WINDHOEK– The Namibia Film Commission (NFC) has set aside N$ 3million for the development of local films including Namibia’s first feature film that is scheduled to premiere in September in 2015.
According to Rosalia Penda, NFC Board Vice Chairperson, 19 applications for funding of documentary films were received and nine for feature projects. After thorough screening, two local production companies emerged as winners for short films, Clever Clogs Productions, and Red Hot Productions. The short film Himba Girl, produced by Clever Clogs Productions has received N$ 200, 000 from the NFC, and Soul Taker,written by the late Songa Simasiku, and to be produced by Red Hot Productions received N$ 200000.
Himba Girl is set in the rural Caprivi where a young Ndamona’s life is marred with trauma and grief as she is the only one who knows that her father killed her mother.Penda also noted that the NFC bought two scripts from our local writers, Himba Girl and Soul Taker, which needed to be developed further. This process was led by Thandi Brewer, a working scriptwriter of television and feature films who is also a mentor and lead trainer for the Spark programme, a script training initiative facilitated by the National Film and Video Foundation in South Africa.
Two projects, From Waterberg to Waterberg and Game On were chosen for this year’s documentary projects. From Waterberg to Waterberg deals with the history of Ovaherero trek out of Namibia between 1904 – 1905 to South Africa and back to Namibia in 1923 and will be produced by the production company Mamokobo Video and Research. This project received N$ 300 000 as well as N$ 300 000 for Game on, a story about Namibia’s wildlife conservancies to be produced by African Productions.
Namibia’s first feature film Land of the Brave ,which is a crime story dealing with life in post-apartheid Namibia, corruption, violence against women, poverty will be produced by Tim Huebschle.
Huebschle has received N$ 750 000 towards the production of this feature film.
The NFC has since the beginning of this year done local screenings free of charge to communities in the Hardap, Karas, Kunene, Otjozondupa and Omaheke regions as well as at local-budget Expos. It has furthermore trained 50 rural filmmakers in Rundu and Katima Mulilo in basic scriptwriting skills.
By Jemima Beukes