A quick script
Continuing the story from the Cyprus Film Festival… After the dancing, there came the buffet and a drink, but I had already eaten. I started chatting to a director called Samuel as it looked like we were the only people wearing the official festival badges, the other guests were organisers and interested parties. We, as people with films in the programme, were treated as the guests of honour and introduced to various people. That was all fine and dandy, and come ten o’clock I was thinking that an early night might be a good idea. I had been on the go since about six that morning. And then we were told that we should attend a meeting in ‘Suite 48,’ about the short film part of the festival. Why not? I thought, best to show support and I can keep awake another hour.
I imagined Suite 48 would be a suite of rooms in the university where we were staying and where screenings were happening. It turned out to be a Grill and Bar Lounge down by the seafront a short walk away. I just went with it not knowing what to expect. I ended up at a table with some of the volunteers and organisers and Samuel, the Belgian arthouse director. It turned out that part of the festival was given over to a short script competition and there were the scripts, around six or seven of them. The idea was to film one of them the next day. The idea being to produce and shoot a film in under 48 hours as a workshop. As people chatted, I looked through the scripts briefly. Little did I know…
I am not sure how it happened, and I’ll cut a long story short, but it ended up with Samuel being the director and me the writer of a short film inspired by an idea from one of the scripts. After much discussion, I thought, ‘I’d better write some of this down,’ and so the writer, me apparently, called for a pen and paper. I know; I never have one to hand when I need one. I jotted down some notes based on what the organiser/producer and the director had in mind, went over those ideas, they were then developed further and honed them down until I had several scraps of paper with a rough outline and the main ideas noted. Later, it seemed that we’d reached the end of the discussion and there was nothing more to do except chat and chill. It felt, to me, as if it was about two in the morning by then and I gave my apologies and left, promising to have everything ‘scripted’ by the next day. (It was actually only midnight when I got back to my room.)
Needless to say, the ‘script’ was a piece of paper with some notes on it, set out in a logical order. I’d listened to what Samuel the director wanted, as a good writer should, and then double checked that this is what we wanted and that all ideas had been incorporated or discarded according to the plan. The following day, we met up at the location, a garden centre in Paphos, where some extras had been called in to help out. After some chatting and organising we got to the stage of, ‘So, what are we shooting?’ and all eyes turned to Samuel and I. A further discussion ensued, we saw who we had to work with, gave the cast their characters, and set out an order for scenes. We’d already decided that the dialogue would be improvised; all I had done really was put the ideas into a structured form and made sure that what Samuel ended up filming was what he had seen as his vision for the short.
It was a long day, but an interesting one and good fun. Everyone worked hard and cooperated brilliantly, and we managed to film a decent amount of footage along the lines of the ‘script.’ There were a few unexpected extras moments, such as a member of the public coming up to Nikos (the lead actor serving behind the counter) and asking him where the toilets were; perhaps that will be in the outtakes. The film will be shown on Sunday night at the awards ceremony, I am told, though it itself is not actually up for any awards.
And that was Saturday up until four in the afternoon. Our film, The 13th, was due to be screened back at the university in the 5pm session and so I was keen to get back, wash and change and prepare myself to be there and answer questions about it afterwards. That’s a story for tomorrow.
