My blog, my shout

So, a disclaimer. I’ll try to make this entertaining, constructive and honest from my point of view. As things move on apace with Industry My Arse, I have to keep in mind that John and myself are making a documentary about people who said ‘Fuck the system’  and worked outside the establishment of the film industry.

So I’m not angling after a job, I’m lucky in that I have one which I like. Therefore I don’t have to keep to the ‘don’t offend anybody’ code of silence that exists in the luvvie industry around here.

But I won’t just slag things off for the sake of it, but I have to get it off my chest about the It’s my Shout film training scheme , and here on my personal blog is the place to do it. These opinions are my own..

 

Great crews, talented actors, shit films

Many people I know have made an IMS. People who have independently worked like bollocks to come up with funny, shocking, powerful, moving and insightful little films. But the script criteria for this scheme seem to be more about satisfying social regeneration funding requirements than anything else , so the stuff that gets produced, whilst it looks good, is well shot and played, tends to be pretty forgettable. Bit of a shame.

So in the interests of not slagging off without offering constructive criticism , why not have a section that can feature adult actors, with adult stories talking about adult themes. Otherwise, the only adult films that get Made in Wales are porn and  everything stays in a state of perpetual adolescence…

 

Where seldom is heard a discouraging word..

Related to this is a lack of constructive discussion around filmmaking in Wales. Or for the bit that I know, South Wales. Chapter Moviemaker does a good job of showing films, but there’s never any real opportunity to discuss in any greater depth than ‘what Canon did you shoot it on?’ – again, the micro/no budget side of things just seems to stagnate by being too limited.

Easier to laugh at the pop culture references in the latest flavour of the month web series than express an opinion. And I’m not saying that I want it all to be po-faced and serious, I’d love some total fucking nutcase to come along with an Abel-Ferrara like stream of piss and vinegar. Crazy ideas that shouldn’t be up there on the screen, but they are driven to do it anyway. Surely here in the nobody-has-any-cash-or-public-funding area we at least have licence to do great, stupid, misguided, pretentious, funny, shocking, moving, serious or just plain WRONG work.

Films that wouldn’t get within 20 miles of BBC2’s graveyard slot. Industrial banging and buzzing with close ups of porn cut with toy adverts. Monologues that gradually shift the audience response so that by the end of it they’re shouting at the screen and walking out. Provoking a reaction, making people think.

In other words, no more films about kids with alcoholic families living in a grim part of town who want to escape it all by becoming a boxer/ballet dancer/drag queen. Please. Fuck. No more!

This may be met with the usual wall of silence, but I hope I’ve at least managed to put my point of view across. Personally I want to see a range of films made , delivered via screenings, websites and all the means of distribution that we now have. It would be healthy if we could watch stuff and talk about it afterwards.

Maybe we need another type of screening to sit alongside Chapter to provide a bit of an alternative. I’d set one up, I know others have tried in the past , maybe it’s worth me having a go. Socking it to the Ginger-beer-and-sweets twee brigade , it’s just not my cup of tea. Better to show a film in an S&M dungeon or something.

So, that’ll do for now, food for thought maybe. Comments and a bit of discussion most welcome!