Uganda
Uganda’s film industry is reaching for the stars
Uganda’s international film festival Amakula From reinventing itself after the Almost-three years ago, in this year’s Ugandan Director. In addition to Auto and open-air cinema, it offers a platform for young Creatives.
Ugandan Movie: Bala Bala Sese
Under the stars on one of the many hills of Uganda’s capital, Kampala: A few dozen people sitting on Blankets in the Grass, some sitting in their cars behind it. You all wear headphones and vorfolgen on the giant screen banned the opening film, Bala Bala Sese, a ugandisches love drama.
After more than three years of Pause and the Almost-Off after the departure of the Danish initiators from the country of Uganda International film festival starts Amakula of these days in a new Era: This Time under the Ugandan Director and with new ideas and concepts, says Faisal Kiwewa, the Director of the Ugandan cultural Foundation, Bayimba organised by the Festival for the first Time. “The task of the festival was a huge loss for Uganda’s film industry, because all of the filmmakers were inspired by it.” That’s why he had negotiated for two years with the initiators, and, finally, last year, to reach an agreement, can the Festival take over, says Kiwewa. For the restart of the 32 has turned-Year-old, the concept and the Festival a new orientation missed. Now it takes place under the open sky, which gives it a whole new atmosphere.
Drive-in cinema in Kampala
In the 1960s and 1970s, it was in Uganda, an open-air cinema, but that has been closed for a long time, remembers Kiwewa: “We want to bring back and people are curious. You can sit in the garden on a blanket or in a drive-in theater from the Parking lot to watch.”
A school for Uganda’s young filmmakers
Uganda’s film scene is still very young and manageable. There are a handful of small production companies. However, even Kiwewa is that it is missing many film-makers with professional techniques and Know-how in order to make productions beyond the country’s borders to be successful. He therefore organised in the framework of the festival, numerous Workshops, for example on the film history of East Africa.
One of them, Arlen Dilsizian. He is the Director of the Ugandan film school, which was founded in 2010. “The idea behind it was that there was no school, to the students for two years, really the art of filmmaking, and something about African movie to learn history,” says Dilsizain. Each year, around 100 interested persons, the selected best will be 25 to apply. “We are now accredited by the Ministry of education,” says Dilsizain easier. “That was not so easy, because in the Ministry there was no one who is familiar with the Film and the Curriculum could check.”
Children’s Cartoons: a whole new division
A similar experience has also made David Musanso. The founder of the production company, CROSSROADS has studied in London film school and then came back to Uganda. In the Luggage of a a for Ugandan conditions revolutionary dream: He wanted to make animation movies, Cartoons for children. But first, he found no one in Uganda’s small scene in the movie, was able to assist him in the implementation.
New target: Ugandan primary school students
Before he could really get started, he had to train a whole Team, he says. “Even So, Pixar and Walt Disney have once started. Also, they had to teach people to build a Team,” says Musanso optimistic. “We have just developed a Comic book series for kindergarten children and elementary school students that teaches how to solve problems.” The series was developed by a teacher. Musanso want to distribute it in TV and on DVD. “In Uganda, there were never Cartoons for children, this is new,” he says.
Because children are a new target group:
The middle class is growing rapidly, and the number of TVs in the living rooms. The main consumers of TV programs are usually for children, but the local stations show any of the children programs. With its Cartoon-series Musanso has discovered a gap in the market and at the same time more than 30 jobs in a new industry.