A new Rwandan film has been released into the US market and is scooping up awards.
Grey Matter, a feature by Rwandan Kivu Ruhorahoza, was released in north America in mid-January. Completed in 2011 it has since bagged several awards including two Tribeca Film Festival awards – a Special Jury Mention and Best Actor in a Narrative Film.
The jury commended the film for its “audacity’, “experimentalism’, and “great originality’, while the filmmaker earned praise for his “courage and vision’.
Grey Matter has also been to festivals in Melbourne, Rio, Warsaw, Dubai, Rotterdam and Goteborg.
Writer and director Kivu Ruhorahoza already proved his worth in short films and wanted to make a feature film. Grey Matter tells of an emerging filmmaker disgusted at the non-availability of funds for his debut full-length film about two children orphaned through genocide and struggling with life.
On completing his script the filmmaker in Grey Matter decides that there is something amiss with the story. So he comes up with the idea of madness – symbolised by a male character who kills the children’s parents.
Says Ruhorahoza: “Grey Matter is a movie about imagination and madness. It is a story about the capacity of the brain to create, destroy and self-destroy.’
The topic of this film is very important to Ruhorahoza. Though the story has autobiographical elements, he feels the entire work isn’t an autobiographical work.
“In the first part of the film, I show a young filmmaker facing the worst difficulties to make his first feature film. I am obviously showing glimpses of what one goes through to make a film in a country where cinema has to serve the community.’
Produced by Ruhorahoza and Australian Dominic Allen, the film was shot by fellow Australian Ari Wegner.
Collaborative effort
Three production companies collaborated on the film – POV Productions from Rwanda (represented by Ruhorahoza), Australia’s Scarab Studio Films (represented by Allen) and Camera Club (represented by Allen and Dave Budge).Languages in the film include Kirwanda and French with English subtitles.
Shooting took place in the Rwandan capital of Kigali over 21 days. The shoot went through a number of hurdles. When principal photography began in Kigali, there was not a single tripod in the country to handle the Red camera and no sound equipment. Plus it rained for hours on the first day.
Finance came in trickles throughout all stages of production. There were some small loans from friends and family, and the generosity of editor Antonio Rui Ribeiro helped to get the film to a rough cut good enough to be accepted by Tribeca. This was before Ruhorahoza again got support from Scarab Studio Films and Allen, who agreed to invest completion funds to master and online the film in Melbourne, Australia.
Production costs were just under $10 000 and post-production costs about $60 000. The overall budget was over $100 000.
Grey Matter stars Ruth Nirere, an actress and singer who is very popular in Rwanda. Her acting debut was in Philippe Van Leeuw’s The Day God Walked Away for which she won awards at film festivals in both Europe and Africa.
Herve Kimenyi, who plays the filmmaker, is a very popular comedian in Rwanda and this is his first movie. He stars alongside Ramadhan Bizimana, a popular radio DJ in Kigali.
US-based Global Film Lens is handling the distribution deal and the film had its first run at the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) in New York for a week.
By Martin Chemhere
Screen Africa Magazine – February 2012
