presence

Presence. It had a great impact on the work how seriously children took the project. When working together with us, at shooting or at other tasks they took it very seriously, they were very active and worked with pleasure on acting out, brain-storming, or writing the scenes.

On the other hand, for some hidden reason they quite often missed out our sessions. Maybe they were busy with their daily tasks, school, family, and friends. This was quite unfavourable in the sense that we had less time for working together, for example out of two Saturdays of shooting only some of them appeared on the first, and the second we had to put off as nobody could attend the session. Other times only some of the kids were missing, but this still set back our work. Each time we had to be very flexible with our plans, so we practically changed the programme day by day. There were scenes that we left out from the film and others that we spontaneously edited to the project. /One of these was the love story of Rosa María and Demba or that Deniel’s role (the father) was acted by András./

Interest was not only related to other “businesses”. Framing the film is a creative, zippy and fascinating work which gives an opportunity to self-expression, emergence. Those, who are not actually performing, are bored. Often they have to wait for the equipment or the scenes to be shot again and again. If someone does not see the goal in front of his eyes permanently – and 14 year old kids see it less as the older teens – they loose interest in work quickly. The difference in the interest of the 3 “sides” gave special dynamics to the development of the project. Monika was interested in the research, observation, therefore in the process. Katalin wanted to finish the film, therefore she was stressing the production. Kids wanted different things, mainly fast success in their personal relations and in acting.

questions and changes

Questions and changes: It was questionable from the beginning how our plan suits the local conditions; and how the environment and the participants alongside with other collaborates influence the process by virtue, including the project team.
It was obvious from the first day that the realisation of the project depended on the selection of the participant children as well as that of locations. The effects of age and gender differences ant the existing emotional relations fundamentally affected the work and the development of the story.