What makes you who you are? To what extent are
you shaped by your origins? And what does it mean if you look back at your
origins from a distance either – as we all inevitably do – through the lens of
time or – like many people – across a physical space, like an ocean or a mass
of land?
These are just some of the questions we hope to
answer as we make ‘Pick Me Up & Turn Me Round’, the documentary film that
will this April take me and my big brother Oscar back to the place of our
origins for the first time in 23 years.
Everyone reading this will have their own answers
to those questions, my brother included, but I certainly feel that a huge part
of what makes me ‘me’ is the house and garden I grew up in, Green Hills (pictured below with our Mum, pregnant with Oscar), which
sits in land 2,000 feet above the sea of Montego Bay, Jamaica.
Until we moved to England in 1991, when I was 9
years old, that house was my universe, a place I loved bodily and with a
passion only a child could have for something that isn’t actually alive. I grew from it like the plants and
feel as much a product of its soil as the fruit trees and the flowers. They say
the first 6 years of a life are the most formative. Well I spent the first 9 of
mine growing in the gardens of Green Hills. So the place is in me and I am in the place, even though
I have never returned.
For years after we moved to England I would dream
vividly of Green Hills. The dream always played out the same way. I was there,
really there. I could feel the coolness of the grey stone walls under my
fingertips. I could walk around the three acre garden that was my domain, the
root of my love for solitude and independent exploration. I would think to
myself in the dream ‘I am home, I am really here.’ And then I would wake up in
Nottingham, where I lived at the time. Home, but not home.
Over the years those dreams and the memories
associated with them have faded, much like old photos. And I now live in
Bristol, England, a place I definitely think of as home. But this April I will
return to the first place I ever marked with that label. How will it feel to
stand again on that land, not dreaming but awake? It’s impossible to say.
Although we grew up in the same physical space,
Oscar and I have different views about our origins. His memories and feelings
of attachment are seemingly less intense than my own. But how will he feel when
we go back to Jamaica? What memories, if any, lay dormant, awaiting discovery?
It is equally impossible to say.
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Telling
the stories of others
But all this just tells you a bit about us and ‘Pick
Me Up & Turn Me Round’ is much more than that. As well as using our
personal journey back to Jamaica to explore the themes of home, origin and
identity, we will also be interviewing others who have made a similar journey,
who have either left Jamaica for elsewhere, or elsewhere for Jamaica.
What will their experiences tell us about this
concept of ‘home’, about who we think we are? Even within the same family, no
two experiences of place are the same. What will we discover as we tell the
stories of others?
We have already met with some wonderful people
who have truly incredible stories to tell and we are discovering more all the time.
Bristol has a large, well-established community of Jamaicans and like every
single person reading these words, they all have a story to tell.
Although we live in a world made small by the
internet, where Facebook posts and Twitter feeds (supposedly) tell our stories
every second of the day, how often do we really get to think about who it is we
are? We get up in the morning, we get on with our days, we go to bed at night
and it all begins again. Years can go by without ever really looking back,
without every really stopping to think, “How did I get here? Am I where I want
to be?”
We believe that ‘Pick Me Up & Turn Me Round’
will give us, and the people we work with along the way, the opportunity to ask
and answer those questions.
We have already made great progress. Two
successful fundraising events and support from our family have enabled us to
buy our flights. Oscar and I and the crew we’re working in collaboration with,
Peg Productions, fly to Jamaica in April.
Peg
Productions
The team behind Peg Productions, filmmakers Ren
Forrest and Stephanie Tasker (pictured below - Ren to the right, Steph to the left), believe passionately in what we’re doing. Earlier
this year they left London and moved back to Bristol so they could work on projects
just like this one.
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The cost of living in London is high and getting
higher all the time. You can’t pay your rent and work on projects just because they speak to your heart. But
that’s exactly what Peg Productions are doing by dedicating their time,
commitment and much needed expertise to ‘Pick Me Up & Turn Me Round’.
We’re going to be in Jamaica for three weeks.
That’s three weeks of work that Peg will not be getting paid for, three weeks in
which they can’t accept other, paid, work. They are doing this for the love of
it, and we love them for that.
They have already done so much for us, all
unpaid. But they can’t do it all, which is where you come in. £5,000 really is
the minimum amount we need to cover the cost of this production.
Production costs include cameras, audio
equipment, insurance, batteries, memory cards, accommodation, living costs,
transport... The list goes on. There are also post production costs to consider,
things like sound design and colour grading.
£5,000 is going to have to go a really long way.
And if we had to pay our crew for their time we’d be looking to raise much,
much more.
Every single contribution will go towards this production,
towards manifesting an idea I’ve held in mind for over a decade. And
manifesting ideas, I’ve come to believe, is what life is all about.
The
Escape
In 2013, working in collaboration with another
Bristol-based outfit Hidden Shallows Productions, I completed ‘The Escape’, a
short film that had, from conception to completion, been 3 years in the making.
‘The Escape’ was a tribute to the memory of my late father, Jamaican Magician
and Escapologist Bunny Neill.
Pictured below (left to right) Tristram Shackerley-Bennett, Dominic Lewis and Kingsley Young, who played Dad.
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The process of making ‘The Escape’ not only gave
me confidence in my ability to manifest an idea, but it also helped me to
process my grief in a way that nothing I’d done before that point had allowed
me to.
Now it’s 2015 and I’m about to embark on film
project number two, another manifestation of an idea, another creative project that
will help to process complex emotions.
With your support we can make this film the high
quality production we know it can be. Please consider making a contribution. Every
donation will be gratefully received and acknowledged with a personal reward.
Other ways you can help
Please help us spread the word and tell your social networks about us. Use the Indiegogo share tool to post our campaign on platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
The more people who know what we're doing, the more likely we are to reach our target. With your help we will do it!
Risks
and challenges
We will be filming abroad in a place that is unfamiliar to us. We will need to be vigilant and aware at all times of the potential for things like equipment theft; if anything happens to (for eg) our cameras, our film won't get made.
We will help to mitigate this risk by using local knowledge and getting local people involved and working with us on the project. They will be able to advise us on (for eg) any potential no-go areas and also things like cultural differences that could impact on the film and to which we may be oblivious.
We will be asking our interviewees personal questions. We must make sure that we conduct ourselves with empathy and sensitivity at all times and that all interviewees know exactly what they are signing up for.
This will help to ensure that we don't end up causing offence or having to remove important parts of the film because participants were misinformed or misunderstood our objectives. Clear, transparent communication and expectation management from the get go is crucial.
We are a strong team built on close relationships. Given that we are dealing with complex subjects and emotions, this is very important.
Going out to Jamaica to make the kind of film we are making has the potential to unearth all kinds of memories and feelings. This may prove difficult at times, which could put the production at risk if those feelings become overwhelming.
Having close, supportive relationships and a good, personal understanding of each other will help to mitigate this as, whatever happens, we can support each other to get through it and make sure the 'show goes on'.
Whatever challenges we face, we're all in it together. This is one of the biggest strengths of our project.
