SCREEN AFRICA EXCLUSIVE: Palesa Shongwe is the director of
Unomalanga and The Witch, a short film which won the Best South
African Short Film award at the 2015 Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) in
July. Funded by the National Film and Video Foundation in partnership with
production company Blingola Media as part of an initiative to develop emerging
female writers and directors, Unomalanga and The Witch was part of
a slate of female directed/written films entitled “Negotiating Spaces’. Shongwe
shares with Screen Africa her experience in creating a short film and how other
filmmakers can benefit from working in the genre.
Can you generate profit or break even with a short?
I don’t believe you can treat a short film as a profit-generating product but there
are ways to make some of the money back. I think one could generate some
returns from a short film, but I am not sure about making a profit.
One could at least break even. Short films cost less to make than feature length
movies, and because they need less apparatus to move them around – I mean in
terms of marketing, distribution and exhibition – you could sell your short film
directly to your audience and conceivably make the money back.
The challenge with short films is that they are difficult to programme (they vary too
much in duration for broadcasters with schedules to fill), so they mostly move
through the festival circuit and through hands-on distribution. For broadcasters, a
set of films that share similar themes could be programmed in the place of one
feature film, which is one way that a short filmmaker can recoup costs.
What are some key points to consider when creating a short with regards
to characters, story structure etc? Especially for a new generation of online
viewers.
Viewing content online inevitably works differently from TV or the cinema.
Arguably, the online viewer is more interested in control and instantaneity – we
want to choose what we view, when and how we view it and often, how much we
view.
When writing a short film, however, I do think the writer should not limit their idea
of where their film will be seen. The most important thing to consider for me is the
story – which needs to fit neatly into a short duration, capture the imagination,
interest of the audience and move them in a short space of time. There are no
formulas, I think, only parameters – for me these have to do with finding the
essentials of your story – what are you saying and what do you need, in terms of
scenes, characters and location, to tell this story?
The trick is to find the essence of your story and the most dramatic, high-impact
moment(s). It’s a great exercise in limitations and getting the most story out of the
elements before you.
On which platform has your short received the most viewership or
attention?
My film is still “doing the rounds’. It was well-received at DIFF, which is a select
audience. It will be broadcast on SABC too.
Why create a short film? What is the takeaway for you as a filmmaker?
The short film is a great narrative exercise – you have limitations in resources that
translate to limitations in how you tell your story but not in what story you choose
to tell. You can still achieve a powerful, provocative story; present compelling
characters; and say something important about yourself, society, etc, in this short
duration. It does not limit your imagination and intention, but shapes it to take
account of the limits in time and resources.
Shorts are a great way to keep making work when access to large budgets is
limited. They are an important format in their own right and allow you to practice
the story-telling craft more frequently and with more freedom. Because you can
make more of them, they also present great opportunities for experimentation and
aesthetic practice.
Because of the limits they place on you as a story teller, they encourage you to
concentrate your abilities – to tell better stories and to tell stories better. The visual medium is profoundly effective in conveying meaning and when you have less time to say what you intend to say, you have to find the most efficient, and hopefully, the most elegant way to do this.
How does creating a short differ from creating a long format film or
programme?
I think the work that goes into a short is very similar to the longer format. The
difference will be in how much time and money you have in preparation and in the
creation of the film. All the steps are pretty much mirrored except for these
differences.
Who do you really want to watch your films?
I look forward to making work that speaks to a wide cross-section of viewers. I
consider myself a film scholar as well as a filmmaker, so my work will exist in both
academic and commercial spaces. I also make work that will sit more comfortably
in experimental or art spaces. I would like to look back on a body of work that
appeals to a wide audience – with different projects attracting audiences that are
unique to them – rather than on a career in which I have created work for pre-determined audiences.
