Interview With Harry Freeland
fluoro spoke with Harry Freeland, the filmmaker behind acclaimed documentary ‘In the Shadow of the Sun’ about his passion for African culture and a new tale he has to share of a reluctant king.
The success of ‘In the Shadow of the Sun’, has shared the incredible strength of marginalised African albinos with the world. Filming in Africa for over six years, Freeland advised that there were many challenges associated with creating the film, but that “witnessing [the central characters] strength everyday, made my job very easy”.
Freeland’s love of Africa began when he was five years old. “My grandparents lived in Kenya and my Dad spent his summers away from boarding school growing up in Kenya as a child. As I grew up his stories of Kenya always stuck in my mind. When two of my uncles moved to Namibia and Ghana in 1986 my family travelled out to Namibia to stay with one of them. That summer was my first experience of Africa and I have never forgotten it,” said Freeland.
(f) Tell us about your background, how did you get into making documentary films?
(HF) I made my first film at 15, with the help of my sister who is a filmmaker, which told the story of an apple that fell from a tree in my garden. Before and during university I travelled extensively all over the world and fell in love with travelling in remote places. I made my final degree film in the Sahara desert in Morocco, which reminded me so much of my first trip to Africa and inspired me to start returning regularly.
My first job out of university took me to Kenya for three months making a series of films for a gap year company. I then went on to travel and work in 17 African countries over the next eight years.
(f) How did you break down the line between filmmaker and subject when filming ‘In the Shadow of the Sun’?
(HF) When I first arrived in Tanzania I lived on Ukerewe Island without filming anything. This was essential for me in building close bonds with Island’s Albino Society and to learn more about the subject matter. I think it helped that at the time I had no expectations about what I was going to produce.
I knew I wanted to make an observational documentary that would follow my characters over a long period of time. As the killings begun to escalate in 2007/2008, many journalists were arriving to report on the story and leaving the next day with their stories. Although nervous this would affect the reach and impact of my film, I never wanted my film to be like this. Now incredibly close to the people I was filming I knew I wanted to try and represent the subject in the right way. In order to do this I needed to stay and keep filming as the story unfolded.
(f) What part of African culture do you most relate to?
(HF) There are many things I love and that I am fascinated by. I feel a great sense of connection with the landscape and most of the time I feel very safe in Africa. Despite the widespread poverty that has existed throughout my lifetime I have always been struck by an incredible generosity and happiness that is so ingrained in the people of so many African countries I have travelled to.
(f) Future…Are you searching for a new story to tell?
(HF) I have started filming a documentary in Cameroon. The film follows a Cameroonian Prince who has lived in America for the last 15 years with his wife and their two children. When his father, the King of Bamunka, suddenly dies the Prince is called home to Cameroon for his father’s funeral. While attending the funeral the Prince is grabbed and made to become the new King.
Against his will he now must stay and rule this small community of 30,000 people near the Nigerian border in Western Cameroon. He is forbidden to return to America and has been separated from his family. After 15 years spent in America working in a telecommunications company he must now learn the traditions of his village.
I picked up filming at the coronation of the new King and we hope to follow him back to America over the coming year.
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Working on ‘In the Shadow of the Sun’, for over six years has seen the topic become a huge part of Freeland’s life, leading him to form a charity titled Standing Voice. Standing Voice uses the film as an educational tool to promote albinism within Tanzania and East Africa.
‘In the Shadow of the Sun’ is screening as part of the Tri Continental Film Festival taking place across Johannesburg, Capetown and Pretoria from Friday 13 – Sunday 29 September 2013.
