doing adverts on TV and radio.
FO: How are these as marketing platforms for filmmakers your age? Obviously festivals are first and foremost promotional platforms.
IK: If I do a film and it is shown at this festival, then everybody knows I am a filmmaker. Everybody knows that this is what l do. If I do a story that touches people, then the next time they hear that I have a story that is coming out and that it is going to be on sale, before any festival I’m sure people will be willing to buy it because they know that the story is going to be good, the story will relate directly to them or to every day happenings in their society.
I think that it is good that these platforms are being created right now. This whole thing is like a revolution. We are trying to bring new ideas into people’s minds and we are trying to make them adapt to something new and that they have never really been used to.When we had the idea of a film festival, a lot of people were asking what a film festival was because, for them, when they say festival, it is to go to the stadium, eating a lot, dancing a lot, drinking a lot, and showing off with their girls. That is what a festival is to them. So actually bringing people into a cinema and showing them different films for 5 to 6 hours is a new kind of trend in this country.
AP: Our festival was the We Own National Film Festival, and the theme for that festival was artist power. We were looking at feature length films that had been done in Sierra Leone and about 54 feature length films came in. We had some documentaries, short films and music videos among them. We did the film festival at the Miatta Conference compound. The festival ended with an awards night, which was the very first film awards night that was ever done in Sierra Leone. We gave them awards for the best actors and the best films and also a satellite company, Medosat, came in at the last moment and they offered to give the winners of the awards digital satellite dishes.
The unfortunate part of it was that we never had any funding from anybody. What happened was that we had to pour in our own money because we actually wanted to do it. Bammy, Michaela, myself and other people came in with small amounts of personal cash and we were able to do it. We moved around, looking for funds and as I said, we went to Airtel for funding, we went to Comium, we went to Africell, and we went to other big companies in this country. None of them gave us a single cent. In fact, Airtel was with us. They were negotiating with us until the very day the festival started. That was when they pulled out, but it was a success. It was a huge success. It was a 2 week long festival.
FO: How was the attendance?
AP/LM: It was good, it was very good.
LM: It was done at the perimeter of the Miatta Conference Hall and we invited all, if not most, of the film groups to build booths around the perimeter and a lot showed interest. We had people from Ghana, Gambia and even Senegal.
AP: They came in for that film festival because it was not only films that were shown. We decided to bring in the textile/clothing industry because people were here to sell their things.
FO: Do you have images of this festival?
AP/LM: Yes we do.
FO: How come you didn’t approach the government to be a part of these festivals?
AP/LM: We didn’t invite them because they are not serious.
LM: It is a difficult situation and you wouldn’t understand the extent. We approached government and it was difficult to meet the right people and even when you did meet them, they would tell you one thing today and another thing tomorrow. At the end of the day we realised that if we kept running after them we wouldn’t succeed and we would just waste our time (laughing). We were able to get some support however, because the space was given by the Minister of Works. The tourism minister came in also at some point, helped to sign the certificate and then gave her blessing.
FO: There was a question if there was any market for documentary. You said no, but then if there is no market for documentary films in Sierra Leone, are you willing to put a lot of money into something and then not make anything out of it at the end of the day?
AP: It’s not that we are not going to make anything out of it. For us at We Own TV, I think we made do with the international market.
FO: So, you are thinking that if you make Sierra Leonean documentaries, you will have a better chance in the international market? Do you think that if you do your own films and take it to the international market, and people like it that it will inspire other Sierra Leonean filmmakers to do their own?
AP: Yes exactly. Sure. The only thing for now is the mad rush for money and the mad rush for money means that people are looking out for money every day, so we have very few filmmakers who are interested in doing documentary. However, when we begin to have people succeeding in the international market with their documentaries then we will begin to have lot of other filmmakers who will want to do documentary.
FO: What if someone came in saying, “We want to fund documentary filmmaking, We Own TV has a structure and we want to put money in to increase documentary filmmaking in Sierra Leone”. How would you put that money to good use?
AP: Most important is to get people to be able to understand documentary, to create a market for documentary film. We first have to get the national broadcaster involved in this. They have to show interest in this because if they have special programmes to show more of our documentaries, they will begin to get people interested. Remember Hilton Fyle who was working for BBC? He came to Sierra Leone and he did Sunrise in Paradise, about the NPRC government, and it was a hit. Also, when Sorious Samura came out with the documentary, Cry Freetown it was a hit. We need to be having documentaries released at a faster speed.
IK: I don’t think the people working in the national broadcast know what they are doing. They really don’t know anything. How can I do my work and then you ask me to pay you as a broadcaster to show my work?
FO: I get you, but what we are asking for is solution.
IK: It is education. I keep talking about education because if they know what they are doing, they would not do what they are doing. They need to travel to other countries and see what other people are doing and how they are doing it and they would understand if they were properly trained. You would know that you as a TV station are to commission my work.
You should pay me. If I have spent 2 years doing my documentary and I come with it and you ask me to pay you, you are doing the wrong thing.
AP: Let me give you a scenario. When we were doing the Real National Film Festival, we went to SLBC and asked them to partner with us. We said: “Ok, you partner with us for one hour of airtime for the duration of the film festival, and also you do advertising for the film festival, and what we are going to do is to give you all the films we show at the film festival for you to air them”. The first thing they did was ask us to pay them and I looked at them and I said, “Can you pay me for my film, do you know what it takes for me to make that film?” So they asked us to do a memorandum of understanding and we did a memorandum of understanding but they never signed it. After the film festival, even though they did not partner with us, I went there and gave them a few films and I asked them to play those films because they were our own films and we were just trying to get our people interested in our films.
After the film festival, we found out that these guys were now buying these films from the streets and then playing them. I am the cinematographic liaisoncoordinator for the union and somebody called me one night and said they are playing my film. It was Janeh, who did Dark Side of Life, so I watched it.
I protested to them angrily and then found out again that they were playing Sierra Leonean films. I gathered a few guys in the union and we went to their office and I gave them strict warning that the day they play one Sierra Leonean film again without our knowledge, or the knowledge of the producer of that particular film, we will take them to court and they will pay the sixty million the law says you should pay if you are caught pirating a film.
ANALYSIS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Sierra Leone for me seems to have a lot of bottled up creative energy. There are a lot of young people who want to be in the creative industry, who think that their talent can make a difference. They clearly understand documentary production because they have had a bit of practice with developmental messaging in terms of the documentaries that are commissioned by the NGOs in Freetown, but clearly, their industry is structured right now like that of Nollywood in Nigeria where films are made in a guerilla filmmaking mode. Basically it is video based, the cameras are very cheap, it is done and finished on a laptop, and it goes straight to a verydodgy distribution system which takes the film straight to DVD, to a distributor in the open market.
In terms of documentaries the outlet for broadcast is limited, because the broadcasting landscape is essentially is not very wide. But the big challenge there is the same as almost every one of the West African countries in this study: the broadcaster or the broadcasting structure, does not commission work. The broadcasters are not commissioning content, they are essentially monetizing airtime, so effectively the filmmaker has to make a film and pay for it to be broadcast. So for these young people, distribution is a problem, broadcast is a no go, the tools of trade are unaffordable to most of them and effectively they are working on the fly. In terms of training, there is not enough professional training, they are basically working on passion, they have basically trained themselves with the software and the cameras.
Structurally speaking, there is really no formal structure from what I can see. There are film guilds, there seems to be some tension there with two different film guilds and there seems to be some interest in different groups taking control of how to organise these associations, but clearly to me, the wind is at the back of the younger people.
The government I am not sure has a clear agenda for what the entertainment or film industry can do. What is clear is that the war years have left a profound impact on Sierra Leoneans, on their history and culture. And these are impacts that I think only creative industries and especially filmmakers can interrogate. Clearly the storytellers are going to be the ones who will mediate the impact of this period of their history. There is no country in my opinion that is in as dire a need of the creative industries to be alive and to be relevant to development as Sierra Leone.
In terms of what is needed there, first and foremost the intervention needs to focus on the young filmmakers. Clearly the ones who have been in the industry for a long time are not well trusted by the young, because there seems to be a feeling that when they had the opportunity they did not put the structures in place to transfer skill, they did not put the structures in place to inspire, they did not put the structures in place to encourage, they did not put the structures in place to provide a liftoff for generations of creative industry, for creatives to come after them. So there is that disconnect between the older generation and the younger generation and thus I think that any intervention for Sierra Leone must focus on capturing the energy and the passion of the young creatives out there.
I think there has to be some kind of investment in training. Training that is specific to the motion picture industry, training with a curriculum that is not a short two, three week training or one month, come in and go out kind of training. There has to be some critical support for a media school that not only deals with the technical understanding of production, but also deals with the creative side of production. It’s not very difficult to see that there is a sense of production being a way out of poverty, rather than production being an expression of creativity. I think that also has to be addressed in training, so that the filmmakers understand themselves as artists, as interrogators of history, as people who have a powerful voice to speak to issues, to speak to policy, to try to inspire people, to be interventionists themselves, whether it be in the documentary form or in the Docu –drama form. That, I think is going to be critical.
My proposal is that some kind of media programme, media school, of a long term variety that will be probably of a nine month to two year variety be created. A part of the curriculum it’s important to connect these filmmakers to the power of the internet. The government of Sierra Leone may not be in a position to open up the broadcasting landscape anytime soon, so the filmmakers will need to be able to understand distribution on platforms that are outside of the traditional cinema house or television industry. They need to have a familiarity with You Tube, they need to have a familiarity with social media like Facebook where they can aggregate an audience for some of the things that they are going to do or at least promote the works that they are doing while they prepare themselves to access to international media.
I think the school that I am suggesting should be one that is able to provide to a large extent a tuition free; because I don’t see the capacity of those who are passionate and want to work in that industry to really pay for the training. Effectively there has to be some kind of structure that is crafted perhaps in partnership with the government, rather than the guilds because
I think the guilds themselves are divisive enough to frustrate the opportunity if it is not carefully put together. The structure of the school, the curriculum itself, the programme has to be a turnkey that is simply brought in; however, it is important that government provides a part of the cost of it somehow, whether it be providing the location of the school, or it be simply in working together to create that curriculum so that it takes cognizance of what the scenario in Sierra Leone. Political support will also be needed to ensure that the school, the training programme is merely a beginning and that the environment is open enough for these young people to able to express themselves in a new way. Hopefully that would be as straightforward as asking the government — which owns the major broadcasting entity — to subsidize or create air time in their schedules to permit these young filmmakers to access an audience. What really needs to be built immediately is the capacity of one or two or three of these young people to emerge as a strong, viable and creative voice, whether it be in documentary or in docudrama.
Secondly, obviously, I look at those who are already working and who need some kind of project funding.
Project funding is needed across all African countries the question is in the design of the funding. In Sierra Leone, project funding related to the experience of the civil war, and the recovery process would make a powerful subject, for example, and also expose Sierra Leonean filmmakers to the rest of the world. The nation building or nation rebuilding seems to be both external and internal, and a lot of stories are personal, people trying to heal, to get rid of nightmares.
I would advise some kind of collaboration with the Government of Sierra Leone to the effect of either seeking from them a contribution to a fund, or ensuring that they guarantee that any beneficiaries of a fund are able to complete their films, maintain their businesses, and remain in Sierra Leone to develop and strengthen the industry to create a level of sustenance.
For me, support for the television industry in terms of distribution is also a third key possibility in creating opportunity for filmmakers to access an audience. The whole idea of the filmmaker paying for that exposure seems to actually kill any instinct for these filmmakers to want to do anything. Those who do have training and do have equipment, and who wish to make films but may not have access to project funding, should be able to at least gain an audience through a TV broadcast.
These three elements, in order of importance, seem to me to be what is necessary to support filmmaking in Sierra Leone.
— Femi Odugbemi
