Community Arts
GOOLE SILENT MOVIE PROJECT
Although this project had it's Premiere last October, this project seems to be ongoing and gaining acclaim en route. Following the Goole Screenings and the Premiere at the National Media Museum the film has been selected and screened at the following festivals Cambridge Film Festival, Culture Shock Festival and even made it as far afield as the Swiss Super 8 Festival.
The next festival the film has been selected for is the Co-op Young Film-makers Festival in October, where all of the cast and crew will be able to re-unite a year on from the project's initial premiere. Keep an eye on our blog www.goolesilentmovie.blogspot.com
Goole Silent Movie allowed for a fun approach to history and heritage with a clear final goal – the production of a silent film based upon the youngsters' research.
The touchstone for their research came through contact with a number of museums, which fed into the youngsters' story ideas, from the specialist Waterways Museum to Goole Town's local Museum. This involved visits, handling sessions, tours, note taking and photography with the youngsters required to look and read about their area's history & heritage.
As a silent movie the project had a second unique area of history & heritage that of film itself. Again, Museums played an important part with the National Media Museum being not only the venue for launching the finished films but also providing an educational visit with a chance to explore the history of cinema and film creation.
This added a layer of heritage, developed through the range of participants brought in to work with the youngsters across the project from the Mime artist, Costume, to the Composer and the setting up of a film club viewing early silent films. The ideas found in early films were discussed and explored in the hands-on training sessions and short practice film creation exercises. Screenings included not just fictional stories and early cinema pioneers but genre and animation. Yorkshire Film Archive also provided support with a screening of a local newsreel. The youngsters were so taken with this experience that the local newsreel formed the basis of one their stories.
In addition to the use of Museums as a ready resource for accessing local heritage the youngsters were encouraged to create 'Mood' boards on which they collected information on the heritage of their area. On a couple of weekends groups were taken on walking tours of their town to photograph historic sites/buildings increasing their awareness of the everyday history around them.
From the original steering committee the young people were engaged by being invited to express their preferences, nowhere more so than in voting for and selecting the end stories to be created.
One of the biggest successes of the project was that the youngsters came up with two short stories. The film "Dr A.D. Holmes" came about as a direct result of reading panels on newspaper pieces in one of the Goole Museums and its style from viewing Yorkshire Film Archive material. "The Lost Princess" took a more fictional story that picked up on the town's main heritage as an International Port.
The project ran for a year from October 2006 with a committed group of young people.
This project has received financial support from Heritage Lottery Fund’s Young Roots Scheme, and has sponsorship from Kodak. Local and regional museums (Goole Museum, Waterways Museum, National Media Museum and Yorkshire Film Archive) have all been really supportive of the project, offering the young people materials, props advice and support when needed.
The project has already received regional acclaim and is to be included in a publication by Heritage Lottery Fund as a model of good practice – and the film isn't even finished yet!
Next stop Hollywood!
Contact Nicola Dixon on 01405 763652 or log onto the blog
www.goolesilentmovie.blogspot.com
Or email nicola.gtc@btconnect.com
