helmed by South Africans nor star them in principal roles— these include films such as the Denzel Washington vehicle Safe House, or Disgrace, starring John Malkovich.
It’ s also worth noting that the Deloitte report makes mention of the success of M-Net’ s Mzansi Magic channel’ s films and Chicco Twala’ s Bubblegum films, but there is no mention of the economic successes
Roger Young of the films that the NFVF has itself developed and supported. That the report is economicscentred, and more than once mentions the export market, seems to hold up the fact that the NFVF, under Mbalo and Haidairan’ s successors, chief executive Zama Mkosi and head of development Clarence Hamilton, is still economically and export-driven.
In a statement regarding the NFVF’ s trip to this year’ s Cannes Festival to promote South Africa as a location, as well as to screen at the South African pavilion( and not in selection) the films Black South-Easter, Blitz Patrollie and Khumba, Mkosi said:“ As we take our filmmakers and film projects there, our objective is very clear: we want to attract new markets and investments.” The NFVF spends 26 % of its department of arts and culture- allocated R105-million( up from last year’ s R86- million) budget on marketing, which includes visiting local and international festivals. Its allocation towards development is just 20 %, and 27 % is spent on production.
At the release of the report, Arts and Culture Minister Paul Mashatile said, referring to the success of South African films abroad, that“ it also indicates that the world wants to hear the South African story; a story of the triumph of the human spirit”. This statement presents problems to film makers who might feel that there are other South African stories.
How the NFVF develops South African stories is a bone of contention. On receiving a development grant from the NFVF the scriptwriter must work within the Sediba structural framework, which they must not only hang their story on, but which also determines the actions of the characters. Sediba employs a formula based on aggressor / victim roles and a three-act structure. Events must happen within set time frames, and there must be a predetermined number of“ turning points”; the film must resolve itself, preferably with a message of hope. It is a closed system of storytelling, leaving little room for ambiguity.
While it is obvious that film, being a time-anchored art form, will have a beginning, middle and ending that can be extracted once completed, this does not mean that extrapolating a fixed structure from this is an effective method of writing films. Successful storytelling in any form, be it cinema, novels or theatre, is not just a structural skeleton to hang a series of interchangeable tropes on. It consists of dreams, visions, inconsistencies and fabula that speak to the author and the audience in indefinable ways.
Employing a scriptwriting framework is often a useful way to test an idea, but the Sediba way raises the hackles of filmmakers such as myself, and may not be any more effective than any other system.
An infringement on creativity
CONTROVERSY
An NFVF script editor, whose job it is to ensure that scriptwriters stay close to the Sediba guidelines, and who asked to remain unnamed, had this to say about the process of deciding what“ works”:“ I have known some of these script decisions to be simply wrong at times and at other times extremely simplistic and opinionated.”
Treffry-Goatley found that 71 % of the filmmakers she interviewed were critical of Sediba, with“ the programme being seen as an infringement on creativity”. One filmmaker is quoted as saying:“ I’ m
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