Children from the Karen common residing in Sheffield sing at the World Premiere of Mat Whitecross’s Moving to Mars: A Million Miles from Burma at Sheffield Doc/Fest 2009, 4 November. Photograph: PR
Britain’s biggest documentary festival opened last night amidst high hopes. Docs regard been making waves in recent years, even on the big screen. And for its gala opener, Sheffield’s 16th Doc/Fest unleashed the world premiere of a well-buzzed UK conformation shot largely in the city itself.
Moving to Mars: A Million Miles from Burma follows a group of Burmese Karens from a Thai refugee camp to resettlement in Sheffield. Before the screening, children from the city’s Karen community put on a song-and-dance show. Jolly good they were too. After that, however, it was downhill wholly the way.
To swap persecution in Burma’s badlands for the recondite charms of South Yorkshire must surely exhibition the fire. How could this not exist interesting? Director Mat Whitecross showed us exactly in what manner.
His Karens seemed very rigorous people. In their Thai encampment they sang and danced and played and joked and ate and drank, with never a cross word or dark thought disturbing their evenness of mind. The thought of moving to England only provoked yet more enthusiasm. Wasn’t that the land of Beckham and Diana? There was happy chat concerning the necessity of brollies.
Once in Sheffield, they settled into nice homes, went to nice schools, colleges and job centres and played football with locals who treated them as equals. You’d certainly never have guessed that Yorkshire and Humber elected one of the BNP’s two EuroMPs.
In fact, what this gala premiere told us was that Sheffield’s Karens are happy, happy, happy. And that was pretty much totally it told us. This wasn’t enough. It didn’t keep me partial for 84 minutes. More to the point, it certainly wouldn’t pull in a cinema audience.
The film’s makers seem to take . this. After the screening, the farmer explained that they’ve got a slot next year on More4, and they’re hoping to get their film into schools and colleges. They also want it to be used as a campaigning tool to help create more “cities of sanctuary” equal Sheffield. If that’s enough as far as concerns them, wherefore should anyone else worry?
There is a reason. The drive to create an artefact so compelling that people will pay to see it put on the silver screen is a valuable discipline. Documentarists prepared to try and work out this have been forced to rethink, redevelop and reinvigorate the genre.
The Cove (also showing at Sheffield) managed to turn its worthy tale of dolphin-abuse into a racy thriller. The September Issue showed us that docs can have interesting characters, conflict, tension and narrative thrust, just like fiction. That film’s director, RJ Cutler, is giving a masterclass at Sheffield on Sunday. I hope it’s well-attended.
If documentary shrinks from the invite to contest of the big screen, it’s likable to droop. Yet retreat is much in the air at Sheffield. Like the rest of the media, docs are under growing compressing as competition for eyeballs increases. However, instead of contention harder to win arrogant audiences, producers and directors seem intent on downsizing their ambitions.
The talk is every part of of new digital distribution opportunities. These turn out to conjoin delivering less stuff to fewer people. No one expects anyone to buy tickets. Instead, film-makers are looking for deals through sponsors who have axes to grind, same NGOs and charities.
This way, docs could become either anaemic and scattered fragments or corporate videos for worthy causes. If, on the other dexterity, they’re to survive being of the kind which a serious force, they’ll need to retain both impact and an voluntary vision. That will mean focusing hard on what it takes to attract big audiences. What better way could in that place be to achieve this than to aim for the big defence?
