Independent documentary makers are a tribe apart. With their feet on the ground, their heads in the clouds and their hearts firmly rooted in their raison d’être they work with zeal and will in a world bent on profit and gain. In South Africa their work enjoys select platforms like Encounters South African International Documentary Film Festival, which puts audiences and filmmakers in the same room. We spoke to Calum MacNaughton, one of three filmmakers responsible for Mama Goema, a documentary on original and contemporary Cape Town music which premiered at Encounters 2011. Up for discussion: the retail of real tales, African identity today and the importance of an intelligent and sensitive embrace of indigenous cultural diversity.
CCT: Goema music (and where it’s going) is one of the best examples we have of contemporary South African music and culture. Yet very few are aware of this style. Did you feel that the audience responded positively?
Calum: There are many perspectives on goema. While respectfully acknowledging the conservative position that this music belongs to the working people of Cape Town, Mama Goema favours the evolutionary position that goema is the ultimate metaphor for our city’s cultural diversity. We need to shake off separation politics and embrace the potential of inclusion and multiculturalism. Musicians who get this reach global audiences because they have something to bring to the table. The only time we indulge the perspective of apartheid in our film is when Mac McKenzie, speaking of the attitude of The Genuines in the late 1980s, says “White people listening to white music, black people listening to black music, coloured people listening to coloured music… That’s a load of rubbish!” Our audience on Saturday night responded positively to this but this was no surprise as they’re the architects of goema as a contemporary movement.
CCT: Mama Goema is about homegrown music. Should we be thinking of homegrown ways to distribute local films beyond Encounters so that they may be seen outside of city centres around the country?
Calum: We’re hoping that though this film we’re helping local audiences re-imagine our homegrown music. Mama Goema provides audiences with a matrix for understanding and appreciating what’s going on musically in this city. Ultimately, goema becomes a manifesto that we can hang Cape Town movements on. Given that watching this film will enrich many people’s experience of original Cape Town music, we’re interested in exploring the possibility of pairing screenings of this film with performances, goema orchestra. Naturally, we’d like to reach audiences beyond the Waterfront or CBD and particularly communities who are acknowledged as the ambassadors of goema in its carnival form. If we had the support, a travelling roadshow providing screenings and performances in community centres would be worth exploring.
CCT: Goema is also about modern local identities. What did you understand about emerging SA identities through the film’s research and shooting? Where, for example, do the three main filmmakers of Mama Goema fit into this identity?
Calum: We’re three individuals, each with a complete set of eccentricities and mental pathologies. Goema is our lowest common denominator. I think micro and macro identities are the way forward.
CCT: Have you (and the crew) developed new ways of seeing, believing and acting through making this documentary?
Calum: We’ve all had our personal journeys. We’re more experienced and have better eyes and ears.
CCT: Where does modern goema music fit into the entertainment and lifestyle scene of South Africa or Cape Town? That is, where do you think it should be shared for best reception? Cape Town Festival? Libraries? Street corners in Khayelitsha?
Calum: Goema as we discuss it in the film has manifested itself over the years in many different forms. The idea needs to be promoted and anyone is welcome to take up the mantel. The more numerous and varied the approaches, the better. Having said this, we should avoid treating Goema as a brand. This is a movement with an evolutionary process behind it.
CCT: The film premieres at Encounters Film Fest. How have your dealings with Encounters informed your views on the kind of support the event offers independent documentary makers? Are you impressed? Disillusioned? Was it difficult to be accepted into the programme? Any advice to other independent film makers on the subject?
Calum: Hard to say given that this is my first experience with film festival. Encounters is the platform that documentaries made in Cape Town seek to premiere on. The people at Encounters who interface with filmmakers are very supportive and the festival has an underlying loyalty toward good Cape Town stories. It’s a non-profit platform but creates valuable marketing momentum for films. For Mama Goema, it provided an opportunity to assemble participants and collaborators and let them be the first to experience the film in this format (which we felt was very important).
CCT: But you’ve had a good reception?
Calum: Yes. This is by far the lowest budget or least resourced production at the festival, yet we sold enough tickets to be given an additional screening.
CCT: That’s quite an achievement.
Calum: Proof that individuals with a handicap can compete with dedicated production companies. It’s also testament to the relationships we’ve nurtured over the last two years. Twenty interviewees and 30 compositions featured!
CCT: Have you had interest from sympathetic international film festivals or distributors?
Calum: Early days! They haven’t found us yet. We haven’t found them.
CCT: Did you get any external financial assistance?
Calum: Not a cent. Much of this film was “financed” by value exchanges that did not involve the use of cash.
CCT: What next, an anthropological ninja rap exposé? What do you think still needs to be written, researched and shot in terms of documentaries on SA cultures and realities?
Calum: There are a million amazing South African music stories to tell. We need to broaden the knowledge of our musical heritage in the collective consciousness before we can create modern, original South African music on a broader scale.
Next month Creative Cape Town explores funding – and how to find it - in a series of informative articles released over three months.
All images compliments of Profoundly South African
