Upliftment of emerging East Cape filmmakers takes centre stage

Eastern Cape emerging filmmakers have been called to apply for the Eastern Cape Film Festival’s #EC10 legacy project, which seeks to empower and mentor 10 selected filmmakers  in a bid to improve the quality of productions  from the province.

Founder Nceba Mqolomba said the 10 filmmakers would be incubated and teamed up with skilled mentors to help them develop story ideas into credible productions.

He said the EC Film Fest had partnered with Encounters International Documentary Festival, one of the oldest film festivals in Africa.

“#EC10 is a fitting follow-up to a 2019 project, EC100, which saw   the screening of 100 locally produced films in communities across the Eastern Cape.

“What campaigns like EC100 have revealed is that the quality of local productions is lacking.

“This [project] seeks to strengthen skills and capabilities of local filmmakers yielding improved and superior quality productions,” Mqolomba said.

Emerging filmmakers are invited to submit a story idea to ec10@ecfilmfestival.co.za for consideration.

“We will be open to receive submissions for the rest of June.

“The second step, in July, will be selecting the 10 filmmakers to attend the Encounters online festival and, lastly, a mentor will be assigned to each project,” Mqolomba said.

Mentors would be there to guide the development of the story idea, putting in place the relevant processes that go into producing a film of good quality. 

This would begin in August, Mqolomba said.

In its five years of operation, Mqolomba said, the Eastern Cape Film Festival, along with some of its partners, had identified a hunger for partnerships to professionalise, promote and sell provincial productions.

Among the project’s goals was to give Eastern Cape productions a better chance at profitmaking, Mqolomba said.

The #EC10 project aims to achieve this by improving production as the first of the three essential aspects of a viable film economy — production, distribution and resourcing.

The project is set to train filmmakers in all three aspects, with a more detailed focus on production.

“Another thing we want filmmakers to learn is that quality productions take time, so this process takes some time and these films will only be ready for screening in a couple of years,” Mqolomba said.

The establishment of the #EC10 project follows a successful and expanded Eastern Cape Festival held in March, shortly before the national lockdown was announced.

“#EC10 will ensure that the festival is a sustainable year-long entity that touches on various aspects of the film value chain by supporting the production of quality films with various stakeholders in the province.

“This programme would be to expose local talent and promote the province as an international filmmaking destination,” Mqolomba said.  

The 2020 festival included a cocktail launch by the National Film and Video Foundation, panel discussions by industry leaders, and masterclasses and workshops with the Film and Publication Board as well as internationally recognised filmmakers, including Jahmil Qubeka and Luzuko Dilima.

The deadline for submissions is July 9 at midnight. For queries, e-mail info@ecfilmfestival.co.za or  follow Eastern Cape Film Festival and Eastern Cape Film Forum on Facebook.