Today - October 14th - I deactivated my X/Twitter account for Voyageuse. It's exactly 11 years ago on this day I decided to make the film, after receiving a cursory two-line rejection email from Creative Scotland - a long and sorry story.
To this day I remain ineligible for Creative or Screen Scotland funding because I/my company don't meet their criteria. It was the first and only time I submitted an application. When I asked for feedback as to why my project was rejected, their response: "we have other, higher priority projects" was a perfect summation of what I suspected - the people at CS had already made up their mind who was being awarded funding. Not me, and certainly not the majority of applicants.
The fact I made the film with zero funding remains a near incomprehensible achievement. By summoning my inner Imp - I was an Imp in the Brownies as a kid - I spent three years writing, designing, shooting, editing, grading and creating a sound design by applying Robert Bresson's maxim, "he who can work with the minimum can work with the most." It's a mantra I live by. My next three planned projects - God willing - will adopt the same model, if more nuanced and refined - using CGI, live action and life's little accidents, the serendipitous events that can change the course of a story, of a life.
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