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Thomas Bywater

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Cinema for the soul

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MARIANNE

a film by tomisin adepeju

photography by Ирре медёс

O n February 16thand 17th we took over the Round Chapel in Hackney. With a 16mm camera assembled, director, Tomisin Adepeju set about turning this unassuming chapel into a retreat for a West African Pentecostal Church.

Marianne is a film about the last-ditch hope of a couple faced with terminal illness. When Marianne is suffering from an incurable cancer her partner, Moses, turns to the religion of his childhood in an effort to find salvation for them both.

Tobi Bakare (Kingsman: The Secret Service) and Vivienne Bell were cast in these key roles. The film has strong dramatic credentials and is carried by the on-screen chemistry of these two actors, tackling a weighty subject.

Written by Adepeju the short film has had its own fair share of struggles. After narrowly missing out on its crowd funding target of £5000 and with an non-negotiable production deadline, filming was going to be tight. When I was attached to the project as a script supervisor, the tribulations were far from over.

In time for shooting a crack squad of film makers were drafted including, award winning director of photography,  Mark Hamilton. However with most more used to filming on video the process was slow moving and expensive. Without the assistance of video playback there was an added dimension of challenge to using celluloid. This was film-making by instinct.

Lovely graded rushes from Paul Dean @CinelabLondon with @Frame24Ltd #Kodak. Good luck editing @TAdepeju @Tobi2baks pic.twitter.com/TA9cikLkCU
— Mark Hamilton (@MarkHamiltonEsq) February 26, 2015

The dramatic climax of the film was to be shot indoors in the Round Chapel. The setting seemed at odds to the African church ceremony, complete with congregation chanting in Yoruba. “I wanted to set it somewhere no one would expect,” Adepeju said. The ‘exorcisms of bodily sickness’ were caught in eerie candle light that translated beautifully to film. Cine film was a gamble but it paid off, perfectly capturing the feel of this surprisingly Gothic location.

After four days of shooting, the canisters were sealed and sent off to the lab. It was not until the film was developed and processed that long suffering Adepeju could breathe easily.

“ We want to thank all our friends and financial backers for their continued support, we also want to extend our gratitude to our brilliant, talented & hardworking cast and crew for their relentless work over the four days of principal photography. We can’t wait for you to see what we have created.” said the director, earlier this month.

The film has its official screening in April.

Adepeju’s film The Good Son is currently showing at Sardinia and Washington film festivals 

Not All Quiet on the Eastern Front

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Exciting News from  World Film Productions and Armistice Day.

Armanshar, Hassan Nazer’s long suffering epic, has begun to make a resurgence. A lot has happened since I joined the team in Jaipur and Aberdeen. Surviving a two week stint in Kabul, one of the worlds most dangerous cities, and an adventure into the frozen mountains of Tajikistan it would appear that the team might actually have a chance of putting a film together. A fairly decent one at that. 

Nazer recently stated his intentions in an interview to Iranian Film Daily magazine to take the film to the Berlinale 2015. The director, a fan of grand statement, has battled to fund the project but the latest previews are keeping the hype the project needs after a troubled year of filming. Stalling payments and non-committal talent has blighted the project fairly late into filming.


The one thing that has appeared is a new redux trailer, suggesting progress is being made. The final cut is being prepared and, hopefully, the books are finally balancing in time for festival season. 


More to follow.

Hall of the Mountain Fest

Big news, also, Siegfried will be showing to a select screening at the Kendal Mountain Fest in a fortnight. It is part of the WWI Centenary commemorations and the anniversary of Siegfried Herford and George Sansom’s heroic ascent of Scafell Pike.

With photography of Britain’s most breathtaking climbs, it will be well worth a viewing if you can get ticket!

T.x

World War Window Dressing

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Keswick 1914: 

Recently I’ve been lending a hand on a project by Gable Media, deep in the heart of the English Lakes. 
The year is 1914 and two climbers, Siegfried Herford and George Sansom, are about to make a pioneering climb of Scawfell Pike but, with with a war looming on the horizon,  for one of the climbers it would be their last. Both of the climbers of Central Buttress would enlist that year and serve in Belgium. However, with a name like Siegfried, life was never going to be fair.

Filming in the world-famous mountaineering shop, George Fisher, the mission was to turn the shop front back one hundred years to its former identity: Abraham’s Photography Shop.

What we were trying to achieve: Abraham’s c.1914

Behind the scenes.

“When I’m Dressin’ Windahs!”

Haven been given the shop front as a set, the rest of the building carried on – business as usual. This included assembling ten foot high window display at the side of the shop. Much to our surprise, in the 50 minutes it took to set up a shot,  the entire display had changed. What had taken two days to build, set up and dress the windows, had taken the pros little more than a coffee break.

George Abraham

As we go on into a further three years of First World War Centenary commemorations, I have no doubt we will see more Great War related work. However, not many will be as picturesque as the ascent of Napes Needle via Borrowdale.

The documentary is due to be shown at the Kendal Mountain Festival, this November.

Derwent Water on a Sunbeam

Kabul Calling

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A new ‘Teaser Trailer’ for Hassan Nazers film Utopia.

http://www.utopia-movie.com/
On the other side of five weeks’ filming in India and Afghanistan we have made it back safe and sound to “bonnie Scotland”, ready to commit the last part of the story to film. It’s good to be back! And don’t think we’d come home empty handed:

We have a brand new teaser trailer cut to set the mood and pique interests while the last portion of the film goes into the can. It’s been a mad whirlwind tour of that finds me back in Scotland. Try as I might I can’t keep away for long. There’s only one thing for it: lets make this movie!

Warning: the following two minutes of trailer contains spoilers. 
(But a sneak peak can’t hurt can it…?)
Enjoy!

****UPDATE 15/04/14****

I’m sorry to say the “First Look” trailer has been taken down after deciding that you had seen too much! However, a lot has happened since the last post. In the mean time, we have wrapped on the Scottish unit and already have a shiny “Utopia New Look” trailer. There is plenty to recap to you with a new post on its way, shortly. 

Until then, enjoy the trailer!

Water Babies.

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Production Photos by sambrill.500px.com


FRANK

Wedding procession wake up call, wagons rolled at 3:30. We were travelling to the small town of Bundi, travelling through the night to arrive in time to film what would be the climax of the film. Jaipur for all of its filmic and infrastructural convenience is very inconvenient for locating clean fresh-water rivers. For this we had a small film-making exodus to the parting of the waters where Janan, our heroine, makes a last ditch attempt to swim home. 

Hassan and Malalai were wading into the thick of the river maelstrom. In this beautiful part of the country a ribbon of water ran through jagged rocks, which made for a dramatic setting. 

The adventurous location for the filming made getting the equipment across the rocks a tricky procedure. No one wanted the responsibility of dropping the RED camera in the wet stuff. In the end a human chain was created to ferry the kit to even the most precarious of vantage points.

The trademark “Fish-eye”


Hidden in an unassuming tool-box was an unpleasant surprise for any unsuspecting DIY enthusiast. The 8 month foetus of Janan had been perfectly created out of hair and silicone awaiting this scene in the script. Now it was time to take it for a test swim. Hassan, again bare-chested, nursed the effigy whilst Malalai and the DP looked on, concerned. In fact, most of the village came out to have a look, as we set up on the busy bridge. It very quickly became a rather macabre live performance – staring the tiny life-like model.

Baby in a box
At last we had a good attempt at covering the final sequence in one day but there was still time enough to get the taxi scenes against an obligatory sunset. And that was it. The Indian unit was now finished with the rest of us waiting to be shipped back to the UK for the next part of Utopia.

After a two day train journey to Kochi in the vein of Darjeeling Ltd. More adventures to come!
Performed before a live audience.

PAINTED ELEPHANTS ON PARADE!

This really ought to be a separate post but I thought these photos couldn’t wait.
I managed to get out to the fort at Amer early enough to see their team of elephants pulling tourists to the citadel’s summit. It really is a spectacle to see these massive animals dwarfed by their sublime settings. Skipping the queue for a ride,  It was far more impressive to make the climb alongside the limbs of these amazing creatures.

Pink Elephants On parade!

Elephants, Iron bars and the Temple of Doom

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With photos by sambrill.500px.com

Scaling the sheer walls of Amer (via the staircase), I had made a journey few had travelled before. But the few that had made it included Harrison Ford, so I was in good company. Before me lay the Amber-Fort Palace, better known as the set for George Lucas’s epic: Indiana Jones & The Temple of Doom. 
Amber Fort.

The Mountain perimeter

After reading Gunga Din, Lucas envisaged the plot of the Indiana prequel with its murderous Thuggi cult of kidnappers in this imposing medieval building. The Fort is one of the most famous sights in Jaipur. It was used as a backdrop the 1984 adventure film and was a famous attraction in Rajisthan since 1604. Its summit can be reached by elephant train most mornings. At the end of a very long queue of tourists it will cost 900 of your Indian Rupee for a piggy-back from a pachyderm. [Photos and story to follow in a future blog-post.] However, for the more impatient and adventurous tourist, the perimeter walls run around the town of Amer and out to the surrounding hill-posts.

The Citadel Palace

From one film-fort to another, we continued our filming at Narhargarh fort. Almost putting the finishing touches to the Indian section of Utopia. Having located a jail, with the required character and lighting. However the key flaw was our jail (read warehouse) had no bars and all the prisoners had long since escaped. The art department were pleased to have a project that was more of a challenge than shopping for props.
Cue the soundtrack and a day later we had cell blog 15 and 16, repleat with a visiting area. All we needed now were some willing inmates.

No one escapes cell-block 15!
Using this location to the full, we were still sure to be wrapped in plenty of time as we had photos to take for the newspaper in Tehran. Saahil, managed to arrange a spot about his involvement with the film for the Times of India, which was a surprise to see over breakfast.

The Team.
Another full day of filming round forts the only thing left to do was get an early night in before travelling to location. Taxis were set to roll at 3:30am for our 6 hour journey. However, the early night was not going to happen.
In Jaipur the custom is that there are only a certain number of days in the year on which one can marry. As it so happened that night fell on one of those marriagable dates. From around 7pm onwards the unmistakable sound of drums filled the street with processions of marriage goers.  With scant chance to sleep, a number of us ran out into the street to try and gain some photos of the event. The bridegrooms were seated on horseback, with a young boy, and had money pinned to them, by their entourage. The procession danced their way down the busy roads playing music, whilst two lines of lamps corralled the festivities in and stopped them competing with the busy traffic on the streets. Fireworks and music kept up an unrelenting carnival atmosphere. There was even a disco in the basement, which went on until 3am. That left a good half an hour for sleep before the taxis arrived to take us on to the river and the last scenes of the film.
A Rajisthani Marriage Procession

Prison Break & Punjabi Rave

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The Jailbirds of Jaipur
[Photography by Sam Brill: sambrill.500px.com]
For those of you who get my instagram feed, you will already know I was sent to an Indian prison yesterday. I had better clarify now that I was “just visiting”, to quote the monopoly board. It was in fact as part of a film set for Hassan Nazer’s film, Utopia.  
Set high above the main city, the prison was built into the Narhargarh Fort. Accompanied by 50 extras or “inmates” in prison uniform and a handful of armed guards, we began filming. Though it wasn’t long before Stockholm Syndrome set in and guards and prisoners alike seemed to mill about in the catering tents and pose for photos with prop weapons.
The acting coach might have struggled to make our hardened convicts seem more threatening, but for once the the whole set seemed to be functioning in perfect
harmony. This was until one of Jaipur’s unseasonal monsoon storms hit without warning. Exposed to the wind and the rain and the lightning on the ramparts we had fifty white uniforms to keep dry. The art department bravely manned their ladders to take down the non-waterproof parts of the set. The Europeans amongst us were ready to take this as an ‘early wrap’ to the day. Fortunately, in Rajasthan, such extremes of weather only last moments and within a couple of hours the sun was out and the yard was bone dry once again.    

The Yard
Preaching to the converted 

Flat-pack Furniture

Long arm of the law.

One of the more memorable scenes to film involved putting the prisoners through their paces with exercises in the yard. Not knowing quite how the scene would work out on camera, there were a number of test rehearsals. The extras went from line dancing to something that looked remarkably like strip the willow. Finally Kuldeep, our first AD, and Hassan lead a route-march round the courtyard. In a surreal blur of limbs and white fabric, it was like a caterpillar on maneuvers. It looked like a lot of fun if it weren’t for the fact it was all being done ‘bare foot’.

Remedial Exercises
After what was already an eventful day, we were due one more surprise. Having been issued the order to meet in the hotel basement no earlier than “a quarter past ten”. I was running late for this meeting, but I needn’t have rushed. The noise was already coming up from the basement to meet me.
To a soundtrack of Contemporary-Punjabi dance music, the Iranian, Indian and UK contingents were already hitting the D-floor – busting what could only be described as: “some very international shapes.” Though the thunderstorms caused a couple of intermissions in the DJ set, it was the start of a very successful Friday night in Jaipur.

Cross-Town Traffic

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A Ride With the Camera Cab.

Photos by Sam Brill [http://sambrill.500px.com/#/0]  

A Casual Camel

Yesterday, after fixing up a taxi with a camera rig,  we took to the streets of Jaipur to compete with some of the busiest streets and the sketchiest traffic on the planet. Strapping our state-of-the-art RED camera to the side of a moving vehicle, we tried to channel the heaviest of the traffic away from the taxi. Recently informed by our producer that we had no reserve camera. One expensive mistake would set us back a day of filming until we could find a replacement from Delhi. Armed with this information we set off into tarmac no-man’s land, where road side markers, traffic lights and careful conduct are unknown. It is a roadway ruled by the horn.
 

The Intrepid Auto…
and facing it
…

The mean streets of Jaipur.

It was a challenging free for all but the car returned from the melee, unscathed. Having spent the morning getting film of our taxi and the vibrant old town, we were ready to drive our actors to the border of Pakistan. Well… as close to Pakistan as the art department could muster. 

Taxi Film Unit

 
The Rigours of Rigging. 

Having spent most of the afternoon travelling to location we arrived at a border control point, painstakingly set up by the art department. [NOT ACTUALLY PAKISTAN]. With a storm predicted and a single evening to capture the scene at sunset, we had to rush  Here we put several of the more geriatric looking extras in position, guarding the outpost. The strategic placement of these sentries played a vital part in obscuring the fact our outpost was being manned by “Dad’s Army”.

“This is as far as we go.”

Would you let me into your country?

Spectators and a spectacle.

Passport control.

All in all we managed to survive our DIY Top Gear challenge, travel to something looking remarkably like the Pakistani border (I’m convinced) and take one or two great production snaps along the way.
So much is happening, at a rate that I am struggling to keep up to date with my blog-posts. However I can say that the next post involves attending an Iranian/Punjabi disco and me going to Indian Prison. I hasten to add the two events are entirely independent of one another.
Till then, Namnaste! 

Japse to Jaipur

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JAIPUR

Hot off the plane to Jaipur (via a 7 hour stop off in the traffic of 6am-smog-opolis, Mumbai), I was taken to the production offices. Arriving by taxi, I was driven to a hotel on the other side of the Pink City. Through the giant pink gates of the old town there were a number of the city’s most beautiful buildings. From the colonial Albert museum to the sandstone beehive of the Hawa Mahal, the city is full of buildings that have vibrancy and contrast to makes Jaipur exotic even by Indian standards.  


If it was a safari, I could have gone home after seeing a camel, a wild pig and an elephant in the streets  within the first 10 minutes.

However, the real reason for visiting this cinematic city is to act as a script supervisor on the film UTOPIA with Word Film production company… and the very real incentive of curry for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
The film involves The story of Janan, an Afghani woman, who is given permission to travel to the UK undergo fertility treatment.
Pursued by an obsessive sperm-donor, we find her in Jaipur, where she is adopted by Rahul, the reluctant taxi driver.
Isn’t that clearer? If you require more of an overview to appease your interests more info can be found on the film’s website and Facebook pages.

Hawa Mahal


Having spent the past couple of days hiding in odd areas of a film-set revising script editions and keeping continutiy, I have found the odd spare moment to abuse my charge of the continuity-stills camera and take some “holiday snaps”. I aim to keep more of a production log on this website if I find the time and the internet to keep uploading my finds on a regular basis.

Scene one. Scene one. Take one. Day one.

Painted Indian Elephant

The taxi being given directions.

The doorman to the hotel and his cameao.

Hiding from hailstones

Sunshine on Leith

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Leith Theatre and Burns Night ’14 an Immortal Memory

I made the journey up to Edinburgh last weekend. Armed with a kindle copy of the Kilmarnock Edition and a quick-wiki page open on the poet’s life and times, I had travelled up to meet with some friends and take part in a Rabbie Burns Supper. Apart from attending Will Frazer’s blurry-but-brilliant Burns-Night reunion, there was another, ulterior, motive for the weekend in Auld Reekie. On the Monday, Sophie and I took the bus to Leith to go and check out developments at the Leith Theatre Trust.

http://www.leiththeatretrust.org/
The theatre caught my attention last year whilst working on the INFERNO. The venue had been one of the restoration projects alongside Aberdeen’s Tivoli Theatre, to come off of the “TBaR” (Theatre Buildings at Risk) list last June when the trust took over from the Edinburgh Council’s Culture and Leisure Committee. There had been rumours of the location being used as a Fringe venue as early as this year. Sadly there had been some setbacks in restoring the main theatre (as is all too familiar with restoration projects). However, with the Thomas Morton Hall restored ready and its fantastic setting an original theatre foyer and entrance, we though it definitely worth a visit. You too can have a snoop on the trust’s website with panoramic tours of the venue’s spaces, here: Virtual Tour. It’ a great way to have a look round to save yourself the hassle and the hard-hat, as for the foreseeable future the Main theatre will still be a work in progress.
The Crush: a greeting from another time of Turnstiles and Ticket-booths
Venus and the boar; no hard feelings over Adonis. 

The Leith Theatre, was commissioned in 1920 to celebrate the borough of Leith’s incorporation into greater Edinburgh. It is a good looking piece of architecture built with the Theatre and the Thomas Morton Hall on separate wings, either side of the “Crush”- a foyer with a rather striking statue. Upstairs, still belongs to Edinburgh council and functions as a marriage registry office.
The workers of which were very helpful in finding our way to the theatre but took some convincing when telling them we were, in fact, just there to visit the Theatre Trust and not a couple eloping from England. (A common problem in Scotland apparently.)

As to the venue, we will have to see as to what stage Holocaust to the Highlands is in, come Summer. With the first deadline for registry already passed, though still in February the Edinburgh festival is fast approaching.
Until then there will definitely have to be more trips up to the city on reconnaissance for Fringe venues. Got festival fever!

 
The Thomas Morton Hall. 

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Update: News coming shortly Re: film-making adventures. Can’t wait!