Interview with Emily Harris and Marc Palmerino about Making Waves Film Festival

Making Waves Film Festival is the premiere film festival in the Solent region and a haven for passionate people who love to participate in the art of moving pictures, or what we nowadays call the ‘movies.’ This festival has been pretty successful, as they’re celebrating their 10th anniversary this year. Their primary objective is to continue developing local creative talent and supporting young filmmakers who are the film industry’s future.

I had an opportunity to interview Marc Palmerino, a 3rd-year student from Solent University who recently took part in a young people’s filmmaking workshop run by the festival. Marc led a team of students who themselves undertook all the filming and editing for the young people all under the guidance of experienced filmmaker Emily Harris. He suggests the best part about the workshop was getting to experience the other side of the educational system. He told me how much he enjoyed “learning what it’s like to be more of a teacher rather than a student”. The first group of young people Marc worked with were asylum seekers and refugees, and he was surprised how much the language barrier frustrated things working with the young people. This made him adapt his teaching methods to suit the participants’ needs leading them towards making the film they wanted to make. Despite dealing with problems like this, he was grateful to be a part of this workshop as a technical instructor. In fact, he now wants to find out more about this role and how to get better at teaching filmmaking skills to young people.

“At the end of the day it’s just a bit of fun” - Marc Palmerino

One of the most valuable lessons he learnt during the workshop was “not everyone is the same, and in most cases, a compromise has to be made, to help ambitious youngsters.” It wasn’t easy for Marc to manage the team of students this at the start especially when most of the crew decided to drop out at the last minute. Though he has never led anything like this before, he believes it went reasonably well. The two groups of young people he led produced a decent quality product with a minimum of time. However, he believes “if my team and I had more experience with teaching skills, the quality would have improved a bit.” Despite his criticism of himself, he knows “at the end of the day it’s just a bit of fun” most importantly, Marc enjoyed guiding the young people and igniting an interest in filmmaking as he remembers when he was just like them.

I also had another compelling opportunity, to interview Emily Harris the workshop leader and director of Carmilla (2019). She explained that “the best part of the workshop for me was the unexpected part.” She didn’t know she would be taking part until the event was getting close, and it turns out that both groups had limited language, though in different ways. I asked her to expand on that, and she answered, “the first group were all from different countries and were all still coming to grips with speaking English.” And what about the second group? Emily responded, “They were all fairly young. Therefore, their film language and cinematic references haven’t yet developed.” So, Emily had to work extra hard to make these young dreamers feel included and as though their ideas count.

“Obstacles are the magic of any creative process.” - Emily Harris

I know those feelings because I used to be an immigrant when I was younger, and not understanding something was highly frustrating. However, the beautiful thing about visual art, it communicates to you through your sight. Despite how not fully understand things, I was able to feel it through my emotions. So, I agree when Emily says, “Obstacles are the magic of any creative process” and “we had lots of magic!” I asked why did she decide to lead this workshop? She told me she felt honoured, and she loves working with passionate people excited by films. Also, what she looks forward to the most is to be surprised by their ideas. In fact, she was incredibly impressed with the participants and what they were achieved in a single day. She told me “it was heart-warming to see how the process of creating a small film together broken down all sorts of barriers from communication obstacles to shyness.”

“Were truly wonderful" - Emily Harris

Emily also added, “it was an absolute a joy to witness, and I think they can all be proud of their genuinely collaborative effort and results.” It sounds like Emily won’t be the only one who walked out with a sense of joy. Because a wise man once told me “To make someone’s day, all it takes is one moment of kindness.” Imagine what it is like to give your kindness for an entire day. She really appreciated how the Solent students threw themselves into the experience and she is thankful for the organisers for setting this up. She says, “making a film in one day is always going to be tough, even for seasoned filmmakers.” So, what happened that day “was truly wonderful.”

Solent University tries its best to collaborate with the local community to make our world better. Although we sometimes don’t know what is under the water, we still dive into it anyway. As Emily said, “obstacles are the magic of any creative process.” So why not start making something magical like Making Waves Film Festival.

Written, Edited, and Published by Krisana Polyotha

BA(Hons) Media Production

Solent Media