We are immensely proud to celebrate the achievement of Louie Damman, a Year 9 Day School student, who won the Young Filmmaker’s Award at the recent 2024 Chiswick In Film Festival.
Louie’s short film, WARtism, was judged by a prestigious panel, including Academy Award-winning actor Colin Firth. The Festival, held at Chiswick Cinema, showcased the incredible talent of young filmmakers, with Louie’s work shining through.
“We are immensely proud of Louie and his outstanding achievement in winning the Young Filmmaker’s Award at the Chiswick In Film Festival. While this incredible film was completed independently of his work at ArtsEd, We now eagerly look forward to the work Louie will go on to create in his GCSE Film Studies course. Louie’s ability to craft such a thoughtful and moving piece reflects not only his individual talent but also the passion and dedication we aim to inspire in all our students. We couldn’t be more impressed with what he has accomplished.”
Mark Fisher, Head of Film Studies and Deputy Director of Sixth Form.
Following this award-winning success, Louie provided a unique insight into the film in his reflections with Mark Fisher:
Watching the opening of your film, there’s something about the style that reminds me of the film Slumdog Millionaire which we study in year 10 GCSE Film Studies. You use a lot of canted angles, quick edits, close-ups and your first use of flashback appears early on. I wonder, are there any films that you were specifically inspired by?
The opening of the film was designed to make the audience feel overwhelmed or discomforted, putting them in the world of someone with ASC. Given that the boy in the film tries to remain masked throughout it, it was necessary to use the cinematography and sound design in an exaggerated way to relay the feeling, instead of through acting. The sound and imagery of the racing trains through the station and the screeching sounds that trains make, came rapidly out of the blackness and darkness of the opening lines. “it’s a war on my senses an assault on my brain” I was hoping to make the audience wonder “what does that opening line mean”, and then instantly be hit with the sharp noises of the trains
I was partly inspired by Tim Burton’s Edward Scissor hands where he uses the Dutch/canted angles to invoke a feeling of tension and fear, and another look on how to view images. The quick edits were also a method to invoke a slight sense of chaos and confusion or lack of clarity which is exactly what a person with an overwhelmed sensory system might feel.
We used this rhetoric throughout the film until the end where I wanted to bring about a sense of relief and calm for the viewers when the edits become less rapid and the angles straighter (the approach to the war memorial). You’ll notice it was also edited in slower motion and in the bed scene, the boy changes for the first and only time out of his red clothing into a tranquil palate of green hues with both the bedding and clothing to represent how he is feeling at peace.
There were many other films that I referenced in different ways for WARtism. There were two Spielberg films in particular, the beach landings scene in Saving Private Ryan was my inspiration for the filming of the WW2 sea and underwater scenes. The reason for choosing red as the colour for the boy to wear (both his hoodie and swim trunks) was influenced by the scenes with the girl in the red coat in Schindler’s List and the impact the colour made on the audience.
The WW2 cinematography was very much influenced by the stunningly beautiful black and white visuals in the Lars Von Trier film Europa.
What was your planning process? Did you storyboard your entire film or come up with a shot list to stick to?
Ha! The planning process was mildly chaotic in its own right! What can I say…..?
It was a very ‘organic’ and ‘experimental’ process! Never having attempted to make a full film in the past, of course the learning curve was enormous when it came to trying to figure out which ideas were and weren’t achievable. The film was initially going to be a time travel movie with a young boy travelling back in time to Chiswick in WW2 when it was very badly bombed. I then decided to ditch that idea and go for a story about a cool urban boy involved in the art/ music scene, but couldn’t come up with a cohesive and relevant storyline.
We then decided to just walk around Chiswick, absorbing and reflecting and seeing what we came up with. At the time, we were with a family member who is neurodiverse and who had an overwhelming reaction to the noise and chaos of a regular Saturday around Turnham Green and Chiswick High St. The seed for the story was planted! I initially wanted to include a scene for each of the five senses, but once the film was put together, it went over the five-minute maximum rule for entries to the competition, so rather than compromise the other scenes by cutting them shorter, I decided to chop the scene of the assault on the sense of touch entirely. It was the weakest scene we did, so I wasn’t too bothered by having to do this.
Now that I have had the experience from making this film, I have started storyboarding my next film as I have a clearer picture of how to achieve my ideas.
I adore the lighting in the sequence where the protagonist walks beside the fence and the way the sunlight creates a wonderful strobe effect. Was this a planned effect or a moment of inspiration on location? Were there any other moments in the film that were not pre-planned?
The sequence walking beside the fence was definitely planned! I came up with the idea of sunlight through a fence as we were thinking about the best way to achieve a ‘strobe’ effect for the assault on vision. Of course, this then lent itself perfectly to converting to German soldiers shining torches through trees to achieve a similar effect for the WW2 scene. My mum and I spent around 4 hours googling where to find palisade fencing…. We were halfway to booking a hotel in North Yorkshire where there was an expo of palisade fencing when my stepdad discovered what we were looking for and in 30 seconds put pay to all our hard graft by saying he used to run beside a fence in Sunbury when he was training for the London marathon where the sun strobing through would give him a migraine! Thanks to google earth, the fencing was located and all we had to do was wait for a sunny day and make a guess given its orientation what time to go…. We were lucky!
There were several unplanned moments that we jumped on! The guitarist just happened to be playing at Turnham Green when we were filming under the railway bridge, and we asked his permission to be filmed. He upped the energy of his playing when we did, which was fantastic. He was so very talented!
Similarly, we went to Hayling Island and Andark swimming lake in Portsmouth/ Southampton respectively. Whilst we were there, we visited the D-Day Museum and found that they had the last remaining original tank carrier boat from the landings. They were so very brilliant when we asked if it was possible to film onboard, even escorting us around so that I could carry my replica gun without panicking the general public!
I know some directors are renowned for shooting far more footage than they need, whereas others keep most of what they shoot in the film. What was your experience? Were there multiple takes of each scene or did you have hardly any wasted footage?
I have so much extra footage, partly as I got a little overexcited by what we were managing to capture and partly because without much experience of filmmaking I wasn’t aware of how little 5 minutes of film actually is! I certainly wouldn’t consider any of the footage ‘wasted’. We have the best footage for one day, making an edit of the comedy bloopers – We may not share that with Mr Firth and Andrea!! We also have some incredible unused black and white footage of the soldier in many other scenarios. We intend to use this one day in another film. I mean, it’s not cheap to rent all those uniforms and travel around the countryside, so one may as well use them to their max whilst one has the opportunity.
Is here a shot in your film that you are most proud of? Why that shot in particular?
I think I’m really very proud of the black and white shots where the soldier starts submerged under the water then emerges with that incredible lighting behind. In part because, although I was wearing a wetsuit under the uniform and everyone else in the lake were only wearing swim costumes, it was so cold. I really had to go, “ok Louie come on”. And dip my head under – I like to hope Von Trier would approve of the soldier standing in sea shot.
There are so many excellent aspects to the film; the acting, directing, cinematography, editing, sound and art direction. Moving forward, which of these roles intrigue you the most and why?
Well of course I can’t take credit for everything! My stepdad is a music producer and without him teaching me about sound design and editing and assisting with the entire process as well as composing the score for me, the film wouldn’t have turned out the way it did. Similarly, my mum is a therapist and visual artist, so I could consult her on emotional aspects and symbolic visuals to use within the film. We also co-wrote the poem. We are lucky in that we all have different skill sets and work well together as a team. My dream has always been to act and direct in film, and this is something I want to pursue.
Great directors often establish their own unique signature style. Has this experience helped you to think about what might be your style should you continue to make more films? Do you like realism? Experimentation? Storytelling? Symbolism? Films that explore social issues?
To be honest, I think I am too inexperienced to know what I want my signature style will be. Of course, in the early stages it can’t really be anything other than experimental, but all I can tell you is my next film will likely be exploring social mobility and question whether climbing the ladder actually brings happiness …… the rest is a secret ……
Louie, at the end of your film, I noticed your dedication to your family. Is it ok to ask you whether you based this film then on personal experience?
You know, so many people who have watched WARtism have assumed that I have Autistic Spectrum Disorder, or Autistic Spectrum Condition, as is the newer term. I don’t, but I know many people close to me who do, both friends and family, and I felt I wanted to give a voice to their unseen daily struggles. I really hope I did justice to both acting the part and portraying how ASC might feel to people experiencing the condition.
Thank you Louie very much indeed for this wonderful opportunity to understand more about your amazing film – many, many congratulations on achieving such outstanding award-winning success.
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