WEBVTT - Origin Stories: Yousef Srouji on Three Promises 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:03.040 Hey, everyone, many here. No such thing is actually off 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:05.520 this week, but don't worry because we still have something 0:00:05.519 --> 0:00:07.880 for you to listen to. This week, we're hosting an 0:00:07.880 --> 0:00:11.719 episode of Origin Stories, a new show from Campside Media. 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:16.000 Every week, on Origin Stories, veteran journalist Matthew Cher talks 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:19.000 to a writer or a director about a project close 0:00:19.040 --> 0:00:22.000 to their heart. On this week's Origin Stories, Matthew talks 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:25.720 to a Palestinian filmmaker who uses his mother's old home 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.200 video footage to tell a story about what it was 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:31.440 like to live in the West Bank during the Second Intifada. 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:33.920 No such thing will be back next week, but in 0:00:33.960 --> 0:00:40.960 the meantime, enjoy this episode of Origin Stories Campsite Media. 0:00:45.720 --> 0:01:00.000 Suha films everything, birthdays, bedtime routines, Chris mess and holidays. 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:02.640 She lives in the West Bank with her husband and 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:07.759 two young children. She's got a relatively comfortable middle class life, 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:12.120 but all that changes in the early two thousands during 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:16.559 what's known as the Second Intofada, a mass Palestinian uprising 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:21.039 against the Israeli occupation. When Israel launches a round of 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:25.440 retaliatory attacks, Suha does what she's always done. She picks 0:01:25.520 --> 0:01:32.800 up her camera and films it all, the barrages of bombs, 0:01:32.880 --> 0:01:36.680 the late night sheltered in the basement, her children's panic, 0:01:40.000 --> 0:01:43.000 and somehow even in the middle of it all, Suha 0:01:43.040 --> 0:01:49.760 captures an intimate and truly remarkable portrait of life under siege. 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:54.120 Nearly two decades later, her son Yusef, finds the home 0:01:54.200 --> 0:02:12.720 video footage. Yello Jima read great dim yellah habit is up. 0:02:12.760 --> 0:02:15.480 There are some, Yusef, for some the iraland wish, for 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:17.520 some the ertanic bar suit. 0:02:21.960 --> 0:02:23.560 I would look at myself and I would just see 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:26.480 two empty black holes as I was hearing my mom 0:02:26.600 --> 0:02:28.959 described me as a child the same way that I 0:02:29.080 --> 0:02:33.000 saw myself in my most vulnerable moment that killed me. 0:02:33.360 --> 0:02:36.919 And he decides to finish the story his mother started. 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:39.440 She's like, when I was filming it, I hope that 0:02:39.600 --> 0:02:42.040 one day we could share it with the world. And 0:02:42.160 --> 0:02:44.440 I told her, well, I think that day has come. 0:02:45.680 --> 0:03:06.679 That's this week on Origin Stories. Welcome back to Origin Stories. 0:03:07.080 --> 0:03:10.079 Today we're going to be talking to Yusef Cheruzi, the 0:03:10.200 --> 0:03:14.920 award winning documentarian. Yusef grew up in Palestine but left 0:03:15.000 --> 0:03:17.480 when he was young and finished high school in Qatar. 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:21.880 Studied Economics at the University of British Columbia. He's also 0:03:21.919 --> 0:03:25.760 got a master's in development economics from Berkeley. He did 0:03:25.840 --> 0:03:29.160 not take the traditional route to filmmaking, in other words, 0:03:29.600 --> 0:03:32.240 but about six years ago he and a friend, Mary 0:03:32.280 --> 0:03:36.840 el Ollentine, began assembling a documentary about Yusef's time during 0:03:36.920 --> 0:03:41.520 the Second Intafada, the years long Palestinian uprising against the 0:03:41.640 --> 0:03:47.119 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. As source material, 0:03:47.440 --> 0:03:51.320 they used hours of home footage captured by Yusef's mother, 0:03:51.800 --> 0:03:54.320 of the family attempting to survive in a time of 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:59.760 pitched conflict. It's a beautiful documentary. There's fear and anguish, 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.920 but also real joy, real love, and above all the 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:07.560 sense that life doesn't stop in battle. He carries on 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:12.120 one way or another. Three Promises won the Harrald Award 0:04:12.200 --> 0:04:15.920 for Best Documentary at the nineteenth annual Camden Film Festival, 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:19.000 and was also a finalist for the twenty twenty five 0:04:19.160 --> 0:04:25.960 Henry Award for Public Interest Documentary at Harvard. Yusef, Welcome 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:27.280 to Origin Stories. 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:29.280 Thank you, Matt, thank you for having me. 0:04:29.800 --> 0:04:33.640 I want to start here with the unconventional path to 0:04:33.800 --> 0:04:36.640 this documentary. So we're dealing with footage that is old, 0:04:36.839 --> 0:04:40.120 that was captured a while back, and in the meantime, 0:04:40.279 --> 0:04:42.600 after this footage is captured, you go off and have 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:45.040 a different kind of career. Talk to me about when 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:50.040 you make this decision. Okay, I've got this amazing footage 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:52.200 here and I want the world to see it. 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:55.080 It was about fifteen years from the events until I 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:58.920 found the footage again. So we had left Palestine in 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:02.359 two thousand and three, and in twenty eighteen, as you mentioned, 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:04.920 I was doing my masters at Berkeley. I had met 0:05:05.000 --> 0:05:08.120 Mary Elle there and she had background in filmmaking, and 0:05:08.520 --> 0:05:11.160 she had grown up in a pro Palestinian family, so 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:13.400 she was excited to meet someone who grew up in 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:17.560 Palestine and was asking me questions about my time living 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:20.640 in the Second End to father. So that triggered some 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:23.320 of my own questions that I had for my parents, 0:05:23.640 --> 0:05:26.400 unanswered questions that I grew up with and haven't thought 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:29.320 about in many years. I was visiting my parents, we 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:33.080 were out for dinner, and I started asking my dad specifically, 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:35.360 just as a young man, and I was curious, you know, 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:37.160 what it was like being a father, a man in 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:40.080 his early thirties going through such a thing, and he 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.400 was like, we have footage of that, and my mom 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:46.320 was not happy at the time that he mentioned it. 0:05:47.040 --> 0:05:48.360 I was shocked. I was like, what do you mean, 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:50.360 we have footage. So as soon as we went home, 0:05:50.720 --> 0:05:53.480 my dad had already digitized a lot of our home 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:56.960 video footage from the nineties and the early two thousands, 0:05:57.839 --> 0:06:00.800 So we put in the DVD player, it off and 0:06:01.760 --> 0:06:04.160 just five minutes into watching it, and you know, for 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:06.520 those who have seen the film, it was that footage 0:06:06.520 --> 0:06:08.640 when we were me and my sister and my father 0:06:08.760 --> 0:06:11.240 were hiding in my grandparents' basement where it was safer 0:06:11.680 --> 0:06:15.200 and having our interactions, and just seeing five minutes of 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:20.640 that scene, I immediately felt an obligation, really deep down 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:23.400 that I have to share this. It's so rare to 0:06:23.520 --> 0:06:27.560 see such intimate moments in a war zone, you know, 0:06:27.680 --> 0:06:31.400 in a family that, for better or worse, can be 0:06:31.520 --> 0:06:36.040 universally related to So I immediately asked my dad if 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:38.240 I could have all of the footage, and I told 0:06:38.279 --> 0:06:40.280 my mom, I'm going to take this back to California 0:06:40.360 --> 0:06:43.120 with me and I am gonna make a movie out 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:45.720 of it. And that's how it started. And I took 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:48.160 it back to Maryelle. The first thing I had to 0:06:48.240 --> 0:06:52.160 do was translate all of it, put the English subtitles, 0:06:52.360 --> 0:06:56.159 and watch all the hours that we had of footage. 0:06:56.600 --> 0:06:58.080 He said, if I want to ask you about the 0:06:58.160 --> 0:07:00.520 fact that your family had all this foot and was 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:04.800 recording in this way, which strikes me as unusual at 0:07:04.839 --> 0:07:07.600 the time. Now, we film everything, you know, when I 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:11.160 look through my phone, I film every aspect of my life. 0:07:11.360 --> 0:07:13.400 But this was a time before we started doing that. 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:16.400 So what was it that drove your mother to make 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:17.280 these recordings. 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:21.280 I've asked my mother this question, and she said that 0:07:22.120 --> 0:07:26.240 at the time she felt that maybe one day she 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:29.000 could share our story with the world. She mentions this 0:07:29.160 --> 0:07:32.160 in the film as well. You know, the news media 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:35.000 weren't really speaking about what was happening in the second 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:37.200 in Fada back then, and there was no social media, 0:07:37.440 --> 0:07:40.480 so if you don't watch al Jazeira Arabic specifically, you 0:07:40.600 --> 0:07:42.880 have no idea what's happening. So you know, she felt 0:07:42.960 --> 0:07:45.200 an obligation to pick up the camera on film. But 0:07:46.680 --> 0:07:49.560 from my perspective as well, you know, we've always filmed. 0:07:49.720 --> 0:07:52.680 I had more hours of footage in the nineties, like 0:07:52.840 --> 0:07:57.040 pre into Fodo. Then I could count because my parents 0:07:57.120 --> 0:08:01.320 filmed everything. They filmed every birthday, every Christmas, every event, 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:03.920 every time our friends came over from school and we 0:08:04.000 --> 0:08:05.680 were playing. And I don't know where that came from. 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:09.160 I mean my grandfather, my dad's dad, also filmed a lot, 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:12.600 and he had a huge archive. He's from Nazareth and 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:16.440 kept old pictures of Nazareth from pre nineteen forty eight, 0:08:16.560 --> 0:08:19.120 from pre the state of Israel, and had them all 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:23.040 organized in folders and was using Dropbox in like twenty 0:08:23.240 --> 0:08:26.200 ten as like an eighty ninety year old man. Maybe 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:29.120 it's in the genes or in the household that my 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:31.920 parents grew up around. But the camera was always there 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:32.680 when we were kids. 0:08:33.000 --> 0:08:35.640 When you looked back and started watching these all again, 0:08:36.480 --> 0:08:39.760 obviously remembered a lot of what had happened. But was 0:08:39.800 --> 0:08:44.000 it different than what you remembered. Was there a gap 0:08:44.559 --> 0:08:47.000 between what was in your head from these experiences and 0:08:47.080 --> 0:08:48.480 what you saw on film? 0:08:49.160 --> 0:08:51.719 Lesser than I would have liked, to be honest, I 0:08:51.800 --> 0:08:55.000 started to question if these memories that I have of 0:08:55.200 --> 0:08:57.360 the second and to Faddos are memories that I made 0:08:57.440 --> 0:09:00.800 up or that I dramatized. You know, memories tend to 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:04.560 shape and get reshapen over the years, but the footage 0:09:05.080 --> 0:09:10.199 definitely provided validation for my memories that I think gave 0:09:10.280 --> 0:09:12.600 me more power to move on and it gets stronger 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:16.640 because I stopped questioning whether these were just silly imaginations 0:09:16.640 --> 0:09:17.120 of a child. 0:09:17.559 --> 0:09:18.839 Do you have kids yourself now? 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:21.319 No, I can't imagine. 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:25.920 When I watched the documentary, the most immediate visceral thought 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:28.600 was thinking about what your parents must have felt, because 0:09:28.600 --> 0:09:30.600 when you're a parent, you want to shield your kid 0:09:30.720 --> 0:09:33.679 from everything, right, and like the most horrifying parts of 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:38.559 this documentary to me were when you were scared or 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:42.040 children were scared. There's like a rawness to it that 0:09:42.200 --> 0:09:44.880 is really remarkably terrifying to me. 0:09:45.320 --> 0:09:49.240 Yeah, and this became more clear to me not only 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:51.880 through talking to my mom, but also more recently since 0:09:51.920 --> 0:09:55.839 the war in Gaza started and the more recent like 0:09:56.040 --> 0:09:59.839 Eron Israel war that was happening when on the daily 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:03.199 we're hearing and feeling missiles being dropped, like Tel Aviv 0:10:03.320 --> 0:10:05.040 is just outside my window, I can see it. I 0:10:05.200 --> 0:10:08.520 grew up feeling maybe deep down that the decision to 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.840 leave Palestine that my parents took was taken without my consent, 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:15.760 and now I'm back here in Palestine and I'm going 0:10:15.800 --> 0:10:18.439 through that same process of oh do I leave? Do 0:10:18.559 --> 0:10:21.840 I stay? But if I leave, you know, there's the community, 0:10:21.920 --> 0:10:23.760 and there's all of this that we've been building for 0:10:23.880 --> 0:10:25.600 so long, and all of this effort that we've been 0:10:25.640 --> 0:10:29.319 trying to do. And that's exactly the same reasoning that 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:32.000 my mom was going through. But then on top of that, 0:10:32.240 --> 0:10:35.240 she had kids, all right. So I'm sitting here going 0:10:35.280 --> 0:10:39.280 through my own anxiety in this decision making process, and 0:10:39.360 --> 0:10:41.400 then I remember my mom and I remember, Oh, thank 0:10:41.480 --> 0:10:43.520 god I don't have kids, because this would be hell. 0:10:43.760 --> 0:10:45.760 This would be hell. I can't even begin to imagine 0:10:45.760 --> 0:10:47.880 what it's like. But you know, makes me more grateful 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:49.400 for the decisions they did make. 0:10:49.920 --> 0:10:54.000 Did you have to take time when you were watching 0:10:54.080 --> 0:10:56.640 the footage? I mean, I'm assuming this is a pretty 0:10:56.720 --> 0:10:59.400 heavy emotional thing to watch, even though you do remember it. 0:11:00.200 --> 0:11:02.800 How did you do it? Did you watch them alone? 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:04.960 Did you watch them with Maryelle? Did you watch them 0:11:05.000 --> 0:11:05.480 with family? 0:11:05.640 --> 0:11:05.760 Well? 0:11:05.760 --> 0:11:07.920 I watched them alone. There was about five or six 0:11:08.000 --> 0:11:11.000 hours of footage from the Intafad period, So I sat 0:11:11.080 --> 0:11:13.160 through that took me about three months to go through 0:11:13.200 --> 0:11:15.880 all of it translated and subtitle it, so I watched 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:20.960 every scene possible more than once in that process. At first, 0:11:21.000 --> 0:11:22.840 I wouldn't be able to watch more than an hour 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:26.120 at a time without stepping outside, taking a breathe there, 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:29.880 crying a little bit, sometimes smoking a cigarette, grabbing a beer, 0:11:30.120 --> 0:11:31.920 doing what I need to do to get back to it. 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:35.959 It slowly got easier, and I started seeing more of 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:40.400 the beauty in what was happening, rather than it still 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:44.439 validating these early childhood emotions that I have still in me. 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:47.079 So once I got past that, I'm like, what a 0:11:47.120 --> 0:11:49.880 beautiful family, And despite everything that's happening, you know, I'm 0:11:49.920 --> 0:11:52.319 so lucky that this is me and that's my mom, 0:11:52.360 --> 0:11:53.880 and that's my dad, and that's my sister. And it 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:56.200 makes me so proud and to see that. Because there's 0:11:56.240 --> 0:11:58.719 a lot of beautiful and funny and wholesome moments, but 0:11:58.800 --> 0:12:01.520 there were some things that soothly killed me on the inside. 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:05.040 I mean, you know, there was that scene in the 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:08.520 trailer as well, where my mom describes the moment where 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:11.520 I lost my childhood. She describes me as like a 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:16.640 face with two empty eyes, like black holes soul. Thessize 0:12:17.160 --> 0:12:19.440 that's how she saw me. Me and my mom during 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:22.880 my teenage years, we didn't have the best relationship, and 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:25.959 I went through a really rough period depression and dealing 0:12:26.000 --> 0:12:28.560 with PTSD and things like that. And when I would 0:12:28.559 --> 0:12:30.439 look in the mirror during that time, that's how I 0:12:30.480 --> 0:12:32.760 would see myself. And I never shared that with anybody. 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:34.599 I would be scared to look at myself in the 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:36.400 mirror because I would look at myself and I would 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:38.960 just see two empty black holes as eyes. And then 0:12:39.000 --> 0:12:41.679 the first time hearing my mom described me as a 0:12:41.800 --> 0:12:44.400 child the same way that I saw myself in my 0:12:44.520 --> 0:12:48.360 most vulnerable moment, that killed me. I started crying immediately, 0:12:48.440 --> 0:12:50.000 and I called my mom and I told her. 0:12:50.480 --> 0:12:54.920 I fully believe that the passage from childhood to adulthood 0:12:55.200 --> 0:12:58.760 involves some hardening of the soul or something like that. 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:01.640 I've heard it described in different ways. It's like you 0:13:01.720 --> 0:13:05.880 stop believing everything that you're told. You lose a vulnerability, 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:08.520 I guess is the way to put it. And it's 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:12.319 a remarkable and terrifying moment because I have kids. I 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:16.120 just kept putting myself in your parents' shoes and thinking like, 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:21.240 what a horrible thing to experience, which also made me 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:23.640 curious when you said I've been looking through these and 0:13:23.760 --> 0:13:26.559 I want to make them public. Was your family ever 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:28.440 like maybe not? Maybe? 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:32.920 Wait No, my mom at first didn't really believe me. 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:35.200 And I know this because when we got our first 0:13:35.360 --> 0:13:37.439 grant and I told her, She's like, oh, so this 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:40.079 is really happening. I'm like, yeah, I've been working on 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:42.000 this for a year. So at that point I had 0:13:42.040 --> 0:13:43.679 to back down with her and be like, are you 0:13:44.160 --> 0:13:47.040 sure that you're okay with this? And she's like, when 0:13:47.080 --> 0:13:49.679 I was filming it, I hope that one day we 0:13:49.720 --> 0:13:51.880 could share it with the world. And I told her, well, 0:13:52.400 --> 0:13:54.360 I think that day has come. And later on in 0:13:54.440 --> 0:13:57.160 the process, she had some concerns that she might come 0:13:57.240 --> 0:13:59.280 off as a bad mom, that she could have done 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:02.160 more to pretec all of her insecurities came up. But 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.880 there was a lot of conversations obviously off camera between 0:14:04.920 --> 0:14:06.880 me and my mom about that and me reassuring my 0:14:06.960 --> 0:14:09.040 mom like, you're a superstar, Like you're the best mom 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:11.000 I could have ever asked for. That, Like, if we 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:12.920 left earlier, you don't know what would have happened. Then 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:15.319 if we stayed longer, you don't know what would have happened, 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:17.640 and we are where we are today because of your decisions. 0:14:17.720 --> 0:14:20.760 Once you started getting love from the audience's, her confidence 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:21.240 came back. 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.920 I have a logistical question, which is this. You're trained 0:14:24.960 --> 0:14:27.080 in a totally different discipline. You came up in a 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:29.520 different world. Is there a point when you sat down 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:32.200 and like, I'm going to teach myself how to make 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:35.520 a documentary? Did you download software and start to teach 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:37.280 yourself how to use it? How did you go about 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:37.840 this process? 0:14:38.280 --> 0:14:42.400 Yeah, exactly that I download a premiere pro and figured 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:44.400 it out. I mean, it doesn't take that much to 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:46.400 do the very basics, right. I knew at some point 0:14:46.440 --> 0:14:49.040 I would have to hire someone that actually knows what 0:14:49.120 --> 0:14:51.520 they're doing to do the final touches. But I can 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:53.400 slice up scenes and put them in the order that 0:14:53.480 --> 0:14:55.640 I think makes the most sense in terms of story 0:14:55.760 --> 0:14:58.400 and narrative structure and things like that. So for me, 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:01.160 the vision was keeping get as raw as possible and 0:15:01.840 --> 0:15:04.120 just showing insight into what it's like living in a 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:05.680 war zone. So I was like, Okay, this is a 0:15:05.720 --> 0:15:08.160 good scene. I could follow it with this scene eventually 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:10.000 came up with a rough assembly by myself, but then 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:12.720 after that, our editor took it to the next level. 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:15.320 I love her for all her patients as well, because 0:15:15.360 --> 0:15:17.200 I went out to New York. She's based in Brooklyn. 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:21.000 I stayed there for two weeks and we were working daily, 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:23.000 and you know, she would tell me Jacob and Elka 0:15:23.120 --> 0:15:25.320 and whatever, and I don't know what she's saying on 0:15:25.680 --> 0:15:26.920 teaching me how to do it, teach me how to 0:15:26.960 --> 0:15:29.440 do it. And she had the patients to be like, oh, 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:31.280 this is what this means, and this is what that means, 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:32.160 and this is how you do that. 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:37.000 Okay, Yeah, And did you have touchstones from other documentaries 0:15:37.080 --> 0:15:40.120 that you admired, Were there TV docs or movies they 0:15:40.160 --> 0:15:43.360 were like, this is my tone or this is the 0:15:43.440 --> 0:15:44.520 approach I want to take. 0:15:45.000 --> 0:15:48.280 Five Broken Cameras always came to mind, just it being 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:51.280 the only other Pelscee film about the second and to Fada, 0:15:51.880 --> 0:15:55.200 as well as for Samma about the Syrian War Civil War. 0:15:55.680 --> 0:16:00.360 For Sama was you know, definitely like a goal for me. Right. 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.920 That's when she's talking to her daughter. 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:06.720 Right, exactly right. So it's this mom and her husband 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:09.400 is a doctor in the hospital and the mother is 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:12.240 filming everything and her husband is one of the last 0:16:12.320 --> 0:16:15.120 to stay when the Russians start bombarding the city and 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:18.440 they have this baby born during the war, and then 0:16:18.520 --> 0:16:21.920 they immediately leave the country. So her story is written 0:16:21.960 --> 0:16:24.120 like a letter to her daughter explaining why they had 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:26.240 to leave and why they had to let go of 0:16:26.280 --> 0:16:29.000 their home, and it was so powerful, and to me, 0:16:29.200 --> 0:16:32.080 I was like, I'm in a position here to write 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:36.000 the follow up to that. I mean years later, when 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:39.080 Semma isn't a baby, you know, I was twenty six 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:41.360 when I started working on this. Other than those two 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:46.680 Nelson Kristen, who both worked on Midnight Traveler and Camera 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:50.440 Person and other documentaries that kind of have a similar tone, 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:55.000 we were lucky the s film and the Catapult program 0:16:55.080 --> 0:16:59.240 and then later the Gotham Institute connected us with mentors 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:04.320 that relate to the aesthetic of our film or the 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:06.240 message of our film. So I was very lucky to 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:08.320 have access to those people and get feedback from them 0:17:08.359 --> 0:17:08.680 as well. 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.560 At what point do you start needing financial support? So 0:17:11.840 --> 0:17:13.640 you decide you're going to start to do this, You're 0:17:13.680 --> 0:17:16.120 coming through the videos, you start talking to your mom, 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:18.080 and then at some point you're like, okay, this has 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:21.159 to become real, and you apply for the was the 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:22.840 Catapult grant where you started. 0:17:23.119 --> 0:17:25.320 Yeah, and it was about ten thousand dollars. I mean, 0:17:25.359 --> 0:17:28.480 we used most of that money to set up the business, 0:17:29.240 --> 0:17:31.800 you know, do some of the legal as well as 0:17:32.280 --> 0:17:36.920 do a professional restoration and digitization of the original tapes 0:17:36.960 --> 0:17:38.760 because we wanted to make sure that the audio was 0:17:38.800 --> 0:17:42.359 really good. That ten thousand dollars kept us going. We 0:17:42.480 --> 0:17:45.320 eventually got grant funding from the Arab Fund for Arts 0:17:45.359 --> 0:17:48.600 and Culture, and then we also got in kind services 0:17:48.920 --> 0:17:51.320 from different pitch events. Right, we got one at the 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:54.439 Malmo Arab Film Festival at that Man International Film Festival 0:17:54.520 --> 0:17:57.119 in Jordan. But we eventually had to do a crowdfunding 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:01.399 campaign on Seedent's Park and luckily we raised more than 0:18:01.440 --> 0:18:05.160 we expected. That was to pay the editor. She offered 0:18:05.240 --> 0:18:08.359 us half her rate on which she would usually charge. 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:10.680 Obviously not going to expect someone to work on this 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:12.440 for free, so we had to raise money to pay 0:18:12.480 --> 0:18:14.239 for that because she was working on it for two 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:17.320 three months editing, and it's not cheap. Editors are not cheap, 0:18:17.400 --> 0:18:18.680 especially editors in the US. 0:18:19.000 --> 0:18:21.600 And you're working at the same time. I'm assuming you 0:18:21.680 --> 0:18:25.200 and Mary all are both have day jobs. Yeah, exactly, 0:18:25.440 --> 0:18:26.560 so would you do this at night? 0:18:26.720 --> 0:18:28.920 I worked out with a time difference, right because my 0:18:28.960 --> 0:18:31.480 team was all in New York. So come seven pm 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:34.760 my time, they're working on things. I'm following up with 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:36.960 them on what's happened on email. And we had a 0:18:37.080 --> 0:18:39.800 weekly calls to catch up on everything, and then me 0:18:39.880 --> 0:18:43.600 and Mattot would She would send over like clips or 0:18:43.680 --> 0:18:46.200 things that she's edited, and you know, I'd give her feedback. 0:18:46.280 --> 0:18:48.320 But eventually got to the stage where like, okay, for 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:51.080 us to get to the finish line, yusef and note 0:18:51.119 --> 0:18:52.520 need to sit down together there and do it. So 0:18:52.600 --> 0:18:55.119 I took two weeks off work and flew out to 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:58.080 New York and just spent it looking over her shoulders. 0:18:58.160 --> 0:18:59.879 So this is your first time making a film like that? 0:19:00.800 --> 0:19:02.640 In your head, if you were wound to the time 0:19:03.040 --> 0:19:04.800 when you have had those two weeks in New York, 0:19:04.840 --> 0:19:06.800 what was the finish line in your head? How did 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:07.399 you envision it? 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:11.760 At that time? We had approximately an eighty five minute film, 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:15.440 and I never really gave myself a time limit, but 0:19:15.480 --> 0:19:17.920 I knew it was too long. My goal was I 0:19:18.040 --> 0:19:20.320 need at least fifteen minutes gone. There are scenes that 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:22.960 are boring and I don't know why or where, but 0:19:23.240 --> 0:19:25.720 I am getting bored. I don't want anyone to get bored. 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:29.360 I want people to leave wanting more. I wanted people 0:19:29.400 --> 0:19:31.680 to finish the film and have to breathe. You know, 0:19:31.720 --> 0:19:33.600 are you're watching the credits and you use that time 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:36.520 to just like zone out and breathe. That's the feeling 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:39.640 that I wanted. And she worked her magic. She brought 0:19:39.680 --> 0:19:44.200 it down to seventy five and then and fifty five minutes. 0:19:44.280 --> 0:19:46.639 She was pushing for the fifty five. I was pushing 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:51.040 for the seventy five. We landed on the sixty one minute, 0:19:52.119 --> 0:19:56.280 mostly because for film festivals we needed to be sixty 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:57.800 minutes to be considered a feature. 0:19:59.119 --> 0:20:01.359 It can't be under an The forty to. 0:20:01.400 --> 0:20:05.080 Sixty minute range is nonexistent in film festivals. If you're 0:20:05.119 --> 0:20:07.600 over forty, you're too long for a short, and if 0:20:07.640 --> 0:20:10.399 you're under sixty, you're too short for a feature, so 0:20:11.000 --> 0:20:11.639 you get lost. 0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:19.560 Welcome back to Origin Stories. Today, we're talking to Yusaf 0:20:19.640 --> 0:20:24.639 Shrewzy about his documentary Three Promises. I want you to 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:27.240 tell me a little bit about the distribution strategy. So 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:29.520 you make the film, at what point do you start 0:20:29.600 --> 0:20:32.399 thinking about Okay, I've made this thing. I'm making this 0:20:32.520 --> 0:20:35.200 thing that I love. Now I'm going to need people 0:20:35.280 --> 0:20:37.639 to hear it. At what point in the process do 0:20:37.680 --> 0:20:40.680 you start thinking about who's going to distribute it. 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:44.560 It was the Gotham Institute. We had a fellowship with them, 0:20:44.640 --> 0:20:47.640 so they had a week long program that was dedicated 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:50.919 to distribution and sales for first time filmmakers. Was perfect. 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:55.200 I didn't even know the levels of bureaucracy and confusion. 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:56.960 I just thought you could just get an agent and 0:20:56.960 --> 0:20:58.879 they'll sell it for you. I'm not proud to say this, 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:00.840 but I am happy to say that I dumped that 0:21:00.960 --> 0:21:03.440 on Maryelle. I'm like, hey, you're the producer. I have 0:21:03.600 --> 0:21:06.840 no idea what's going on here. Because when we first 0:21:06.880 --> 0:21:08.560