Questions??????

At a meeting this morning with the two main participants in the project I’ll be asking many many questions, which I’ve nutted down to a few different sections:

• What are the aims of this project, what do you/we want to achieve out of it?
• Keeping in mind the limitations certain broadcast agreements can have, what would be the most comfortable approach to planning a broadcast? (ie: pre-sale commission, independant production)
• Who are we going to invite to be part of this project by way of contributing interviews? What sorts of questions should be be asking? How do we make sure we ask them in a culturally appropriate way?
• Explanations of the various protocols we need to be aware of
• Any ideas about musicians who might be interested in being involved?
• Discussion of ideas about the style of the piece

Busy meeting indeed!

Canadian Apology

Way across the other side of the world another historic apology has taken place. Reading through the comments its amazing to see the same sentiments being raised in response to a governmental apology to Aboriginal peoples for past injustices sanctioned by government policy. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise I suppose the similarities were quite startling for me to read. Even though of course I was very aware of similar kinds of histories elsewhere in the world, I found myself thinking, surely no one could have botched things up as much as we did, surely ours was a once off mistake?

In a way it would be comforting to think that Australia is the only nation struggling to grapple with the ugly elements of our past but of course we are just one of many.

Much to do

The next stage of the doco is not so much working out how the collaboration will work (I have a meeting next week to work out the final nuts and bolts with those involved) but more about the actual production choices, which is my major role as the producer (naturally).

Over the last week I have tried to work out what it will sound like. In Search of Edna Lavilla was recommended by my supervisor as an approach to consider. I really liked lots of aspects about this feature, there were really nice textures with the sunny side of the street being whistled and played throughout, the personal interviews and conversations with the mother as they discovered new parts of the story and especially conversations reading newspaper articles together. Also the court transcript reenactments weren’t as corny as I’d imagined.
But I think the thing that stood out for me in terms of techniques I could adapt was the way that the search for Edna’s grave was the thread throughout where snippets of the walk through the cemetery were returned to as a kind of transition from scene to scene.

The other documentary which was suggested was Fernando’s Ghost which was more of a historical reconstruction more in line with Hindsight type programs. It used a mix of historic transcripts and news articles and interviews with historians, as well as some soundscapes to build a sense of place. I really enjoyed this one too and certainly will take on how the historic interviews were woven into the story so that it had a sense of discovery.

I’ll talk about some of these ideas at the meeting next week and get down to some serious search for textures: newspaper articles, the actual protest letter, places, newsreels from reporting on the holocaust, newsreels about the missions, people alive who remember the time, especially people from Moroopna.

Fun!