One of the perks of being a freelance DP is unexpected travel to often exotic places around the world. Over the past decade, I’ve filmed a food show in Borneo, an industrial on the gulf coast of Mexico, in a small galley on the Malaysian Orient Express and in the most arid region of the world: the copper fields of Northern Chile.
And though I’ve made every effort to avoid calamity abroad, I have still ended up in police stations on two occasions (more about that later). However, with experience, mistakes and mishaps have become fewer and fewer, albeit still frequent enough to not drop focus during pre-production foreshadowing. I hope sharing some of my personal experiences will help those of you about to venture beyond your borders.
Know Where You’re Going & What You’re Getting Into
Perhaps the most harrowing place I’ve filmed in recent memory was in and around Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina for the trailer of a documentary on forensic efforts to link the dead with the living. I, along with the producer, my sound engineer, and Haris, our driver/fixer, had just passed from the Muslim sector in relatively “safe” Sarajevo and were heading to Tuzla, a region peppered with armed Serbs.
Dozens of mass graves were being discovered on a daily basis in Tuzla. Bodies had been thrown in dried up wells, found along river beds and in shallow graves amidst landscapes that were breathtaking. It was the aftermath of a civil war that had occurred some 14 years prior to our visit.
Connie, the producer, had seed money for a documentary that would show how sophisticated Western technology could help link the living with the dead through DNA analysis. Though she had done her standard producer’s research, she hadn’t figured on Haris’ fear factor. Haris, our Muslim driver, was making every effort to get us to the gravesites in one piece. From his point of view it was about as risky as his job could get. Many of the fields being tended by the Serb farmers had been confiscated from Muslim families “cleansed” from the region.
“How would you like to come home from a forced vacation to find your neighbor tending your fields?” Haris, after a week of our gaining mutual trust, would ask. “That’s after they burned down your home.”
Understanding the bewildering history of the Muslim-Serb conflict in the Balkans helped gain trust and cooperation from Haris and others who worked with our crew in Bosnia. It also greatly enriched our experience. We ended up meeting Haris’ mother and using home video that captured her being shot and dragged out of harm’s way. Beyond the obvious, knowing a little bit about the food, the predominate religions, regional mores and quirks, what might be going on politically and some of the social customs helps in untold subtle and not so subtle ways.
Hire A Fixer
A fixer is someone who facilitates your needs in the host country. If you’re lucky, you find a Haris, who speaks all of the local languages, lives the culture, can drive, is smart and nice to boot. Depending on what you’re shooting, a fixer could be someone from the country’s tourism bureau or local business association who feels your project will bring in tourists (like a documentary). Or, he can be someone you pay who has no vested interest in what you are shooting (like news). He or she is in it for the money. But, trust me, that’s okay; especially if this is your first trip to the region. Think of this person as your private tour guide and your salvation if something goes wrong with the locals.
If you can find a fixer who can wear several hats, all the better. The important factor: make sure he or she is street savvy.
Avoid Jail Time
You have all of your papers in order, the locals you’ve pre-arranged are waiting for your arrival at the airport, there’s absolutely nothing you have forgotten that will hinder a smooth sailing shoot... yet.
We were in Budapest, back in the communist era, shooting a documentary on three generations of Hungarian-Americans who were tracing their roots back to the old country. After finishing an interview on the “borrowed” roof of an apartment building in an upscale district of the city, I swung the camera over the balcony to get B-roll of the neighborhood. Unbeknownst to us, we were filming an urban military training facility and someone from the “neighborhood watch” saw us. Packing up and slowly going to our production van, we were suddenly surrounded by soldiers who swept into the building, looked us over and were convinced they had made the espionage coup of the century. A
Keystone Cops moment if ever I experienced one.
Eight or nine police cadets marched us to the same facility we had been filming where an interrogator showered us with questions. The Hungarian fixer was embarrassed for us and tried to explain the nature of the documentary but the initial officer was convinced he had uncovered a covert American operation. We were held until a senior officer checked playback, determined that we were innocent and released us with an apology.
A similar incident happened in Camaguey, Cuba a few years ago. An Israeli journalist was covering a story on the first synagogue to be built in Cuba in 40 years for the Israeli equivalent of 60 Minutes. I had never completed so many forms before entering a country, nor spent so much money paying for additional permits after entering. But there we were, driving through beautiful coastal villages, on our way to the second largest city in Cuba.
In all of the pre-production preparations, no one had mentioned one key point: When you get to Camaguey, drop by the local constable to pay your respects. To make a long story short, on the last and most important day of the shoot, minutes before the ribbon-cutting of the new synagogue, the sheriff showed up and arrested us. He would not look at our papers on the street, which our fixer explained to him were in order. Instead, we had to drive the 20 minutes to his station. We actually got there before he did and found the station locked. After he arrived, unlocked the station, marched us in to stand at attention as he sat behind a rickety metal desk and looked over our mountain of papers, he announced that the papers were all in order.
“Next time you must come to my office before you begin work.” He added his official stamp and released us.
The point: It’s a terrible cliché, but always expect the unexpected. Could we have avoided the arrests? Perhaps spending an extra day in country before heading out, asking questions, getting an “in-country” lay of the land might have helped.
Find An Ice Breaker
We were shooting the Manila segment of a series I co-produced with Martin Yan for the Food Network (Edible Roots With Martin Yan). Because Martin’s other program, Yan Can Cook, is enormously popular in the Philippines, we had plenty of gushing help to show us around, intervene if any problems arose.
However, outside of Manila we were on our own. We wanted to film in the northern region of Luzon, which is known for its majestic rice terraces. After a single prop plane ride, a jitney through rural villages and a hike to get to the mountain village where we would be filming rural Banaue Indian cuisine, we quickly discovered that the natives were not exactly happy about our being there.
The Banaue Indians live on these ancient rice terraces and, according to the history books, not that many years ago they would have found us a delectable entrée rather than the bamboo chicken that Martin eventually learned how to make.
The ice breaker turned out to be beetle nuts, which Martin cheerfully chewed with the chief, setting off a flurry of giggles from five toothless women who were observing his crazy antics. Martin is a master at figuring out very quickly the local customs and what to do. He knew that a ceremonial presentation of money to the chief was essential if we were to get cooperation.
You Can’t Take The Kitchen Sink, But It Helps
When you are planning what equipment to take overseas, especially to countries in the developing world, you have to think about redundancy. Each shoot has its particular requirements beyond the gear you normally would take on a shoot. Aside from the transformers, 220 lamps and the adapters that will fit into the foreign outlets, make sure you have plenty of tape stock, batteries, mics and anything that you normally would have at home only in duplicate. Even if you could find a store abroad that would carry these items, the cost could be astronomical. Check out the on line forums to hear war stories about equipment failures and the mistakes shooters have made abroad.
It is also helpful to check with the country where you’re heading to see if there are any additional requirements. On a recent shoot in Altamira, Mexico, in addition to my US Customs stamped forms, the Mexican consulate in Manhattan translated a statement that was helpful in getting us through customs in Tula. But... no matter what you do to insure safe passage through customs, my experience is that there is often something unforeseen that holds up entry. And it’s not necessarily a bribe. It could just be a minor official throwing his weight around. Keep your cool, smile a lot, and it doesn’t hurt to look dumb. It also helps to have someone meet you at the airport to troubleshoot those potential problems, the higher up in the corporation/government/tourism bureau chain, the better.
Hal Rifken is a DP whose company, HM Rifken Productions (www.HMRifken.com), is based in Manhattan.
You can email him at hal@hmrifken.com.
CATEGORIES
LATEST ARTICLES