Triomf

Click here for new Triomf website

2009-11-01T17:43:00.009+02:00

Triomf was released in South Africa in 2008, and went on to win the award for Best SA Film at the Durban International Film Festival.

The most up-to-date information on the film, including trailers and international reviews, can be found at www.triomf-movie.com

Raeburn Featured In The Times

2007-11-07T13:48:00.005+02:00

South Africa's daily Times newspaper interviewed Michael Raeburn about his film Triomf. Check out the November 2nd article here and read a little bit of the introduction:

STRAIGHT TALKER: Filmmaker Michael Raeburn struggled to get funding for ’Triomf’ because he refused to compromise the story Picture: ALON SKUY

Triomf has a universal quality, poverty is dramatic. The context is a metaphor, it’s the end of one world and the beginning of another

Michael Raeburn has a default personality trait — he is nothing if not tenacious, writes Aspasia Karras.

It’s raining like it’s monsoon season in Bombay the night I meet Michael Raeburn. It’s Sunday and he is on the phone to a French post production house in another room of the small house in Westdene where he is holed up for the filming of Triomf, based on Marlene Van Niekerk’s prize-winning novel about a dysfunctional poor white family on the eve of the 1994 elections.

Each room hums with the mysterious activities performed by the myriad people that populate the final credits of any film. Its a labour-intensive industry even on a Sunday night.

“Just don’t call me a British film maker,” he says when he emerges. “I am from Zimbabwe.” That fact alone could fill up several columns of this article, suffice it to say that he is less upbeat about his homeland than he was in 1993 when he made Jit a comedy that captured his hopes for the future of the country from which he had been expelled by Ian Smith for his hard-hitting film Rhodesia Countdown.

Thirty years later he made Zimbabwe Countdown questioning Robert Mugabe’s betrayal of the liberation war and documenting his own dismay at the unravelling state of his nation. “It’s a catastrophe,” he says with an air of finality, as he settles down on the couch to chat with me.

Triomf Movie Featured in Nokka Magazine

2007-11-05T11:49:00.001+02:00

I heard from Michael this morning and they have completed the shoot in Jo'burg and he is on the way back to Paris to begin the edit process. It's amazing, with all of the weather, strikes and other challenges that the crew faced, that they were able to complete the shoot within the original time frame. This, I'm sure, is due to Michael's long-term experience in film making and the professionalism of the South African crew. I'm sure there are more tales to be told when Michael returns.

Meanwhile, Samantha Poole over at Nokka E-Magazine featured an in-depth article about Triomf the movie in the magazine's 8th Issue on page 24, entitled Frighteningly Funny - Triomf. (Click to open pdf here.) Please also visit and join Nokka's Facebook group here.

This online magazine is graphically beautiful, as you can see from this cover shot. She was also on the Triomf set and got some great pictures of the crew. We'd like to thank Samantha for the coverage and the thoughtfully-written article.

The Dogs They Are A Howlin'

2007-10-27T14:04:00.000+02:00

Alex has been ill and also busy with 18-hour shoot days, so all he had to send me were these two pictures. But I have to say that the photo of Lionel and Treppie doing the important dog howling scene, is amazing. This is a favorite pastime, passed down to them from their Grandfather, to howl on the front porch so that the neighborhood dogs would all join in and thus, piss off the neighbors.

The second photo is Lionel Newton and Eduan Van Jaarsveld in conversation with DOP Jamie Ramsay.

Forgotten Afrikaners

2007-10-25T12:25:00.001+02:00

Our executive producer, Lyndon Plant, has been in Joburg recently for the shoot. He writes to me from there and his email is below. Please comment on your thoughts regarding the names used to characterize the Benade family. We are interested in your feedback:

Dear Lisa,

I had my laptop stolen in London and did not have backups of my photographs so I am afraid I cannot help any further with photographs. [I had asked him for another one of his beautiful photos to submit to the Beautiful Africa Blog Carnival.]

On a different point, I would like to sound you out about our description of the Benades as white trash. Whilst I accept that white trash is an understood genre (especially in the States), I don't think that it describes the movie's characters well.

In particular, Treppie's intelligence and obsession with science and philosophy, Treppie's disdain for incest, Treppie's and Lambert's 'affinity' to Cleo, Lambert's friendship with Sonnie et al indicate that a different description by us would be appropriate.

I have discussed this matter with some of the actors who consider the use of the genre to be somewhat offensive, unfair and even misleading. I asked them about Afrikaner phrases that they would consider appropriate to describe the Benades or the people I have met in the community that we are filming. They came up with English words like "forgotten," "lost," "close-knit," "protective," "damaged," "deprived," "Afrikaaner underdogs," et al.

I personally like the sound and meaning of "Forgotten Afrikaners" but I would be interested to find out how our internet community who have read the book (and perhaps the author of the book) would describe the Benade family and their community collectively.

Alex has been ill and I returned to Joburg yesterday afternoon from a week's break in Harare. In brief, the weather held out for us [for the filming], although the temperature drop in the evening had Vanessa asking whether she could do the outside burial scene early Thursday evening instead of late Wednesday evening, as she was shivering from the cold.

I returned to the set with stories of a Jan Hofmeyr resident who chased and attacked a crew member and was subsequently picked up by the police in connection with other crime(s), an expensive light blowing, a generator breaking down, the volksie catching fire due to an auto electrical fault and a neighbor who is irate after being woken at 5am by the catering team setting up for breakfast and by the number of crew and cast vehicles parked on an adjacent residential road.

Its time for a cup of strong coffee!

Lyndon

In my research about Triomf, Sophiatown, apartheid and the 1994 first Democratic vote, I get a sense that the human beings referred to as "the poor whites problem," have been first set up and then abandoned by their government. I am not an expert, and invite your comments.

Starting the Lanwmower on the Veranda

2007-10-23T09:33:00.000+02:00

Alex sent me a shoot update. I don't know if you have noticed, in previous pictures and the picture below, but Jose Baptista, our sound engineer, is using a revolutionary process for capturing the sound. He has his MAC laptop in a bag slung from his shoulders. He is actually capturing the sound directly into his MAC, saving several steps in the recording and mixing process. He spent quite a bit of time here in Paris prior to going to Jo'burg, looking for the perfect bag, as well as an extra battery.

Day 24

Jo'burg's excellent weather continued for another day and the pace with which we worked made us realize how much we missed through all those weeks of rain.

Today's shoot was all exterior - thank goodness we got a day off to recuperate because it was certainly long and physical. Day 24 was really all about the Benades, with our favorite dysfunctional white trash family making an attempt at landscaping their uh, front 'lawn.' Of course, this being Lambert, Treppie and Mol, nothing is quite what it seems and even the most mundane chores can provoke a semi-murderous booze-fueled conflict.

For those of us trusted with capturing the sight and the sound of their antics, it was a pleasure to behold. Here we are, filming the family in alcohol-soused action.

Of particular amusement was Lambert firing up the lawnmower on the veranda (where else?).

Tomorrow we'll be shooting at night, so cast and crew can have a bit of a sleep in. We'll be working til twelve at night, so we'll have to get all the rest we can get. And of course, our first proper evening in the none too salubrious neighbourhood of Vrededorp...no doubt a riveting experience awaits!

World Cup Final? No Problem.

2007-10-21T10:35:00.000+02:00

It was quite convenient that the World Cup Final was played Saturday night, after the Triomf shoot, and before a nice day off on Sunday. Otherwise, the Benades family would have had to show up on set the next day looking drunk and disheveled, or just like their characters. No makeup required to cover up that hangover. Just start saying your lines, you'll be fine.

Here's the report, a day late and typed shakily, despite the delirium tremons, by Alex, our man in Jo'burg:

Day 23...
...started inauspiciously, with gray skies and heavy mist threatening to doom our planned shot list of exteriors. But as dawn gave way to morning, the sun burned through the clouds and gave us the kind of light we needed. The relief we all felt ensured an upbeat tone to the proceedings, with jokes and smiles giving us the stamina to complete what turned out to be a mammoth day.

A 6AM barbecue scene, complete with beers, wine and cocktails, might have looked strange to any passersby, but Coco Merckel and his fellow actors made it look like the most natural thing of the world. Of course, the day was largely overshadowed by the fact South Africa was playing England in the World Cup Final that evening.

In between takes, all the banter between cast and crew revolved around where and with whom they'd be watching the big match. In the end, it hardly mattered, as the Boks' victory ensured that mostly everyone eventually converged at the street party on Melville's main drag.

Good thing, then, that we got to enjoy Sunday off!

Marlene van Niekerk and Her Book Triomf

2007-10-20T15:25:00.000+02:00

As I await the next update on the shoot from Alex in Jo'burg, I wanted to give you a link to a Mail & Guardian ZA@Play article that has the best information I've been able to find about Marlene van Niekerk's novel, Triomf. This is the book on which Michael Raeburn based the film, which he's shotting right now.

So, if you're wondering about the background, history and plot of Triomf, check out this article.

Thanks go to Lyndon Plant, our executive producer, who sent me that link.

Here's a little excerpt to get you started:

This violent, incestuous, alcohol-saturated family represents the "poor whites" courted and favoured by the Nationalist government, given jobs on the railways and homes in the new suburb of Triomf. That suburb, with its hubristic name, was, of course, famously built on the ruins of the demolished Sophiatown.

In the novel, Lambert, the 40-year-old epileptic, is obsessively digging a hole in which to store petrol for an emergency trek to "the North" if and when South Africa collapses under the weight of black rule. From this excavation he draws the fragmented remains of what was once a lively, multiracial area: this is what underlies the white Afrikaner triumph of 1948 and after, the rubble beneath the ideology to which the Benades, in a half-blind tribal way, have so long been loyal.

Astrid Braaf, Delia Meyer and Carmel Fisher Play Nasty

2007-10-19T21:53:00.000+02:00

Crew Call: Any Wild Clappers Available?

2007-10-19T21:13:00.000+02:00

Alex sent me today's shoot rundown...

Day 22
Probably because it was on a Friday, today turned out to be one of the best-humored days on set. Not only were the cast on top form (both during and in-between takes!), but some elaborate practical jokes kept spirits high as the weather inevitably took a turn for the worse.

Scenes for the day were a continuation of the past two days - a chase involving some acrobatics from the cast (no stunt doubles for these tough guys), followed by the arrival of the police.

The wild nature of the scene, with Coco Merckel and Oscar Pietersen full of light-hearted menace (if such a thing exists), had the cast, crew and local residents in stitches. Not all of the action took place in front of the camera: I myself provided unwitting amusement to my fellow crew members, thanks to the efforts of Jamie and Wiaan. Called to a field next to the set just before lunch, I 'wild clapped' for sound across the entire paddock, an entirely made-up task that looked as ridiculous as it sounds.

No sooner had lunch been digested than the sun gave way once more to cloud, rain and thunder. A change of plans was on hand and the madcap antics of the Fort Knox crowd gave way to interior shots in Lambert's Den. Designed to be inhospitable, the Den is not exactly beloved by crew or cast.

Image below: Here's Paul Luckoff as Pop, outside Lambert's den:

With some good vibes still lingering from the morning session, we plowed on into the late afternoon; notwithstanding some very loud thunderclaps. Not a patch on my wild claps, of course...

Chase Scenes Completed Seconds Before the Deluge

2007-10-19T08:58:00.000+02:00

Alex Pearse sent me a recap from yesterday's shoot:

Day 21
Action was the order of Day 21, with a violently hilarious chase scene involving Lambert and The Fort Knox Boys, plus some inclement weather providing more drama.

Images below: Crew sets up for one segment of the chase sequence while (second image) Director of Photography Jamie Ramsay (in red cap) is in consultation with Focus Puller Wiaan Matthee.

Lambert's escape from the very irate Fort Knox residents was successfully created, thanks to some mammoth performances from a very talented cast, namely Coco Merckel as Beerguts, Astrid Braaf as Bikini Girl, Craig Palm as Speedo, Carmel Fisher as Speedo's girl and Delia Meyer and Oscar Petersen playing their party guests.

Tony Caprari as the baboon man was, as always, a joy to behold...

In the picture below: FortKnoxBoys: Speedo (Craig Palm) leaps from a tree in pursuit of Lambert while Oscar Petersen awaits his chance.

Just as we were congratulating ourselves on having successfully navigated the vagaries of dodgy weather, we got a little reminder of the awesome power of nature. At a little before 12:30 am, the skies opened with such ferocity that within minutes the city's drains were overflowing. Needless to say, film making was hastily shoved off the agenda in favor of finding shelter for crew, cast and equipment.

Although we had had several hours of beautiful sunlight to film our dramatic chase scene and the antics of the feral baboon man, our schedule for the rest of the day had to be altered dramatically.

Image above: Clapper board takes a break during the storm.

After intense discussions between director Michael Raeburn, first AD Grant Nale and script supervisor Elaine Butler, a plan B was hastily conceived. The gaffer and camera department got to work lighting the set for an afternoon of interiors and work resumed.

Our recompense for a lunchtime of misery came moments before the final shot of the day: Joburg's skyscrapers bathed in pure gold as the setting sun burned through the mist and rain. This is why Johannesburg is called The City of Gold.

The Sound of Triomf

2007-10-18T12:55:00.001+02:00

Alex Pearse sent me some photos last night of Triomf's sound engineer José Baptista and Nati, the boom operator. This is a great opportunity to introduce José and his illustrious background:

José Baptista was born in Lourenço Marques-Mozambique. He is a professional sound engineer and a designer and installer of electroacoustic equipment and sound studios. He holds a Cinéma Diploma C from the London International Film School and a BTS Cinéma opt Son from the Ecole Nationale Louis Lumière. He speaks English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.

When José is not working on a major film, he co-produces documentaries and records and mixes music albums/CDs. He is also a journalist for Portuguese-language newspapers.

You can find his film credits on IMDB here. His professional experience includes:

2006

Post-production sound engineer for la société de Production de Films de Long Métrage : « Les Films de Mai »
Post-production sound engineer for la société de Production de Films Documentaires : « Strawberry Films »
Installation of electroacoustic equipment for a music studio - dedicated electric installation, video/audio wiring and Ethernet, installation of the equipment.

2004/2005

Technical Directeur - Studio des 3 Arts (Feature film and TV mixing)
Sound engineer and maintenance of audio section for Plateau de Télévision de la Société MMP (Antenne de Télévision « La Locale »)
Installation of electroacoustic equipment for l’Auditorium de là société TABB Productions
Sound engineer and Installation of electroacoustic equipment for Studio 64.

1998-2003

Sound engineer, member, founder of « Créason » - association of sound research, managing the post-production unit within « Films du Village ».
Mixing of several full-length fiction films, many short fiction documentaries for television and cinema.

1990-97

Sound engineer for Images Ressource, S.F.P., Offshore, Films du Village.
Sound engineer for Studios de la Seine, Studios Desmarquest, Films du Village.
Sound engineer for Studio Savane. (Tam Tam Vidéo, Audiophase)
Sound engineer for video studios Mikros Images, UMT, SACFA, Studios Desmarquest, Auvico, Alphamédia.
Designer/demonstrator of audionumeriques equipment at PUBLISON

1979-90

Sound engineer for the video studio of Waymel Montage
Sound engineer for the mixing studios of Teletota and Version Française.
Sound engineer for the video studio of Tigre Productions.
Chief sound operator for documentary films, sound engineer for mobile video, assistant sound engineer for fiction films for many French video production companies
Sound technician for Production Services for l’Institut National du Cinéma du Mozambique

Lesbian Suitcases, Welding Visors and Headless Cats

2007-10-18T09:58:00.000+02:00

It seems like the Triomf production crew can finally take off their wellies and get some shooting done. It was also discovered that it is not beneath Triomf's director, Michael Raeburn, to get down on his hands and knees to coax a wayward actor (a dog who needed to be more vicious). This report came in from Alex Pearse late last night:

After three weeks of relentless rain, Jo'burg finally came aglow with the kind of scorching summer day it is famous for. Needless to say, the cast and crew of Triomf were more than relieved that the weather lottery looked to be ending and that the important job at hand could continue.

So it was smiles all round at 6:30, the damp atmosphere at breakfast having been replaced with some kind of enthusiasm (well, as much as is possible at that hour.)

It was good that spirits were high, such was the scale of the task at hand. With eight scenes to shoot and a host of actors and extras to coordinate, Day 20 promised to be one of the biggest yet. Just a quick glance at the props list - lesbian suitcases, cat without a head and Lambert's welding visor - tells its own story.

Recreating early nineties South Africa is a deceptively challenging task because unlike a period drama where everything needs to be recreated and the lines between what is real and what is not are very clear, the recent past and the present blur into each other, yet also include a number of very stark differences.

Negotiating this challenge has been a major task for Triomf's Art Department and today proved to be their day in more than one way: AWB campaigners on horseback, rag and bone men, a couple moving house - all meant wardrobe and props standby were working off their feet. It all came together nicely though, under Michael Raeburn`s fastidious eye, DOP Jamie Ramsay brought it all to life.

It wasn't all work-work though - the day had its lighter moments too. In particular, the crew's attempts to get Producer Natalie Stange's dog (playing the role of obnoxious neighbor Beer Guts' pet) to shake off its docile demeanor and play vicious (or at least bark), was something to behold. Not one to let his troops do all the hard work, Director Michael Raeburn got down on his own haunches and tried to coax an award winning performance out of the beast. (Notice the dog's nose sticking menacingly through the bars in between Michael's legs.)

With a glorious highveld sunset telling us the lighting department was about to stand down, First AD Grant Nale called it a day. With the shadows getting longer by the minute, we wrapped and packed, with cold beer, good wine and something other than the set's staples of chicken and rice on everyone's minds!

Alex Pearse Joins Triomf Crew. Rain Stops.

2007-10-17T13:13:00.000+02:00

I just spoke by phone with Alex Pearse, a South African writer who lives in London but is now in Johannesburg to help with the Triomf film production, as a "labor of love," according to our executive producer, Lyndon Plant. Alex told me in an email, "My official credits on the film are clapper loader and stills photographer - and general multimedia dogsbody!"

Alex will be on the set from 6AM until 6PM or whenever shooting is finished for the day. Then he plans to download any photos and anecdotes to me in the evenings. Stay tuned!

Lyndon also told me that the month of October is known in parts of Southern Africa as the "suicide month," because it is usually so hot and dry. Jo'burg has been known to get some afternoon/evening rains in October, but never has it seen rain such as it was last week. So you would think that this is a safe time of year for a film shoot, but unfortunately for the crew, the rain put off the entire production schedule. According to an article on the City of Johannesburg website, tornado reports were a hoax, but they managed to snarl up traffic because so many people left work early in fear of the tornado.

Ezekiel Sebego, a forecaster at South African Weather Service said,"We are aware of the emails that were sent to people warning them about a tornado and severe storms. Yes, there were severe storms in some parts of the province - there was heavy rain, hail and extremely strong winds yesterday in Gezina [east of Pretoria] - but there was no tornado."

Finally, Lyndon and Alex had to fly to Jo'burg from London and bring the sunshine with them. All of you in Jo'burg, and the crew of Triomf, can thank them for that. Now he and Alex and the rest of the crew are back on the job, specifically Lionel Newton, who plays the part of Treppie in the film. He was selected to perform weather watch in between takes.

Brixton Hill shoot...

2007-10-08T17:55:00.000+02:00

Treppie (Lionel Newton) in a(nother) confrontation with Pop (Paul Luckhoff)

and Mol (Vanessa Cooke. PICTURE: Alexis Flynn

As you can see, everyone was pretty close to the edge during the shooting of this scene. PICTURE: Natalie Stange

Proverbial Wisdom from Africa

2007-09-26T16:49:00.000+02:00

Q. What did the Sufi dervish say to the Zen master?
A. One hand washes the other.

Which is to say, as they say in Zimbabwe (and as quoted in Michael Raeburn and Hanna Broadbridge's version of Jit done as a text for Danish schoolchildren), "Proverbs are horses for solving problems."

And on precisely that note, we thought we might want to offer up some other Zimbabwean proverbs from Jit. If Danish schoolchildren have profited (and consider the worldwide proliferation of IKEA, for example – but wait: they may be from Sweden...), perhaps so shall we all:

"If you do not use your head, you will have to use your legs."

"The man who gave up did not become rich."

"You will not have to buy what you find."

"If you are not there to work, your share of the harvest will not be there either."

"If you eat alone, you will cough alone."

"Good thinking is better than good money."

We hope these have proven morally instructive and perfectly sensible. After all, as we all know, "The ass's gratitude is farting."

Triomf Movie Rehearsal - Watch the Video

2007-09-15T10:59:00.000+02:00

For those of you who have been looking forward to details about the Triomf production process, take a look at this clip taken during rehearsals.

On the left you see LIONEL NEWTON playing the character Treppie and on the right you see EDUAN VAN JAARSFELDT playing Lambert.

Michael Raeburn is directing them.

The actual shoot starts in Johannesburg Sept 25 - November 3. Wish us luck!

For email alerts each time we upload a new video clip, click on the links to subscribe to RedPillPictures and Triomf Movie YouTube accounts.

Triomf; The Tower of Babel Re-Titled (Avec Subtitles)

2007-09-14T10:30:00.001+02:00

Producer Lyndon Plante brings forward an intriguing point:

"Triomf the movie is now being made with South African, Zimbabwean, French, British, Mozambiquan and American input (that I am aware of)."

It makes us wonder: How many languages do all of us speak? An obvious list would include Afrikaans, English (in its South African, Zimbabwean, American and perhaps even British variants), French, Portuguese, Spanish... and then we up in Jo'burg-sur-la-Seine would love to know if Triomf has anybody aboard fluent in Zulu or Xhosa or Swazi or... well or any of SA's eleven official languages. And what is it like to live in a land not merely official languages, but eleven of 'em.

(As Americans, we consider it our patriotic duty to discourage any speaking of Spanish whatsoever, worldwide, lest our mother tongue be corrupted and we find ourselves, say, at a rodeo out on the chaparral twirling our lariats high atop our cayuses and discover our burritos have been adulterated with too much guacamole and salsa, forcing us to vamoose across la frontera to, peut-être, Quebec.)

In any case, we welcome the day when the Tower of Babel, much like Sophiatown, is officially renamed "Triomf." (And then back again. With an official ceremony. In eleven languages. And then a big braii afterwards. And maybe some dancing.)

National Braai Day Raises Concerns

2007-09-11T14:21:00.000+02:00

According to one of those anxiety-inducing little countdown clock-widgets located here, there are currently only 12 days, 9 hours, 32 minutes and 59 seconds until the outbreak of National Braaiday.

Worse, and even more worrisome, by the time you read this, there will be even less time ticking away. And every time that clock ticks off another second, we can't help wondering, and worrying. And the big day falls on a Monday this year — what if nobody shows up, and the whole thing is just one big colossal failure? Will Emeritus Archbishop Dr Desmond Tutu, patron of this important event, have managed to wrap up that little mess in Darfur in time to get back for a bit of burnt boerewors? And how come those clocks running down always bring up grim thoughts of death and mortality and of how fleeting life is, and how much of it we're wasting standing next to the braai with a beer in one hand and a fork in the other? And what will happen to that little clock once its time has passed? And can any of this time-pressure be good for the meat-grilling business? It does almost certainly make us need a drink. Maybe the beer industry is secretly behind the whole thing. And that worries us too. But slightly less.

Boere Music, Afrikaans... and Paris

2007-09-03T09:56:00.001+02:00

Those of us in the Paris, France, region of South Africa will have to be forgiven our ignorance. Especially when it comes to matters like discussions of Boere Music, or Boeremusiek, or whatever it's called (we speak a very curious Afrikaans argot in this arrondissement).

And because our Afrikaans is so lacking, up here in Johannesburg's northernmost suburbs, we worry sometimes. We worry that we're missing nuances, or that we're not currently right in the thick of what's left of the argument over Bok van Blerk and "De La Rey." (Even if that discussion seems a little overwrought to our Southern South African comrades, we here in Paris love to sit around Les Deux Magots and discuss the finer details.)

But in our effort to inform ourselves, we came across a pretty extraordinary piece of work by Andries ''Roof'' Bezuidenhout, on SA's own LitNet Vryepoort. It's a lively, lengthy article that makes a tremendous effort at putting "De La Rey" and conteporary music in Afrikaans in context. We need that up here in Paris, frankly.

So we're adding a link to this article in here, in hopes of stimulating a small and civilized but lively discussion. And note that it even has footnotes, which means it must be good. (We Parisian philosophes love a laundry list's worth of footnotes. It makes us feel — how do you say it in Afrikaans? — tres existentialiste?

Location Recce - Sunday August 26

2007-08-28T15:03:00.000+02:00

This past Sunday Michael took a small group of us out to the film's main location - a small house in Jan Hofmeyer Park in Brixton - to discuss various aspects of the shoot. Art director Tiaan van Tonder got the opportunity to see how much work he would have to do to get the place looking the way Michael wants it to. Our DOP Jamie Ramsay got to see the dark & cramped spaces in which he would have to shoot for around 5 weeks. Michael and Natalie spoke to the homeowners - Ernest, his sister Doreen and her truck driver husband - about the alternative living arrangments being made for them for the duration of the shoot: they will move into a caravan that will be placed in their neighbours' backyard. In the meantime, I shot lots of material for the film's "Making of...", and we all marvelled at how closely the entire place - the home where we will shoot, the surrounding neighbourhood and its inhabitants, even the mangy dogs - resembled exactly Marlene van Niekerk's description of the place in her novel.

The effects of grinding poverty are everywhere visible, from the mud-soaked and rubbish-strewn backyard, to the men and women lurching drunkenly across the open field at 11am, to the skinny dirt-covered kids playing with home-made wire toys in the dusty streets.

Now while there are many communities in South Africa that have failed to find their place under the warm sun of the new democratic South Africa, there is something about this place that sets it apart from every other: one has the sense of a place that has truly fallen off the edge of the world. There is not the slightest ounce of hope in these streets.

But I'm quite certain the film will change all that: the homeowners - Ernest & co. - are sweet and humble people, but already they are utterly gobsmacked that their home is to become the prime location for an international feature film. They are talkative and curious and surprised at the fact that anyone would want to point a camera in their direction. Although the other residents mostly ignored us on Sunday, this too will change once cast and crew start moving in and causing a commotion. Then we can expect crowds of curious onlookers. The countdown has begun...

A Proverb from Zimbawe

2007-08-17T14:25:00.000+02:00

"Truth cannot be bought in the market place, but lies are bought with ready cash."

A proverb from Zimbabwe, included in the Danish print edition of Michael Raeburn's novelization of his film, "Jit."

PICS: Triomf Production House

2007-08-17T11:55:00.000+02:00

Stained-glass windows are known to stimulate
creative thinking...

...as is evident from this photo of Michael hard
at work... on Facebook!

Security is top-notch! Even flies struggle to enter here.

Large and fully-equipped kitchen for early morning
coffees and late-night snacking.

The hard work has begun, but there's hope for
relaxation on the right hand side of the pic...

"Giddily Upbeat," Says The New York Times

2007-08-15T16:36:00.000+02:00

As something of a follow-up, we wanted to include a little more about Michael Raeburn and Zimbabwe. In 1991, he made a movie called Jit. (Among its many distinctions, perhaps even beyond the fact that it was the first feature film ever made in Zimbabwe, it is extremely high on the Marquee Letterer And Ladder Shifter's Union Special Achievement Award shortlist of Shortest Film Titles Ever, though nosed out at the finish line by by It).

In any case, not only did Jit serve as the film launch-pad for Oliver Mtukudzi, perhaps Africa's biggest World Music star today, it also was shockingly available in the US at Blockbuster Video. Not, admittedly, perhaps every Blockbuster Video in the entire United States of America, but still....

Just imagine -- there you could be, of a Tuesday night back in the mid-1990s, when people still went to video stores instead of doing all the astonishingly illegal -- and convenient! -- things they do to get their movies today, and you would be trolling the aisles amongst all the other sad Tuesday night consumers with their Burger King bags under their arms, trying to take advantage of Blockbuster's "Three-For-One Tuesday" deal but all the big Hollywood star-laden car-crashing action-comedy just-released-to-video spectaculars are sadly not in evidence on the shelves. And your Burger King bag is starting to drip. To a degree, in fact, that suggests that its structural integrity is about to give way right there on the lush (but stainproof) blue Blockbuster carpeting. So, as an emergency measure you wouldn't take under any other circumstances, you grab -- in addition to Dumb And Dumber II and some movie you chose because Adam Sandler was on the cover, so it must be really funny -- a bright orange-and-green covered box that clashes noisily against Blockbuster's blindingly jaunty yellow-and-blue corporate color scheme) belonging to some movie with the wacky, zany title of Jit.

And "Wacky" it is . And perhaps even "Zany" too, though not in the blockbusting Adam Sandler manner. It's wacky and zany in the sense that the hero of the film, an under-achieving but ambitious striver named UK, is chided and counseled and very actively assisted by a Jukwa, an ancestral spirit, in this case in the form of a beer-chugging granny. It's wacky and zany as well in the sense that somehow, some way, somebody at Blockbuster made a deal to buy just enough VHS tape copies of Jit to make sure the movie actually skidded into the black.

It's not retroactive for 1990, but just to keep you honest here, we've included this link to a highly useful Zimbabwean currency counter, so you can compare your own local shekels to the Zimbabwean Dollar (ZWD) as it floats giddily toward the stratosphere, sort of like the first African Mission to Mars. There are all manners and degrees of wacky and zany, after all. And as long as its not your life savings going down the drain, hey, what could be zanier than the Zimbawean dollar in 2007?

A Disturbing Thought Or Two

2007-08-14T15:27:00.000+02:00

A deeply disturbing thought suddenly occurs: Michael Raeburn, distinguished director of Triomf, the film that is surely going to be one of the most talked-about South African films of our time, is another of those infernal immigrants from Zimbabwe. Zounds!

Let's face it: no matter what internal problems all South Africans share, one thing everybody there ought to be able to agree upon is the simple and straightforward idea of building a massive, unbreachable, impenetrable, unscalable wall all across the entirety of the Zimbabwean border. Preferably financed by the United States, using technology, know-how, and leftover spare parts from the USA's own re-Berlin-ificaton of the Mexican border. Which is scheduled to be completed weeks after we sign off on Mission Accomplished II: The Sequel in Iran (Oops -- I meant Iraq; we Americans have trouble keep you foreign lands straight.) (In any meaning of the word.)

Now, as a native-born American of sturdy, unswarthy European stock, whose forebears on either side of the family arrived almost entire decades before the last half of the Twentieth Century, there's nothing that irritates me like illegal immigrants. Not to say that Michael, whose work permits are every bit as in order as the rest of the production's, is illegal, but still....

Well, now that I've got that pot properly stirred, I'd like to move on to other profound thoughts Zimbabwean....because some Americans, if you haven't heard, are about to become minor experts on the place. A couple few weeks ago, we sat around Michael's ultra-chic Parisian flat in its fashionable district (okay, his chic Parisian flat in its questionable neighborhood) (alright, ok, his funky but entirely serviceable flat... but it's damn well in Paris) while I showed Jose' [Triomf's sound engineer] and Michael the website counting down the last few hours before the Dispatch concerts at Madison Square Garden benefiting Zimbabwe. I'll go into more detail about that and those shows in times to come but both Michael and Jose', who's originally from Mozambique, raised the worthy question of "How do they get the money they've raised to the people who need it most, instead of the people who figure they need it most because they're running the country?"

Dispatch, a band hardly anybody over the age of 30 outside of New England had ever heard of, and one that had been broken up for three years, decided they were going to reunite long enough to do a benefit show for the people of Zimbabwe. As things fell together, the show ended up being scheduled for New York City's Madison Square Garden, and it sold out within minutes of tickets being put on sale. So a second and then a third night were put on sale, both of which sold out instantly as well. The band turned over their own guest list tickets in order to raise more funds, and some pretty significant sums were raised. And the question of how to disburse those funds is central, obviously.

But as anyone who's ever been around a successful benefit knows, a huge part of it is not based in fund-raising but in consciousness-raising.... There are now a couple of hundred thousand American kids (consider exactly how fast those tickets sold out, and do a little math based on those lucky ticket holders actively bragging to all their friends, and multiply by Myspace....) who now know at least a little something about a remote Southern African country named Zimbabwe..... Okay, now all the Americans say it in unison: ZIM - BOB - WAY ....

Which brings us back again to Triomf and South Africa and Michael Raeburn, all by way of Zimbabwe. Because as we explore the nuances and the crashing non-nuanced plain-as-day non-subtleties of the making of Triomf in South Africa at this moment, we're inevitably going to run afoul of all manner of sensibilities, delicate and refined, crude and rude. And as we do, we're going to keep reminding you of a few important facts. Beginning in the 1960s, under Ian Smith's Rhodesian regime, Michael Raeburn, a native born African who would most often be defined as "white," began making films and books that powerfully questioned the status quo. As each decade's events unfolded, he continued to do so, despite the fact that he was now banned from his native land. And when that land became known as Zimbabwe, one of his books became a primary text in its schools. His film Jit, with the music of Oliver Mtukudzi, Thomas Mapfumo, and the Bhundu Boys among others, was the first film ever made entirely in Zimbabwe. And by the time of our own decade, Michael had once again been banned from his homeland for making a film, Zimbabwe Countdown, that examined the regime that has ruled Zimbabwe since its promising birth.

We bring this forward not to blast forth Michael's horn on his behalf but because it needs to be said. Consistently, in five different decades, this African filmmaker has made films about Africa in Africa. When he wasn't allowed in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, he made them in Tanzania, Zambia, and South Africa. When he wasn't allowed to complete a South African film named Soweto, he moved on and made others. And now, in a time when many people would question his wisdom, he's preparing to shoot a South African picture called Triomf about a lower-class white Afrikaans-speaking family who may not be the model citizens some might wish. Do you think he has any idea what he's doing?

Beautiful Africa Blog Carnival: Sunset in Beira Moçambique

2007-08-13T21:34:00.000+02:00

Loomnie and fellow blogger Ishtar announced a "Beautiful Africa" blog carnival and we wanted to participate. So I sent a message out to the film crew and it was our Executive Producer, Lyndon Plant, who sent me this beautiful photo.

Insight Into Marlene Van Niekerk

2007-08-13T15:00:00.000+02:00

I've been considering Triomf's "dysfunctional" characters. You know, dysfunctional; as in incestuous, mentally ill and just plain nasty. It made me want to know more about Marlene van Niekerk, and whether she was a nutcase too. I mean, where did she get all of those details? Did she live with these people? Or is it from her very own lively imagination?

Here's a little backgrounder taken from Niekerk's bio on the Stellenboschwriters website:

Born on the farm Tygerhoek near Caledon in 1954
Studied Languages and Philosophy at Stellenbosch University
Obtained a MA with the thesis: Die aard en belang van die literêre vormgewing in 'Also sprach Zarathustra' in 1978. (Not sure what that translates to but there's something in there about "Thus spake Zarathustra.")
At university she wrote three plays for the lay theatre.
Moved to Germany in 1979 to apprentice for directing at theatres in Stuttgart and Mainz
Continued philosophy studies in Holland
Obtained a Drs with a thesis on the works of Claude Lévi-Strauss and Paul Ricoeur: "Taal en mythe: een structuralistische en een hermeneutische benadering."
Lectured in Philosophy at University of Zululand, and later at Unisa.
Lectured in Afrikaans and Dutch at University of Witwatersrand.
Currently Professor at the Department of Afrikaans and Dutch, Stellenbosch University.

When I looked for answers to why Ms. Niekerk might think that poverty, ignorance and incest can be knee-slappingly funny, I found an interview with Marlene by Michiel Heyns (who translated Ms. Niekerk's book Agaat in 2006) on LitNet. Heyns asks Ms. Niekerk specifically about her viewpoint of humor:

Heyns: It is not only The Reluctant Passenger that was funny. Your readers marvel at the specific type of dry ironic wit that you wield in your novels, also in The Typewriter's Tale. Could you say something about the place and use of humour in your work?

Niekerk: Humour happens. I didn't think, when I started writing The Typewriter's Tale, that there was anything particularly funny in the material, but somehow it turned out that way. Of course, few situations are inherently funny: the poor bugger who slips on the banana skin and breaks his coccyx fails to see why the rest of the world is laughing. It's a matter of the perspective one adopts, and again I can only say that it happens: I see these people and they're funny. It's possible that reading authors like Jane Austen and Henry James schooled me in a certain oblique way of looking at things, so that the more seriously people take themselves, the funnier they are. In any case, in the South Africa I grew up in, in which some people took themselves very seriously indeed ("Dit is ons erns"), humour was a mode of survival.

Red Pill Ramblings

2007-08-10T14:43:00.000+02:00

So myself (Ryan) and Natalie are naturally very excited to be involved in the Triomf film. It's our first project together, it's a big one, and so a bit daunting, but we feel we're more than up to the challenge. Not only do we have the requisite skills and experience to make it happen, but it's also a film with exactly the themes we've been talking about ever since we first met. Themes we've felt were sorely lacking in contemporary South African cinema, resulting in anaemic films bloated by political correctness. Anyway, we believe Triomf is about to change all that, so we're going hell for leather! (dunno exactly what that phrase means, but I've always wanted to write it...)

I first met Michael Raeburn last year, at a script workshop in Johannesburg. I sat in on some of the discussion and viewing sessions around Triomf, was impressed by the clips now playing as a trailer on YouTube, but I didn't keep track of the project after that. Fast forward about 10 months and here we are, gearing up to shoot Triomf in a very short while.

The past few weeks have been interesting on several levels. Mention of the film to people not directly involved elicits some strange reactions: Natalie has gotten calls from respected SA directors who cannot believe we're doing the film, and that they are not directing.

Other producers have reacted with a measure of awe: "Wow," they say, "you're really brave to be doing this film." Another said it "had no light." We generally laugh in their faces. Clearly they have not read the script properly, or the book on which it is based. It's one of the funniest scripts I've read in ages, fully of acutely observed South African irony and satire. Of course it's also quite tragic - incest always is - but it's also warm and tender in many places.

I don't know about Natalie, but I've also had other concerns of a more political nature: Triomf places the microscope on a family of white Afrikaners on the very lowest rung of South Africa's socio-economic ladder. Some of the things they get up to are so repulsive that one cannot help, but recoil in horror. Could not my more sensitive Afrikaner friends therefore construe the film as a wilful attack on Afrikaner culture?

Another niggling doubt has been over the "necessity" of making this film at all. My more Black Consciousness friends could easily allege that by helping to make a film that elicits sympathy for poor white Afrikaners, I am complicit in re-inscribing the superiority of whiteness in South Africa?

Both these concerns have been answered by reading the novel, as I've been doing these past few days. Triomf is not about "Afrikaner Culture" understood in its monolithic sense. If culture is survival, it is simply the brutally honest portrayal of one family and how they have managed to survive (just barely) in this topsy-turvy country called South Africa.

My response to the second charge - that Triomf will re-inscribe white superiority - requires the retelling of a personal anecdote brought to mind by my reading of the novel. Some years ago, I was back living in Cape Town, my hometown. My regular route to work took me through St. George's Mall, a thoroughfare frequented by all sorts of Capetonians, including a couple of white beggars, seemingly husband and wife.

One day, in a cheerful and generous mood, I reached out with a few large coins for their begging bowl. Before I could drop my meagre gift, however, the woman pulled the bowl away at lightning speed, and flashed me a dirty look from her bloodshot eyes. I stared at her in shock as it dawned on me then, perhaps for the very first time, exactly how deep white racism goes. Dirt poor as they were, the colour of their skin was still their final refuge from the devil of equality with "the blacks". Since that moment, I have never once given money to a white beggar.

Instead of re-inscribing white racial superiority in South Africa, what Triomf does is to shatter the myth expressed by that beggar woman's reaction. The book and the film say that skin colour doesn't matter at all. We are all human beings, and when things get rough, as they sometimes do, we are all capable of the most extreme behaviour. Perhaps next year, when the film is done, I will be able to give money to white beggars again...

The Trutone Dolls - Ranking High Among the Top 100 Girl Group Names Ever... and you need to hear this 78!

2007-08-09T13:13:00.001+02:00

Among the one or two or three or possibly even more things that have changed since the arrival of that newfangled Internet thing is the collecting of music. The artifact-i-ness of those sacred artifacts, the records (ie; 78s, 45s, wax cylinders, LPs, EPs 8-tracks, cassettes, CDs) has shifted in ways that are difficult to measure because they've both gained and lost. You really don't need devote massive real estate to your record collection any more because it all fits on your IPod . . . but if you've got any taste whatsoever, a big fat hunk of your IPod real estate is devoted to stuff that only exists because some fairly obsessive collector of wax cylinders or 78s or obscure Mexican surfin' lounge-soul grooves has devoted some huge hunk of their real life real estate to the care and preservation and storage of Mexican surfin' lounge soul.

Point being, that of all the record collectors ever categorized, the most obsessive and persnickety of them all --- excepting, of those darn wax cylinder-collecting geeks -- have always been the 78 guys. (And guys they were, and are, almost always, almost exclusively....there's like maybe about three of 'em who have ever even had a girlfriend. Women always want to dance and that might jar the phonograph needle.) Anyway, 78 collectors never really wanted to share the music; they just wanted to have it -- on their shelves, in its proper sleeve, then sealed in plastic slips and properly filed according to arcane systems of chronology and genre and label and artist alphabetizing that only they understood.

Well, thanks to the internet, that's pretty much over. Musicblogs worldwide are blowing it all up. Generosity reigns supereme. You can now go get the entire history of Norwegian Death Metal or the roots of Brazil's forro music online, compliments of somebody who's thrilled that you even care to bother to visit and download and listen and maybe even offer a friendly comment. And who generally is willing to pass along what information they have on artists who are often so obscure that copyright issues are about as integral as interstellar train schedules. (Maybe we can discuss Gallo and copyright and artist royalty payments at perhaps a later date.)

Case in point (and here, at long last, is the part where it begins to get slightly somewhat germane to Triomf, kind of, sort of, maybe) is Excavated Shellac, "A weekly blog dedicated to 78rpm recordings of folkloric and vernacular music from around the world." This guy --- we're assuming he's a guy, but, hey, let's face it -- is putting his collection online, one record at a time, one week at a time. And a week or so ago (go to July 29, 2007), his hip pick to click was "Kudala Ngikutshela" by the Trutone Dolls on South Africa's Winner label. He acknowledges how little he knows about the Trutone Dolls (although, let's face it -- that has to rank in the upper percentiles of the Top 100 Girl Group Names Ever) but what he does know is pretty fascinating. And, given that some of this blog's current (and future!) readership is from SA, we're guessing that he'll know more quite soon. Anybody out there know more about the Trutone Dolls, Strike Vilikazi, or what year this 78 was made? We're guessing that there will be a Sophiatown connection in there, and we want to thread that needle. Assistance, please?

Meanwhile, here's the label and a link to the music. We'll be listening to a lot of Boere music and to music made in and around and about Sophiatown/Triomf/Sophiatown down through the years, but we couldn't resist starting here. Oh, and somebody tell us, please, how to translate "Kudala Ngikutshela."

Telling The Story of Sophiatown

2007-08-09T11:28:00.000+02:00

(Blog Author's Note: Originally published in the Mail & Guardian, this article is one of a number included on this highly informative page that explore the overlapping history of Sophiatown and Triomf.)

Telling the Story of Sophiatown
by Reesha Chibba | Johannesburg, South Africa
Globe & Mail
11 February 2006 09:51

The reclaiming and renaming of Sophiatown, which has had two names for far too long, is a past we dare not forget, said Johannesburg Mayor Amos Masondo on Saturday.

Masondo was speaking at a ceremony to rename Triomf back to Sophiatown, west of Johannesburg.

“Sophiatown is a place with an amazing history and depth. Sophiatown was, in its heyday, the epicentre of politics, jazz and blues in South Africa. It’s renaming is an attempt and effort to tell [its] story,” he said.

Masondo spoke of the suburb being “bulldozed to dust” during the forced removals in 1955, leaving 65 000 residents without homes. They were forcefully removed over the following eight years and dumped in matchbox houses in far away places like Meadowlands, Lenasia, Western Coloured Township (now Westbury) and Noordgesig.

“Sophiatown evokes memories of a vibrant, creative, multicultural community. A place where artists, writers and musicians flourished, against the odds, in an atmosphere of racial tolerance,” he said.

Nandi Mayathula-Khoza, a Johannesburg council member, paid tribute to former African National Congress president, Dr Alfred Xuma, in her speech.

Xuma, who lived in Toby street, was one of the last residents to leave Sophiatown in 1959. Today, his house is one of only two houses that managed to escape the destruction of Sophiatown by the apartheid government.

A heritage plaque honouring Xuma and his wife was unveiled at their former home during the street parade. People dressed up in true 50’s style and jazzed up the streets with their singing and dancing during the street parade after the official ceremony. Everyone rejoiced when the Sophiatown suburb sign was officially unveiled.

Thabo Matsho, an Ekurhuleni councilor who was born in Sophiatown, said there were moments during the street parade when he felt very emotional.

“I felt like knocking on the door [of the house my parents once lived in] and saying, 'My parents lived here. It’s my parents place. I want it back!' But you can’t do that.”

Freda Tangee, a former District Six resident from Cape Town, said she will never forget the time of the forced removals.

“I will never ever get over that. It was terrible and it’s frustrating.”

Tangee said she feels frustrated because she never had the opportunity to carve a better life for herself.

“At 17 I couldn’t even get a job. It was because of the colour of my skin,” she smiles.

She said she felt hesitant to chat to a policemen at the event because she doesn’t trust them anymore. “I don’t know. Should I be friends with the police? They are not part of me anymore. They have become extinct. I forgive, but I never forget,” she said.

Small children with painted faces, colourful striped tops, hats and umbrella’s cluttered the back of Ben Linde’s 1970’s cream bakkie.

“Sophiatown is the best suburb. It’s the best place that I’ve lived in."

(Used by kind permission of Johannesburg News Agency; www.joburg.org.za)

Red Pill Productions: Triomf's South African Production Company

2007-08-07T11:47:00.000+02:00

Red Pill Productions, a partnership of Natalie Stange and Ryan Fortune, has joined the Triomf movie team as the South African production company.

Natalie Stange has a broad range of production experience as a screenwriter, editor, producer and production manager on live events, animation, corporate video, television commercials, documentaries, short and feature films and factual drama. She is the General Secretary of the Documentary Filmmakers Association and a member of The Producers Alliance. Natalie matriculated from St. Paul’s College, Windhoek, Namibia and received a Diploma in Theatre/Dance from Pretoria Technikon and an IMM Marketing Diploma from Damelin Randburg.

Ryan Fortune has been a radio news journalist, news editor, anchor and entertainment commissioning editor for the South African Broadcasting Association (SABC). In recent years he has worked on award-winning film and television projects for Matabane Filmworks, a company well-known on the international film festival circuit. As a print journalist he has written film and theatre reviews for the Cape Times, ThisDay and the popular Sunday Times Lifestyle. Ryan holds a degree in Journalism from Peninsula Technikon in Cape Town and an MA in European Journalism Studies from Cardiff University in Wales.

We look forward to hearing from them in future posts.

Yet Another Assassination Attempt on Michael Raeburn

2007-08-06T14:25:00.000+02:00

Yet another assassination attempt on Michael Raeburn's life by an unidentified assailant.

Wait - this just in...this particular fork-wielding assassin is the distinguished Caroline Chomienne, Déléguation Générale of ALTERMÉDIA, le cinéma autrement, an esteemed film school in Paris, in this case fulfilling her function as film critic.

You can see that she hasn't given up, even in this next picture, as a group of great Triomf minds tried to have an elegant meal at the restaurant atop the Centre George Pompidou in Paris.

From left to right: Lyndon Plant, executive producer, Rachel, Michael Raeburn, director and writer, Caroline (Corday) L'Assassin, and finally co-producer Bruno Daniault, Epoteon Productions, Paris.

Michael Raeburn Field Tests Paris Vélib' Bicycle

2007-08-05T17:22:00.000+02:00

Ever the early adapter, Michael Raeburn wanted to be the first to try the new Vélib' bicycles while he was in Paris last week. Vélib' bicycle rental areas were placed all over Paris, in hopes that people would use bikes instead of cars, thus addressing Paris traffic and pollution problems. We are seeing people on these bikes all over town - they were immediately popular.

To rent a bike, all you do is put your credit card or a Vélib' card into the machine and you can rent the bike free for the first 1/2 hour and then for only 1 Euro an hour after that. (Check out the great explanation of how Vélib' works, in English, on the Polly Vous Francais blog.) Since there are so many stations available, with proper planning, you may never have to pay for your ride.

When we were expressing awe about them recently with Jose Baptista, Triomf's sound engineer, he said, "Yes, but you can only use a credit card, or you can get a Vélib' card but you must have a bank account to do so. The rental machines don't take cash or coins. So that means that poor people can't rent them." Interesting point. We tried to rent a bike with an American MasterCard debit card but it didn't work, nor did an American Express card. So we may be out of luck also.

This was Michael's first ride on one of the bikes. He and Lyndon Plant, Triomf's executive producer, used the bikes to get to a meeting with the French accountant for Triomf. Michael customarily bikes all over Paris on a daily basis, whereas Lyndon, who lives in London, was more in the mode of the typical tourist. Both of them ended up quite delighted, a near-universal experience, if the faces of all those riders on the street are to be believed.

Triomf Test Shoot Videos Are Back on YouTube

2007-08-02T15:29:00.000+02:00

We had a little problem involving the mysterious disappearance of our test shoot videos from YouTube. But the problem is now solved and you can watch the test shoot now with either English or French subtitles.

You can click on the Google widget on the right side of this blog to watch the videos and a video screen will appear just below the blog header graphic and just above the latest post title.

Or you can view them directly on YouTube. English subtitles here. French subtitles here.

SATimes: ‘Armblankes’ story could go world-wide

2007-06-25T18:06:00.000+02:00

Written by Elizma Nolte
Wednesday, 20 June 2007

A British filmmaker is about to create the first Afrikaans film for the international market – with a storyline that is bound to capture attention abroad and raise a few eyebrows at home.

Michael Raeburn will start shooting Triomf, an adaptation of Marlene van Niekerk’s controversial book, in South Africa in September. With the words “here is your next film”, someone had dumped a copy of the novel, which has been translated into English and widely lauded, on Raeburn’s desk.

“I was totally captivated by the characters and this world on the edge they inhabited,” he says. “It reminded me of the worlds created by [American playwrights] Sam Shepard or Tennessee Williams.”

Triomf is set in the Johannesburg suburb of the same name – a previously bulldozed township inhabited by poor white Afrikaners – in the years leading up to the 1994 elections. It follows the story of a dysfunctional family of “armblankes”, as they would have been labelled [sic] in the old South Africa.

The more politically correct term would be “trailer trash”, says Raeburn and as such he believes it tells an international story.

I cringe as I recall the mixed feelings of shock and disgust, sadness and sympathy the uncomfortable reality portrayed in Triomf had evoked on my first reading of Van Niekerk’s book. Is this really an image of South Africa we want to show the world? The Benade family – Pop, Mol, Lambert, and Treppie – are very extreme people, Raeburn admits.

Read the rest of the article by clicking here.

Triomf and Michael Raeburn Featured in Southern Suburbs Tatler

2007-06-25T14:53:00.000+02:00

Cape Community Newspapers' Southern Suburbs Tatler featured an article written by Toni Stuart about the film production of Triomf. They don't have their articles online but here are some excerpts:

Mr. Raeburn, a filmmaker and author, wrote the script and directs the movie, which tells the story of an Afrikaans family living in Triomf at the time of South Africa's first democratic elections.

"It's a fable about the end of Afrikanerdom. It's a story about this family and it's a story about apartheid. And who survives is the innocent and the sweet. It's the first tragi-comic novel from SA which stab you in the heart and at the same time it makes you roll on the floor (with laughter)," he [Raeburn] says.

...when he read the book he was intrigued by "these weird and intense characters in the claustrophobia of this intense household."

I've uploaded an image of the entire article in the Triomf Picassa photo album so you can take a look at it there.

Marlene van Niekerk Wins Awards for Book Agaat

2007-06-25T13:47:00.000+02:00

Marlene van Niekerk, author of the novel Triomf, has just won the 2007 Hertzog Prize for Prose and C.L. Engelbrecht Prize for literature for her novel that was released in 2004, Agaat.

Description of Agaat from Kalahari.net:

This novel deals with the relationship between a 67 year-old white woman in the terminal stages of ALS (motor neuron disease) and her coloured caretaker Agaat. The acute helplessness of the mute and completely paralysed patient makes extraordinary demands of her caretaker, who goes about her duties with a mixture of infinite tenderness, sadistic precision and a desperate and passionate undertow of anger about the past, as well as sadness of the anticipated loss of her "mistress". Through flashbacks and lyrical intermezzos, the history that leads up to this situation is revealed.

The Hertzog Prize or Hertzogprys is an annual award given to Afrikaans-language writers by the South African Academy for the Sciences and Arts (Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns), formerly the South African Academy for Language, Literature and Arts (Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Taal, Lettere en Kuns).

It is the most prestigious prize in Afrikaans literature.

The prize was first established in 1914 as part of the Tweede Taalbeweging ("Second Language Movement"); its first winner was Totius for his 1915 poetry collection Trekkerswee (Trekkers' Grief). The prize is awarded in the categories of poetry, prose, and drama.

Read the award announcement in Afrikaans here.

Michael Raeburn's Novel Makes Awards Shortlist

2007-06-22T17:52:00.000+02:00

Michael Raeburn's novel, "Night of the Fireflies" is a shortlisted candidate for the 2007 M-Net Literary Awards:

"Now in its 16th year, the prestigious M-Net Literary Awards serve to acknowledge and celebrate the exceptional creative talent among South African authors...Shortlisted titles for the M-Net Literary Awards – (in alphabetical order with publisher in brackets):

Green-eyed Thieves, Imraan Coovadia (Umuzi)
How We Buried Puso, Morabo Morojele (Jacana)
My Mother’s Lovers, Christopher Hope (Atlantic Books)
The Native Commissioner, Shaun Johnson (Penguin)
The Shadow Follows, David Medalie (Pan Macmillan)

The honourable mentions in this category include What Kind of Child by Ken Barris (Kwela), Room 207 by Kgebetli Moele (Kwela) and Night of the Fireflies by Michael Raeburn (New Africa Books)."

(LitNet)

The Black Christ -- A South African Icon

2007-06-18T08:50:00.000+02:00

During the Cape Town Book Fair, Michael met with Ronald Harrison, painter of The Black Christ, a South African icon.

According to this October 1997 Dispatch Online article, written the day after the painting was displayed for the first time since it had been banned in 1962, Harrison "painted one of South Africa's most controversial art works 35 years ago -- a picture of the ANC's banned Chief Albert Luthuli as a crucified Christ flanked by two centurions. The Roman centurions bore the faces of then prime minister Hendrik Verwoerd, the man accredited with being the architect of apartheid, and his justice minister John Vorster. The Black Christ was first exhibited at St Luke's Church in Salt River in 1962, and was to impact on Harrison's life more than he could have imagined. He was arrested and Mr Vorster's censors banned the painting, deeming it sacrilegious and illegal to display."

Mr. Harrison has written a book, The Black Christ, A Journey to Freedom. You can read a review on his publisher's website, New Africa Books. Here's an excerpt:

"In the ordinary course of events, the painting would have been destroyed. Instead – in what the author sees as divine intervention – it was not confiscated, but was successfully hidden and smuggled abroad, where it played a key role in raising funds for victims of apartheid, including the Rivonia treason trialists. The miraculous recovery of the painting and its return to South Africa after more than 30 years – it is now held at the South African National Gallery in Cape Town – are part of the dramatic story of ‘The Black Christ'.

...

Alongside publication of the book, an extensive campaign is planned to take the painting around the country and to repeat its British and European tours of the 1960s, with the objective of raising funds for projects of the Luthuli Education Trust and other causes identified by the author. It is hoped that both the book and painting can help to meet the global challenges of racism and inhumanity through the multicultural, non–religious and compassionate approach exemplified by Christ. "

Promoting "Night of the Fireflies" -- Michael at the Cape Town Book Fair

2007-06-18T08:31:00.000+02:00

Michael sent me some images from his phone of the Cape Town book fair, where he was promoting his newly released novel Night of the Fireflies.

I'll write in more detail about Michael's book in upcoming posts. For now, here are the pictures:

Sophiatown; Triomf; Sophiatown

2007-06-15T11:02:00.000+02:00

Those of us back here in Paris, back behind the blogging curtain, feel a long way off from South Africa.... and as Americans, we proudly assert our ignorance of all things un-American. Like, for instance, South Africa. The whole thing, practically. Oh, we've heard of that place -- didn't you people used to have something kinda weird going on down there for a while? But surely that's all been straightened out nicely by now?

Well, ok -- we're not quite that dumb. But nearly. And as we've gotten involved with TRIOMF, we've been learning...and fast. We learn that -- and here we invite anybody who knows anything to jump in and correct us -- once upon a time there was a place called Sophiatown. And that approximately one million years ago, in the middle of the 1950s, its residents were kindly requested to vacate, due to certain legal discrepancies. Like them being the incorrect color. And that the South African government was kind enough to offer them six bottles of soda pop each as it ushered them away, and razed their homes. Let's see; 63,000 people each given 6 bottles of pop. You do the math -- we're too boggled.

And in honor of this epic urban redevelopment process, the new white suburb was jubilantly titled "Triomf." And this is the context for the novel and now the film. But not the mid-1950s. Instead, TRIOMF is set in March, 1994, five days before the first democratic general election in the history of South Africa.

After which, a number of things happened, we understand. Not least among them: Triomf was renamed Sophiatown.

We'll be putting some music on here before long, music created in the cultural environment of the original Sophiatown. We'll perhaps put up something from the Jazz Epistles, the Sophiatown band that included Dollar Brand (Abdullah Ibraham), Hugh Masekela, and Kippie Moeketsi. Their album, released in France in 1960, was the first appearance of South African jazz on an LP. You might say it was a small triomf.

Headline: Black Wednesday D-Day Unions Go for Jugular

2007-06-13T17:25:00.000+02:00

Michael just sent me this photo from his phone:

Jurgen Schadeberg Supplies Triomf with Photos of Sophiatown Forced Removals

2007-06-13T11:32:00.000+02:00

Michael emailed me today with these comments:

I was due to go and meet some crew on a shoot in Soweto today – it was canceled cause of the general strike – too risky. People who went to work were careful not to wear uniforms of any sort. Even maids with aprons off.

Today I spent time with Jürgen Schadeberg and his wife Claudia – the photographer of so much of SA history. He will be supplying stills of Sophiatown days and the forced removals. You can see some great stuff from the 50s on his website.

Bonne nuit a toi et a Bart…

Bonne nuit à toi trop Michael! And...I did some research on Jürgen and found this quote in an Axis Gallery exhibition article:

"In 1994, Schadeberg was again able to photograph Mandela as a free man, gazing through the bars of his former cell on Robben Island. Jürgen Schadeberg has returned to live in Johannesburg. Together with his wife, Claudia, he has produced several films and books, which are available in the Online Store."

There is also an in-depth and very interesting article entitled Jurgen Schadeberg, still capturing Joburgers, written March 1, 2004 by Lucille Davis with lots of images here courtesy of the City of Johannesburg website.

Lost in a Hail Storm? Or How D'Ya Like That New Logo?

2007-06-12T08:18:00.000+02:00

Since I haven't heard from Michael I will assume that he is in Cape Town as he had indicated last week, meeting with the musicians referred to him by Barry and pursuing other production related activities.

This assumption is better than wondering, as I am wont to do, if he's been lost in a hail storm or has joined the strike (doubtful but you never know with Michael).

Meanwhile, Bart has been having fun with the new logo and placed it at the top of the blog. Hope you like it!

I've been busy setting up a MySpace and FaceBook account for Triomf so visit and join us there.

Location Scouting - Will This Be the "Home" Location?

2007-06-10T11:44:00.000+02:00

Well, if the neighbors agree. Here are some pictures taken with my new camera phone. You can see all Triomf movie photos at our Flickr group.

The front of the Benade's home:

The Bedroom:

Lambert's "Den":

The Miracle of Technology

2007-06-09T13:04:00.001+02:00

Spent some time Skyping with Michael this morning, helping him send a photo and video from his new phone (Sony Ericsson K790) to his MAC laptop via Bluetooth. Next step is teaching him how to send them directly to this blog - but first things first. Here's the plan...as Michael and the crew start production of the film, Michael can send photos and videos of behind-the-scenes events.

We had great success bluetoothing, although finding the files on the laptop after they were sent was a bit of a challenge.

I mentioned that he might want to find something called the "Bluetooth Manager" on his MAC so he can set up default receiving folders but one technology lesson was enough (to bore the crap out of him) for one day.

He strictly prohibited me from uploading the photo he sent me. But the video was pretty funny. Don't blink or you'll miss it.

Michael had to hurry off to meet with a casting agent. Could it be you that is chosen to work with us on this film? You never know. Subscribe to this blog so you can get the latest casting calls and any other opportunities that we dream up.

Skype and Cape Town and Bluetooth - Oh My!

2007-06-08T15:20:00.000+02:00

I've been trying to Skype Lisa – no one in… thank God she goes out from time to time.

Bart sent me some logo ideas – strange but good and trashy. Nice if a bit subtle for Joe Soap.

Have been dealing with finances most of the last 2 days. Tying up bits. And crewing is slow as this place is buzzing with TV work as the channels here have real money and make real soaps. Also international commercials ruin a lot of technicians – as the life of each commercial is fast, lucrative and short.

Will go to Cape Town soon to meet a potential Production Designer. He spoke about assistants. I answered, “What assistants?” I painted the blackest picture of the funding and he still wants to come on board. I found him through Darrell Roodt (Director: Cry the Beloved Country, Sarafina!) and he certified that this fellow is just what we need as he is mad and frightens many people off. I'll let you know how it goes.

All those music people via Barry Van Zyl of Johnny Clegg’s Band will be seen in Cape Town while I'm there.

Meanwhile the strike goes on. A teacher who wanted to teach was badly beaten yesterday. Sometimes people here forget that the struggle against apartheid is over. It was OK to go to war against the old oppressors, but a democracy has some decency.

Cant find Bluetooth in my phone. Disaster. Will have to mail J-P of the SFR store in Paris.

This is Africa but it is 2 degrees C.

Greta Garbo and The Creature Shop

2007-06-06T09:05:00.000+02:00

So Michael emailed me today, after I requested that he go to YouTube and reply to some of the comments that have been posted about the Triomf test shoot video. Poor Michael...we're dragging him, and Greta Garbo evidently, into the information age. But he has no trouble, at the end of the day, ordering a rat face...

Here's a word (or 39) from our Director:

I ANSWERED THOSE COUPLE OF COMMENTS ON THE YOUTUBE MOVIE PAGE. As I explore the technological jungle, I have to sign up everywhere. Giving away all that secret information. Would Greta Garbo give her age? Then all these passwords not longer not shorter than… it took me eight goes to succeed in not being rejected. There is this sense that the machine is defiant. It is stronger than you. I feel I am throwing rocks at a wall. How will I ever remember all those different log-in names… cause someone has aways stolen yours long ago – the sense of having been replaced, repressed.

DID YOU GET WHAT YOU NEEDED FROM JOSE? AND ARE YOU IN TOUCH WITH BRUNO?

Today I spent four hours driving to THE CREATURE SHOP in hail storms that only ever happen in November and December – never in the winter which is when you must come and shoot in South Africa as it NEVER rains in June. Graham showed me his bag of tricks – lions that yawn, baboons that jump and crocs that snap. I need him to make a mask for my lead actor Lionel Newton who becomes a ratman in the mind of his nephew Lambert towards the end of the film.

tried skype but yous out.
Thanks for your comments Bart – you’re always a pleasure to read.
I must now master the camera and BLUETOOTH – what the hell is it? What does it do?

Now my challenge - how to explain bluetooth in 10 words or less? How's this: short-range wireless communication between devices. Kind of corporate speakish but it's a start.

Nothing Can Stop TRIOMF! Unless...

2007-06-05T21:26:00.000+02:00

Sitting in Johannesburg, capital of South Africa – land of paradoxes and social divides, STARTING for the third time this film called TRIOMF (a miss-noma for this movie with its history for DISASTER). But this time it’s really going…. I think…. unless… a bomb drops, a backer kicks the bucket, the lead actor has a nervous breakdown, or someone sues… or there’s a national strike.

And there is. A strike. The very day I arrived. The hospitals are shut, people are dying of their ailments, teachers are beating up kids who want to do their homework – the world has gone mad; since when do kids want to work?

Keep calm, Michael; this movie thing is making you live out your fictions. I go to bed for a day.

I awake and its still there. The strike. No movie. This is a hard-core strike like in the good ole days of Margret Thatcher.

Oh well, I go down to ”Expresso” in the chique northern suburb of Parkhurst quite far from strike zones, and have a coffee with Darrell Roodt, the most prolific South African director of Sarafina and Cry The Beloved Country et alia, including very small budget pics – his Yesterday in Zulu was nominated for an Oscar. We meet so he can suggest crew folk who will work for art and not lucre on small-time TRIOMF …

Now to the real grind of pre pre pre production to find the right car hire at zero rent a wreck prices, and the right bottom prices of everything needed. The strike becomes background on TV as I am not yet in hospital or enrolled in any school. So I’m going to just get on with prep and meet crew, and actors and stuff…. Good night or nite dear bloggers of the world united.

Michael is in South Africa

2007-06-05T19:55:00.000+02:00

After flight delays Michael finally made it to South Africa a couple of days ago. He has secured a nice apartment with a large "American style" kitchen and he loves his coffee pot. (Don't ask) He called us via Skype and using the video camera that comes integrated with his MAC (grrrr...my expensive Dell XPS doesn't have video or a microphone!), he gave us a tour of his apartment. He even has his own garden.

This afternoon in an email he said:

I am crewing up and very busy as I don’t want to find I run out of time. But now I have mastered the email on the phone which works as an MMS that converts to email – AND will only respond to a received email i.e you can’t just send one off to someone. Jesus, they never tell you any of these irritations!

I helped him get a new phone before he left Paris since his was from WWII or thereabouts. But he's had some struggles getting it up and running. We hope he can live blog from the phone while in production and on the set. Stay tuned for all of this ground-breaking techno movie making fun.

South African Directors Meet at Cannes...Both of 'em!

2007-05-25T09:33:00.000+02:00

Now where am I? In Cannes. My Executive Producer Lyndon from London whom I bring here to meet Bruno the French producer to see if they get along. After four nights of leaving them together in a zillion Cannes parties until they rolled home at dawn – I guess the trip is a success.

I met Darrell Roodt for the first time despite our similarish careers (he is the most prolific South African director of Sarafina and Cry The Beloved Country et alia, including very small budget pics – his Yesterday in Zulu was nominated for an Oscar), and where he tells me he was inspired in 1982 by my first movie “The Grass Is Singing”, and I answer that I was madly jealous of his 1986 film “Sarfina” = bla bla bla of darling film directors as fake sycophants. But I like Darrell, really, and we moan at political correctness that ignores many filmmakers from the southern part of the continent of Africa (like him and me) who are not black-black, but brown or pale yet make real African movies. But to hell with it, the point is we fight on and make movies and they are ‘us’ from the heart like any movie or art can only be. Not my fault guys – I just do what I know. And the only judge is the public who sees them – and if they like them it means they work, if not, change career.

It's Hot Here!

2007-05-24T14:14:00.000+02:00

Hello All. I've been here in Cannes since Tuesday and thought I'd be back to Paris today but now it looks more like Saturday.

It's been too hectic to post to the blog in the last few days but I will give you more details soon.

Warm regards from very hot sticky New Orleansish Cannes.

Preparing for Cannes

2007-05-21T09:35:00.001+02:00

Today I am packing and preparing for Cannes. I'll be meeting with my producers before I go off to Jo'burg to begin production. It will be a madhouse there but everyone I need to meet with will be in one place.

Including Mr. Borat and his assistants. They'll be helping me with something. Haven't decided what yet, but I will figure it out soon enough.

IS THIS A BEGINNING…??? Or is it...?

2007-05-21T09:15:00.000+02:00

The kick off for this production line-up began when we had brunch at Joe Allen’s in Paris on 20 May, 2007 years after the birth of The Father, as we sat in a locale linked to London, New York, Miami – Joe Allen’s restaurant, a global village for nearly 40 years, launched in four transatlantic cities before such concepts were even born. Now, global culture has encircled the earth. We five brunchers scrolling our mobiles – those tools that hold our future in store, our messages, our films, our books, our entire vision of life – and we’re talking about how to get my unmade film ‘Triomf’ onto those tiny ubiquitous machines so that it can be magically thrown out and up and over to every connected soul. First the message that the new film is about to be born at last, then - one day next year - the final thing itself and in its entirety, roaring around out there.

Jose, the sound mixer, talks about Pro Tools. He can go on about machines for hours. So I tune out. But slowly get drawn back in by the word “revolutionary” used more than a few times, which is what he is going to be doing with a machine that normally sits in a studio mixing sounds, and which he is proposing to carry onto the set in a bag…. no, two bags because one has to hold the Mac that runs the mixer, or the other way around – or anyway the machines will talk to one another for the first revolutionary time while being roped round Jose’s waist in special bags.

Then Lisa and Bart who have become instant friends since appearing physically out of a rental ad to hire my apartment while I go off and make TRIOMF talk of some company that makes bags and how revolution will come soon to this bag company by means of a never-before-seen bag to hold a laptop in its ‘open’ position on someone’s hip like a Colt 45. Good heavens to Betsy! My film is now revolutionary – not through its content, but through machines (telephones that do nearly everything except make coffee, and computers that hang off the body, and mixers that roam, and bags and bags more).

And now Bart and Lisa are outreaching left, right and centre. BUT, and it’s a big ‘but’ – I have to supply this drivel to a thing called a blog that everyone of course knows about but cavemen like myself for whom a blog is a bog misspelt. Anyway, ladies and gents, I’m trying. Promising not to be too dull. Although trivia is supposed to be the spice of blogs rather like boredom is part of life and therefore if you do not have it you might think you’re dead, but if you do have it you’ll feel right at home as if you were sitting in your own bog (those in the British cultural zone crap not on John but in a bog –- hey! since I am on my first outreach, hey, you out there! you I cannot see, can you tell me, please, why John got to be bogged on – and who was this guy John?? [is this not one of the educational perks of blogging to be able to ask about something you are too lazy to find out about yourself?] ).

Now I'll jump forward to ---- now - it’s the 5th June 2007. Are such lacunae of time allowed on bogs, oops blogs? And that word ‘lacunae’ – should it be blogged down to dumb gap? (Answer me again out there – hey you I cannot see!)