South Africa continues to be a revelation.  Last year I arrived to help organize the Enter The Pitch competition SA. We had high hopes but no idea who would enter.  (The competition opens for new submissions soon)  The prize is full professional support and financing of your short film!

Our full field was relatively small to start (as expected in the first year) but we managed to have six amazing finalists.  Over the course of a long weekend (our residential), we worked with the group and worked individually.

Their three-minute pitches vastly improved from their original submissions. After questions and critiques, their five-minute pitches made a further leap forward. Additional feedback took their following twelve-minute pitches to a solidly professional level.

Quite honestly, each pitch would have been a deserving winner.  In the final analysis, and in an astonishing precedent-breaking development we named two winners. The judging panel was enthusiastically unanimous that both pitches MUST win.  It’s never happened in a decade of competition in the UK, and we certainly never expected it would happen here in SA

It was quite literally a magic moment both for the winners and for the competition.  One winning story (The Second) is set in rural Kwazulu Natal in the dying years of apartheid. It is a profound story of hope in the midst of chaos and violence.  It was pitched by our youngest ever winner, Mpumelelo Kheswa (22) and will be our first ever film in a foreign language (Zulu). The other, pitched by Howard James Fyvie, ( Ramsey) is our first animation and comedy. It retells the story of Abraham and Isaac from the perspective of the ram. “Ramsey” believes he is destined for greatness and that this will be as a stand-up comic. (It is a hilarious dark comedy!)

I am so proud to be working on the development of both short films.

Here are our finalists–

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