PPC Imaginarium Film Award winner and runner-up

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PPC Imaginarium Film Award winner and runner-up --

Fri, 11 Mar 2016 11:32

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SCREEN AFRICA EXCLUSIVE: The PPC Imaginarium Awards challenge art and design creatives to innovate with cement and use concrete as a medium of expression. The Film category, which was introduced in 2014, requires filmmakers to pitch their ideas to a panel of judges and if selected are given a R35 000 budget to produce their films. The winner receives R50 000 and is entered into the gala exhibition alongside the other category finalists. This year s runner-up film was Optimus Usimende, created by Zara Julius and Francois Knoetze. The winning film, The Catalyst was made by Kyle Goulden.

The Catalyst - Short Film from Kyle Goulden on Vimeo.

The Catalyst portrays the story of children growing up in a turbulent environment of fundamentalism and extremism, learning to hate and ultimately experiencing the cost of this hatred. It draws a parallel with what happens within concrete in its production and usage and how the processes are similar. In that process, there are elements that are lost or form the catalyst for that process to occur, explains Goulden. A similar thing happens in war or situations such as the terrorist acts which have occurred overseas in places like Kenya or Paris. Lives are lost and usually it takes a single moment or element to be lost for people to realise the true extent of these horrific acts.

The film was shot over three days in December and January 2015 at Media Film Services and Flashback Studios. Kevin Gibson produced the soundtrack for the film while Rose van Staden acted as the stylist and assistant art director. Camera operator and director of photography (together with director Goulden) Yash Lucid, shot the film using the Sony FS700. A GH4 and an array of Sony, Sigma and Canon lenses were also used.

Alongside a casting call which was put out on Facebook, extras were sourced from a local charity, Home of Hope. In addition to telling our story, we also wanted the film to help uplift and include creatives who were possibly new to the industry. We wanted passionate, engaged people who shared in the vision and story of the film and with that, we chose our cast, Goulden adds.

Optimus Usimende (Excerpt) - 2016 from Francois Knoetze on Vimeo.

Julius and Knoetze s film, Optimus Usimende, tells a story of land and resource dispossession, against the background of a greater built environment where rife inequality is physically translated in the different types of housing and infrastructure which exist in geographical spaces. To amplify the contrasting themes in the film, the filmmakers applied a number of cinematic techniques: The film makes use of handmade miniature environments. We wanted it to have a lo-fi, stuck-together feel, in reaction to the polished, clean aesthetic of things like television adverts and commercial films which demand very little of the viewer. Actors were filmed in front of a green screen and superimposed into these environments during post-production, explains Knoetze. We also chose black and white as a colour scheme, only highlighting the waste and the resources in colour.

The film, created and directed by Knoetze, was co-directed and executive produced by Julius; co-written by Julius, Amy Louise Wilson and Daniel Nel; with production design by Francois Knoetze and Daniel Nel; and editing by Francois Knoetze, Julius, Nel and Anton Scholtz. Scholtz also shot the film using a Canon 5D Mark II. Knoetze adds, There are some layers where we used my Nikon D750 as well, so that we could get two angles of a single shot and be economic with our time. Usually its not a good idea to use such different cameras for a single project, but because we went with a sci-fi aesthetic, we got away with it in our approach in post-production. The film features Aphiwe Livi, Amy Louise Wilson and Aphila Livi, with Knoetze and Julius playing a number of roles as well.

Optimus Usimende was shot over two weeks in November and December 2015, in Knoetzes old industrial studio space in Salt River.

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