Sunday 4th March 2012 - Remembering the first visit to Afghanistan

Sunday 4th March 2012 - Off on another plane, this time to Hobart in Tasmania. It’s been another packed day but I thought I’d spend some time answering an email I’ve received. ‘Why did you go to Afghanistan in the first place and how did you meet Mir?’. Well, it’s a bit of a tale but here goes:

July 2002: A warlord's guesthouse, central Afghanistan. A long way from home. I am, perhaps surprisingly, really quite comfortable. There are no luxuries but the floors are clean, the thin foam mattress supports my weary bones nicely and, above all, breakfast, lunch and dinner arrive in a rolled up plastic mat straight to my feet. Bread and oily brown soup, rice, an egg, some Pepsi, an apple or two. Did I say no luxuries? Forgive me; this was the height of luxury. Wonderful. Waking at 5am, the near-darkness lent an air of unreality. I was indeed a long way from home. Peeking out of the window, I could see the first wash of light stroking the early risers; men wrapped in blankets who were shuffling along the road outside. I dressed and crept down the well-worn mud-brick staircase and out into the courtyard. Silence. I banged my camera’s tripod against the wooden gates on the way out and the sound echoed off the high defensive walls. But no-one stirred. I looked to the mountains on my left. The Hindu Kush – the ‘Killers of Hindus’ - an unpleasant name for such a magnificent view. Two women, head to toe in sky blue, drifted past averting their gaze. A dog barked. Ahead of me was one of the world’s most extraordinary tourist attractions except there were no tourists any more.

What had once been a favourite stop on the bus route from Europe to India was very much now off-limits. The cliff that I was approaching contained two huge vertical niches into which, 1400 years earlier, two statues of Buddha had been carved. These ‘Buddhas of Bamiyan’ were the most famous spot in Afghanistan. Bamiyan, a verdant valley at 2500 metres, is bordered by two cliffs – in between which cultivated fields are dotted with mud-brick houses, each like a fort. Those homes – like the one in which I was staying – were little changed from the time the Buddhas were built. Their size and defensive nature told a story: the Silk Route that passed through this valley, linking Central Asia with India, had brought both wealth and trouble. These enormous statues, each of a calm Buddha gazing serenely across the valley, had marked this spot for centuries with impunity. Then the statues, having lost their faces to Islamic soldiers in the 18th century, were utterly destroyed by the brutal Taliban regime in March 2001. Over a period of two weeks, the Taliban had packed explosives in crevices around the statues and, despite last-minute offers of $50m from both Japan and the Metropolitan Museum of New York, they lit the fuses. For a brief period, this remote valley in central Afghanistan had been front page news. Few held sympathies for a regime that was just as brutal to its own people. It was said that on this very road a woman had been beaten to death for showing her ankles. True or not, countless atrocities like it had indeed happened. During the rule of the Taliban – and in the preceding Russian occupation and civil war - an estimated two million people had been killed. Two million. This was undoubtedly a land of guns and rocket launchers. I was carrying my camera and a microphone. A year earlier and had I been seen with a camera I’d have been thrown into jail. But then the world had been turned upside down by the Al-Qaida attacks on the eastern coast of the United States. In the fall-out, US President Bush had given the Taliban an ultimatum: hand over their ‘guest’ Osama Bin Laden and stay in power or refuse and face the consequences. The Taliban refused, Bin Laden fled, the US and a wide coalition of international forces forged a united and rapidly successful front of Afghan anti-Taliban groups under the title of the Northern Alliance.

I had followed this story in the news back home and had found it all very confusing and very far away. Yet now here I was making use of the hospitality of one of those very warlords who had fought against the Taliban. Walking down this dusty road in central Afghanistan, I wondered to myself what exactly did I have in mind? More immediately, would I even be allowed to get my camera out? The only way to know if I had any chance of making any kind of film was to set my camera up and see what the reaction was. A few people stared curiously at me as I walked but most went casually about their early-morning business – tending crops by the roadside, urging donkeys laden with produce towards the bazaar, collecting water in yellow containers from the single stream. At the remains of the larger of the two Buddhas, I stopped. Three Afghan men stood talking, leaning on shovels alongside wheelbarrows. They were clearly about to start a day’s work. The three were exactly what one would have expected Afghan men to look like if your only point of reference was the TV news: turbaned and bearded. ‘Here goes’, I thought. I set up my tripod and slid the camera on to it. The three men turned towards me and picked up their shovels. I smiled nervously while also keeping my hand on the tripod’s quick release button just in case. I pressed ‘record’. A sudden move and the men sprang into action; one jumped into a wheelbarrow and started dancing and the other two began singing.

Then, while I was looking through the lens and marvelling at the unpredictability of human behaviour, something else strange happened. A little child in a colourful hat suddenly stood in front of the camera and stared down the lens. It was a split second and I barely noticed but that was the first time that I saw Mir. It was a fleeting moment but it was enough. That chance moment subsequently led to his face being seen by audiences around the world.

(More on Afghanistan tomorrow...)

Thursday 1st March

Thursday 1st March
Now here’s a tough one. I have been asked to do a lecture on my top ten documentaries…Crumbs! I’ve been mulling that over. Where to start? It’s so easy to think about the last two or three years but I’ve been watching docs for 30+ years – and then there is 70-odd years before that too. And Top Ten in what sense? My favourites to watch? The ones I feel were the best made? The most effective? The most popular? Go on, take a moment or two and think for yourself which ones come to mind. Naturally I can’t vote for my own so I’ll have to think of another ten! (My own top three would be THE BOY MIR, IN SEARCH OF BEETHOVEN and HEAVY WATER)… Only kidding, right, let’s go. 


Image from IMDb

Night Mail, loved it. The mix of photography, music and poetry were and remain wonderful. I wish we had more films like that today. Koyaanisqatsi (or however on earth you spell it) – a very influential film for me. I remember seeing it when it first came out – and it showed me how documentary can be anything the director wants. It doesn’t need interviews or narration. And those shots of the packed Twin Towers’ escalators have taken on such a meaning for me now.  Dennis O’Rourke’s Cunnamulla – shot on a PD150 in his typically direct, bit tricky, emotional but certainly signature style. I saw it at Sheffield and decided I wanted to do feature docs too. My Muhammad Ali feature doc that I then made opened the next year’s festival and remains one of my proudest days.



Image from IMDb



Others: Little Dieter needs to Fly, Touching the Void, Anvil, The Great Silence, The Elements, Shed your tears and Walk Away, got to be something from Errol Morris surely…and what about those hundreds of docs on TV I’ve watched…hmmm, dozens of poor ones but some of those old Modern Times were super.… and the work of my buddy David Bickerstaff…OK, I’ll need to think about this…oh, and some non-English language ones….

Anyway, back to today: had a screening this evening of THE BOY MIR. It was particularly nice as lots of the Adelaide Afghans came and I always enjoy the screenings when Afghans are there – not least because they can hear the profanities in the background which are not in the subtitles. Half the audience are giggling and the other half guessing why. It’s very interesting, actually; I always imagined I was making the film to inform (and entertain) a western & Japanese audience. I don’t remember ever really taking into account the Afghans who might see it. Now, I realise my mistake – they are actually the most important audience of all. Why? Two reasons: first, I have had so many Afghans who have said they watch the film again and again at home – they adore seeing their homeland, hearing the jokes, seeing a film that is actually about Afghans not foreign soldiers. Some talk of their parents watching the film maybe once a week, every week! So the film has really offered something to many Afghans in exile and that is wonderful. Also, I had not predicted at all how many wish the film were shown immediately in Afghanistan to reinforce two keys things: first, that education is essential and for those who have it, look at Mir, and know not to take schooling for granted.

Secondly, I have had at least a handful of Afghans stand up and declare ‘I am Pashtun. I have always looked down on the Hazara but, after this film, I will never do so again’. My ego and ambition want more for the film but actually aren’t those Afghan responses enough? After the film I went to dinner with about 30 of the audience – I couldn’t resist the offer of kebabs – and was very touched by how much the film meant to them. The life of exiles and refugees is so tough that I’m glad a little film can bring a lot of joy.

Wednesday 29th February

Wednesday 29th February

Adelaide. Raining and grey, that’s not fair. 15 hours of screenings, meetings and press. I can’t remember a thing. Could be a very short blog. OK, OK…let me think.


There was a meeting with an American distributor which was interesting and, being over breakfast, stopped me from eating too much! Distributors are always on the lookout for shows that will sell but, unsurprisingly, are sure-fire hits and free. Doesn’t really apply to the worlds of art, classical music and social docs. Nice guy though, nice chat. Then a quick chat with local radio about tonight’s In Search of Haydn screening. Then a talk for younger film-makers about the ways to keep a production company alive. I had to give it to them straight: 95% of you will be out of business in 5 years and the other 5% will be struggling from project to project…Well, no need to sugar-coat stuff is there? Someone suggested that being a documentary film-maker means taking a vow of poverty. That makes me mad: if you think like that then you’ll behave like that. We should be able to be creative and informative without a life of penury. Of course there are wonderful rewards in what we do too. Anyway, gave them that whole spiel and then moved on.

A quick chat with a great commissioning editor from ARTE and then a quick dash to local ABC radio. Australia is great for local radio – it knocks the UK way into touch. I tried to answer the host’s questions and, in the best politician way, keep mentioning tonight's Haydn screenings… I didn’t really succeed but hopefully it all helps.

The afternoon was spent doing emails – which eats up so much time. Then after a meeting with my cinema distributor, it was off for the Haydn screening. Not a great turn-out it has to be said. Cinema was about half-full. Or half empty. They really liked the film and the Q&A went well. But it was still half empty … so went for a beer with my distributor and threw lots of ideas around: more social media, more press, more targeting of music groups, offers, flyers, digital stuff and any crazy idea we could. But it’s all more time and more money. And I need to remind myself why it matters. Back to the hotel: knackered but, hold on, better check the emails and, oh yeah, better write the blog….

Tuesday 28th February 2012

Tuesday 28th February 2012

Perth: Tuesday night. It’s a great flight to Australia – but I did feel odd flying over the top of Afghanistan knowing the characters of my film THE BOY MIR were down there fighting the cold and uncertainty of an Afghan winter. I miss being in that extraordinary country and, of course, I don’t miss it at all. Life can seem very cheap there. On we fly…


I have 45 minutes in Singapore to change planes but it’s enough to smell the humid air and let one’s mind wander to exotic adventures one could have in this part of the world. I love it here, I have to say. But no time to wax lyrical before boarding another plan for the flight to Perth…a mix of TV magazines and Family Guy videos gets me there in no time.

I might love Asia but I love Australia more and I’m delighted to be back. A cab ride into central Perth and my routine kicks in. In to the hotel room, unpack, charge computers, check emails, read notes, pack a small bag of DVDs and head for the cinema. It is the Australian premiere of In Search of Haydn and I’ve really no idea if people will come. Both my previous Mozart and Beethoven films did do well – with a lot of effort involved in pushing them. But how much of that was the name and how much the approach? Will Haydn attract people?

A few press interviews first and then with half an hour before the film starts, people start to trickle in – and trickle and trickle. It’s almost a sell-out. I am relieved and pleased. Even better: they love the film. The Q&A afterwards is a long one: how do I select the musical extracts? Why so many shots of nature? Is it hard to get permission to film musicians? Who’s next? What moment most made my hair stand on end? Who funds it? What’s your favourite bit of his music? How do you choose the interviewees?

A good crowd in Perth

So, a good start. The film actually opens (with a 2 week booking to begin with) in a few days. I didn’t tonight but I’m glad to say that directors are now able to insist on ‘appearance’ fees & expenses for such Q&As – and we should. It’s not yet the standard everywhere but it’s coming. We should be able to, of course – any other industry would charge for hours of one’s time like this. Again, film-makers have done it for free for too long. As I mentioned in a blog a few months ago, you can find yourself on a train for five hours to get to a screening and the cinema will still charge you for a cup of tea. That’s just plain mean. We have bills to pay too. Back to the hotel for the nightly stream of emails. I hope I get a good night’s sleep and slip into the timezone easily. 8 hours ahead at the moment.

Monday 27th February 2012.

Monday 27th February 2012.

Heathrow Airport. I never enjoy leaving home and I never enjoy sitting in the car-park known as the M25 but, here we are, at the airport ready to fly Qantas to Perth. After months and months of endless emails I’m finally at Day 1 of another cinema tour. Starting in Australia and then going via New Zealand to the USA. Before anyone reading this thinks ‘great idea, I must try that’, I say ‘don’t!’ It makes no commercial sense and involves 25 flights, thousands of miles of driving, 18 hour days, a gazillion emails, press interviews and post-screening Q&As. I’ve gone this route and don’t regret it but I wouldn’t advise it to anyone. One good conversation with a UK commissioning editor that results in a project being funded will be better for you or your company – and you can be home for tea. So why do it? Because I love showing my films to a live audience. I love bringing the worlds of Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn to them, the Leonardo exhibition, or the life of a small boy growing up in post-Taliban Afghanistan. I understand the numbers – one TX can get 2 or 3 million. That would take me many lifetimes in cinemas but still….


Of course, any attempt at generating an audience involves a stab at winning awards. The BAFTAS and OSCARS have just gone by. Senna nabbed the BAFTA but wasn’t even shortlisted for an OSCAR which was won by Undefeated. We were one of the films that qualified for OSCAR consideration this year and I guess it is kind of refreshing that a relatively unknown film won. But anyone who thinks the best films make the final 5 is a fool. Small groups of largely white, middle class, older men initially watch their DVDs and make their decisions…partly on the film of course, but just as much on politics, buddies, favours, and there’s a certain style of doc that Americans like. Narrated, endless music, bold clear narrative. Yes, there are exceptions that have won but, by and large, that’s how it is (in my opinion, at least). So why do we invest the time and money to enter. I do wonder. Ego I guess. The hope that it will help sell or promote the film too. Last week my film THE BOY MIR won an RTS and was shortlisted and nominated in various other awards/festivals, as were two other recent films IN SEARCH OF HAYDN and LEONARDO LIVE. The laurels look good on the DVD case but I’m not sure if any award we’ve ever won has made the blind bit of difference – except when they come with a cash prize. No-one ever rings up and says, ‘hey, we saw you win that award and we want you to make your next film with us’. Maybe that happens to other folk…

While I’m on the subject of awards, let me state publically that I can see no earthly reason why the BAFTAS, having been dragged screaming into having a best doc award then only can bring themselves to have three nominations. Seriously? Ask Anna Miralis of True Stories or Nick Fraser of Storyville or any serious doc director (i.e the ones who actually bother to watch as many docs as they can) if they feel there were only three docs this (or any) year worthy of a nomination. Ridiculous and insulting. Therein lies a key problem for documentary production as a whole – it’s belittled, disrespected, looked down upon. We try to pretend otherwise but wise up, people. Compare where you are at as a 40 or 50-years with decades of experience with your buddies who are doctors, bankers, lawyers. I’ve been invited in Australia to give some masterclasses at the AIDC and one of the sessions is with young film-makers wanting to know how to ‘make it in the industry’. A colleague of mine summed it up: I have to tell them that 95% of them will fail and the rest will struggle from project to project. My BOY MIR film has won multiple awards, had great press and lots of TV & festival screenings - and yet I don’t think I would risk the mental strain of raising the funds to make another such film. I know there are lots of other film-makers now willing to go to Afghanistan and good luck to them but the mile steeplechase of endless funding hurdles is feeling too much for my ageing bones. I’ll be sticking to my art exhibition films for TV & cinema and my composer films, also for TV & cinema. They are a struggle too but, unless something goes really wrong while filming at the National Gallery or Barbican, I won’t risk being kidnapped or blown up.

On that note, I want to end this blog with a sad note to mark what I’m sure is a shared sadness at the death of Marie Colvin and the other journalists who have died - and continue to so - in Syria, as well as the thousands of Syrians. Beyond X-factors, Dancing on Ice, Big Brother there is a wicked, weird and wonderful world out there which needs to be reported – and it is shocking that anyone has to die as a result. That’s what journalists and film-makers are for: to bring that world to the audience. I just wish the industries we work in would treat us with a bit more respect.

Still, can’t complain: off to sunny Australia.

Wednesday 8th February 2012

Wednesday 8th February 2012

I have just had the most stunning drive from Brighton to Aberystwyth on the western coast of Wales. I had a talk to students to do and then a screening in the evening of THE BOY MIR - TEN YEARS IN AFGHANISTAN. It all went very well but I want to share that the drive (accompanied by Ronald Brautigam CDs playing Beethoven) through central Wales was absolutely stunning. Sunny, with a sprinkling of snow on the ground. So, people, stop sitting in front of your computer reading blogs and take the family for a drive in your local hills....

Thursday 2nd February

Thursday 2nd February

The international screening of LEONARDO LIVE is coming up...and it's all very exciting. Here's an extract of an interview I did for a US newspaper which sums up why I'm so happy we went through so many hoops to make this film.

I have been making films for 25 years - and in recent years this has included many arts & culture films. My films IN SEARCH OF MOZART, IN SEARCH OF BEETHOVEN & IN SEARCH OF HAYDN play to good audiences in cinemas and concert halls around the world and thus I know there is in an audience out there. It is TV that has abandoned its public service ethics and gone down-market and down-hill but crowds of all ages remain who want to learn about great composers and great artists. I have made over 100 films about artists and I always feel such a sense of privilege to be in galleries after the visitors have all gone home. I wanted thus to bring all these things together and present a major exhibition not just to TV audiences but cinema audiences. TV is one thing but in the cinema it plays on a big screen in high-definition, no interruptions, great audio, like-minded folk around you, nice cup of coffee and a slice of cake...and a stunning look at the works and life of one of the most creative genius's ever to walk the planet - if that's not worth 90 minutes of your time, I don't know what is! I have close relationships with galleries around the world but above all the UK - and thus I went to talk to my friends at the National Gallery What, I asked, have you coming up in two years time that might work in cinemas...they smiled and said, we have the best possible answer to that question...Leonardo! The exhibition focusses on his time in Milan - which was the most productive time of his life. The National Gallery has brought nine of his paintings (almost half his painting output) under one roof for the one and only time in history. It has never happened before and it will never happen again. I feel so honoured to have been the one camera team to have been allowed in to film these works in detail - and to give you, the audience, a rare opportunity to share in these masterpieces. Plus we go behind-the-scenes of the exhibition too. If I have a favourite moment from the many great moments in the film, maybe it's the look at the new Leonardo painting, the Salvador Mundi. It's the first 'new' Leonardo discovered and acknowledged as one of his in over a hundred years and it's quite wonderful. The reaction has been tremendous - and the sense of pride that all over the world folk have had a chance to share in these examples of what humans are capable of means that we are certainly going to do more. We have a few already lined up and it's all very exciting. What the Met has done for opera and the National Theatre for theatre, PhilGrabskyFilms.com will try to do for art. When you look at so many of the feature films out there - $100m productions that seem little more than an excuse to show violence of one sort or another - there has to be room for small projects like this which celebrate creativity. We all know that we are able to bomb, shoot, stab, punch and swear...but it's good to remind ourselves that we can also paint, sculpt, compose....