Martin Cuff Consulting

LOVE JGL. Love Seth Rogen. Love The Big C (tv show, not life-threatening disease.) This? Not so sure.

Still with my American History theme, it was Memorial Day and the much vaunted Ridley-and-Tony-Scott brother’s History Channel docudrama Gettysburg was on tv. So how do you cram three days of fighting and more than 50,000 dead in one of the most bloody and revered battles of the Civil War into two hours of Prime Time entertainment for a nation that is in fact actually at war?

Viscerally, is how. Although there are plenty of facts and diagrams and talking head academics, the Scotts mostly go for blood, guts and CGI gore. This was the world’s first technological conflict, so we see rifle butts smash into skulls, grooved bullets rip into thighs, eardrums shatter from the loudness of canon-fire, tin cans whistle and explode overhead allowing tiny ball-bearings tear through tens of men – think Black Hawk Down with bayonets and no anesthetic. I get that they were trying to remind us of the brutality, the dehumanization of war. Except I’m not sure, in this video-game age, that this is not distracting, rather than thought-provoking. Anyway. For what it’s worth, it filmed in Cape Town, South Africa.

Incidentally, also, Ta-Nehisi Coates, the (highly highly recommended) blogger with The Atlantic who is currently undertaking a very nuanced and personal educational journey into the manifestation of American slavery, exposed me to something I really did not know: the origin of Memorial Day as an honoring of Union dead by the black community of Charleston. Astounding. Astounding also that it’s been largely forgotten.

James Peak of The Location Guide talks to AFCI caretaker manager Martin Cuff about his appointment and plans:

After the unexpected departure of CEO Larry Brownell, the Association of Film Commissioners has a new caretaker manager. Martin Cuff is an economics expert based in Cape Town, South Africa. So the most American of institutions has hired someone outside Hollywood? Who is this guy, and what is he doing? And is he interested in the job on a permanent basis?

Martin is a film sector specialist: “I have a small business that specialises in establishing and mentoring film commissions around the world. I’ve run film commissions and film permit offices on two continents. I was the first African representative to be voted onto the AFCI board. I’m the only foreigner to ever have been hired in to run a US state film commission….

Click here for more.

Hanna is a frustratingly inconsistent film. Part fairy tale, part campy Bourne Identity, part Cliff Richard’s Summer Holiday, its unevenly paced and every single actor is forced into some inexplicably unwieldy accent or other. It’s about super-kids, if that’s not giving away too much of the plot, and it felt to me a bit uncomfortable, like watching child abuse. Saoirse Ronan is good though, I’ll give her that (though like The Child, I kept wanting to tell her to tie her hair back). Olivia Williams is in it too, so there’s a bit of proper elocution, finally.

And I’m delighted to say that the locations are one of the best thing in the entire film. One of the earlier locations used is the severe, concrete site of the Berlin Windkanal – the Nazis’ aerodynamic testing windtunnel – a site that appeared in ons eie Charlize’s Aeon Flux (and was in turn the movie location that started me on the road to writing this blog.) The other-worldly abandoned amusement park is an actual site in the former East Germany called Spree Park; the owners shipped all the funfair rides off to Peru (honest) and ended up as cocaine smugglers. You can’t make this up. They left the dinosaurs and mammoths behind to slowly decay, like some post-apocalyptic Creation Museum in Boondocks, Kentucky.

So today I’m heading off on a mission with Leonie Berning, who’s the manager of the revitalised Zululand Film Office. As the website blurb says: “The Northern Kwa-Zulu Natal Film Office’s objective is to promote and market the Northern Kwa-Zulu Natal District as a prime location for Stills and Film Production companies…… from the bustle of Ballito in the south to the harbour city of Richards Bay and the open wilderness areas of the north, the Zululand and Ilembe North Coast regions offer creative visual practitioners a scenic diversity and multi-cultural heritage not easily found elsewhere….The Northern Kwa-Zulu Natal Film Office vision is to position NORTHERN KWA-ZULU NATAL in the global spotlight as prime film destination, thus creating sustainable employment opportunities, develop skills within the related market as well as promoting local and international tourism.”

Northern KZN is already in some demand as a tropical production destination, but we’re going to be doing a rapid introduction to some of the production companies and other film practitioners in Cape Town – those businesses that are most likely to actually bring productions to KZN – putting faces to names, and starting on the road towards relationships of trust that are so important for film commissions and offices. We’ll also be brainstorming some of the options available to the region, and generally just finding answers to all sorts of questions. We’re also going to Cape Town Film Studios for a tour, which will be a first for me. I’ve never met Leonie, but since we started chatting in November, I’ve been impressed by her energy, her enthusiasm, and her whacky sense of humour. So I’m looking forward to it.

I’ve just come back from a few days in Antalya, Turkey, where I was keynote speaker at a national Film Commissions’ conference. Organised by the erudite and thoroughly entertaining Mr Zihni Tumer and his team, the conference gathered eight cities from all over the country under the auspices of the Ministry of Information, Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the General Directorate of Motion Pictures and Copyrights, to discuss Film Commissions and how they might work in Turkey.

Over two days I was invited to outline the opportunities, benefits, possible structures of film commissions in Turkey, as well as explain their objectives, functions and key interventions. The fascinating Stefan Roesch also spoke about Film Tourism, and the gentlemanly George David also demonstrated the hugely successful Royal Film Commission of Jordan as a case study, and shared some of the fantastic things being done in Amman to build a dynamic, professional crew base. I also had the pleasure of meeting producer Manu Gargi, who’d just wrapped Ghost Rider 2 in the country (starring the awful Nicky Cage – above) and had very good things to say about his experiences. He even had nice things to say about Mr. Cage, which of course I couldn’t actually understand…..

Anyway, all eight cities will now be encouraged to prepare models that suit their local jurisdictions, and we’ll reconvene in a few months to assess progress.

And now for something completely different. Along with my fine colleagues from the USAID Serbia Competitiveness Project, I’m attending World Travel Market in London. According to the blurb, “World Travel Market is a must-attend four-day business-to-business event where the global travel trade meets, networks, negotiates and conducts business under one roof.” Last year, 187 countries & regions were represented, 5121 companies exhibited, and 14221 trade professionals participated.

We’re here to work on a City of Belgrade City Breaks program, that we’re producing in co-operation with the Tourism Organisation Belgrade, on the bright-and-white Serbia stand. Our goal here is to have direct face-to-face access to top European tourism professionals, be exposed to the latest developments in the travel industry (which will influence our activities in Serbia), build relationships with potential business partners to develop City Breaks Tourism in Serbia, and position Serbia for competitive advantage within the tourism sector. So there.

So far, we’ve met with Destination Management Companies, Group Travel Organisers, Tour Operators and Travel Agencies. Interesting though; there’s not a great deal of product differentiation in the European market. Whether that’s because they’re all basically selling the same product, or because that’s how the market likes to receive its information, is something I hope to discover over the next couple of days.

HBO shot Fatherland in Prague in 1994 – a year in which we were somewhat pre-occupied in the Republic of South Africa – so I missed it entirely. In fact I’d never even heard of it until I caught it on tv today. Based on a Thomas Harris novel of the same name, it’s set in 1964 and starts with an intriguing premise: that Hitler defeated the Allies in 1944 and established a Nazi super-state across Europe.

Against this backdrop, President (Joseph) Kennedy is about to arrive on a State Visit to meet the 75-year old Hitler to formally end the Cold War; Hitler needs American support to finally defeat the Soviets in the East. But the Germans have a nasty little secret that threatens to derail the entire deal….. An American journalist and a German detective investigate.

It’s definitely a tv movie in size and scope, but it’s a pretty chilly thriller nonetheless. And the Nazi meets the 60s styling is impressive too.

For a while I thought Roller Derby was a made-up sport, like Dodgeball, or Extreme Ping-Pong. Turns out there really is a competition where girls in short-shorts pummel the hell out of each while skooting round an indoor bike track on rollerskates. Who knew?! And the girls take on such rockin’ names too -  my favourite: Smashley Simpson. All this – the rules, the myths, the bruises – is marvellously evoked in Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut “Whip It!”

“Whip It” (so named after a killer move that’ll get the protagonist four valuable points on the scoreboard) stars the can-do-no-wrong Ellen Page as Bliss, a grunge-leaning teenager unhappily stuck in Bodeen, Texas, with a part-time job in the say-no-more Oink Joint, a postal mom (literally) who’s obsessed with beauty pageants and deportment, and a sweet-n-savvy best friend who’ll be on the first bus out after graduation. One fortuitous day Bliss stumbles upon Roller Derby and her life’s turned upside down. Sweet, funny and laden with friendship, it’s like a coming of age movie, but on wheels.

In spite of the strong Texas location, the production actually filmed in Detroit, no doubt taking advantage of Michigan tax breaks and the fact that warehouse space can be bought for a dollar an acre now there’s a recession.  To support the all-star cast of grrrrl-power, (Kirsten Wiig, Zoe Bell, Eve – awesome!), real roller girls were selected from local Michigan teams such as The Detroit Derby Girls, and The Grand Raggidy Roller Girls.

Just a week to go until we open the doors at the V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre.

For broadcasters, bloggers, photographers and writers, the V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre offers a range of turn-key solutions including hot desks with high speed internet access, editing facilities, camera, lighting and equipment hire, libraries of rights-cleared music, photography and HD video footage, production services from live studio broadcasts to roving news teams to single photo-journalists, studio space and camera positions through the Waterfront and beyond. We are also able to offer events and press conference facilities accommodating from 20 to 1500 guests. We’re also the place you’ll need to come to if you want permits to film or shoot anywhere within the 300 hectare Waterfront zone.

The V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre doesn’t just offer service, it also offers content. We have own Content Website, where you can find Stock Photography, Stock Video Library and accompanying editorial. And we’ll also be posting and updating great local stories on everything from South African soccer history and local culture to a daily diary of events – in short, offering a great pool of unique leads and angles for you to develop.