2017
Hezayah Screenwriting Lab
- Start date:
- May 06, 2017
- Ability Level:
- Intermediate writers
The Hezayah Screenwriting Lab is organised by the Doha Film Institute in collaboration with the TorinoFilmLab. The lab is designed to assist emerging screenwriters and writer-directors to develop and write an original feature-length screenplay. Participants work in small groups with the support of experienced mentors. The lab consists of four sessions of four-day workshops, which take place intermittently over a period of six months. During each four-day session, participants are expected to work on all agreed assignments and reach key milestones as they build toward their screenplays. Strict deadlines must be followed, and participants will be asked to read and engage in the other lab attendees’ work.
Participants are selected on the basis of the strength of their screenplay idea, their writing ability, their vision and approach, and their previous work. Candidates who are shortlisted for the lab will go through a selection process, which will assess their potential to expand and develop their ideas into a passionate and interesting work of cinema.
The lab is a transformative experience where filmmakers examine and explore their inner creativity and personal voice. Development takes the form of group sessions and individual feedback, in a sharing process guided by experienced mentors and tutors. Candidates are encouraged to develop personal stories that come from the heart, and that reflect contemporary life in the Gulf region. Candidates should also consider how their films might realistically be achieved on budgets of differing scales, including a more micro-budget approach.
Dates
Session 1: 6 to 9 May, 2017
Session 2: 21 to 24 September, 2017
Session 3: 7 to 10 December, 2017
Session 4: 11 to 14 January, 2018
Please note that each session lasts four full days.
Hours
Each session takes place from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, including lunch and breaks. Participation is required for all four days of each session, as the work, sharing and learning build from day to day.
Language
English
Lab Fee:
2,000 QAR
Group Size
8 – 10 participants
Selection Criteria
• Applicants should submit a synopsis and/or treatment they would like to develop into a solid first draft of a feature screenplay during Hezayah over the course of six months. If the applicant has a complete script, it can be submitted for added value, but application materials must include a full synopsis and/or a full treatment.
• Applicants must have previously written at least one short film script or equivalent (e.g. a novel or short story)
• Candidates must demonstrate an aptitude for interesting cinematic ideas, and be interested in the writing process that leads to visually and dramatically strong films.
• Open to Qatar and GCC nationals and residents.
• Candidates from the GCC are responsible for funding their own travel and accommodation
Submission Deadline
19 April, 2017
Submission Requirements
Please send the following in Word or PDF format to hezayah@dohafilminstitute.com
1. Full Synopsis and/or treatment (up to 15 pages). If available, a complete script may be submitted as supporting material.
2. Short biography of the author
3. Previous short film script
4. Any previous film or creative works (links to films or showreel, photography, writing, online portfolio, website etc.)
All documents must include the following:
1. Writer’s first and last names
2. Project title
3. Draft number
4. Date
Selection Process
Candidates whose work shows promise will be shortlisted.
Shortlisted candidates will be invited for an interview process with Doha Film Institute and TorinoFilmLab.
Shortlisted candidates who are not selected for the lab will be placed on a waiting list in case of any cancellations.
Lab Programme
| SESSION | Session Description and Milestones | |
| 1 | Introduction and pitching of the ideas. Input and feedback from the other group members and tutor. Character and theme development. Overview of documents to be produced for the next sessions. | |
| 2 | Review of new and revised materials (the first scene-by-scene breakdown, or extended treatment). Feedback and input from group and tutor. Revisiting of character and theme, adding to the discussion/further exploring a structural dimension (plot, resolution, inciting event etc). | |
| 3 | Review of the new materials (revised scene-by-scene breakdown, revised character documents etc.), first draft or some written scenes from the revised breakdown. Visual research, and other materials reviewed. Premise and pitch further developed.. | |
| 4 | Feedback sessions on first draft. Scene analysis. Group feedback and input and/or tutor input and feedback. Setting trajectory for the next steps of the project, in regards to financing, casting, etc. The final Hezayah session will include a pitch session with an external panel. Participants will submit their written work to the panel members and present the project they have developed over the four sessions. |
Mentors
Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten
Lab Mentor
Swedish screenwriter Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten is a member of the Swedish Drama Union and the European Film Academy. She wrote and co-produced ‘Call Girl’, which won the FIPRESCI Prize at the Toronto International Film Festival and was shown in numerous festivals worldwide. Since 2007, she has been connected as a script consultant with TorinoFilmLab, Binger Film Lab and the Venice Biennale College Microbudget lab, on films including ‘The Babadook’, ‘Djeca, Children of Sarajevo’, ‘Hi-So’, ‘Los Hongos’, ‘Les Quottro Volte’, ‘Beyond /Svinalängorna’, ‘H’, ‘The Fits’, ‘Mediterranea’, ‘Diamond Island’, and ‘Blanka’. Other related programmes are Qumra, Feature Expanded, Bridging the Dragon, TIFF STUDIO Toronto, Boost Rotterdam, the Rutger Hauer Master Classes, Generation Campus Moscow, Script Lab Russia, the Balkan Film Fund Athens, Talent Campus Berlinale and Sarejevo. In addition to this, Marietta consults privately on films, and has worked with filmmakers from more than 45 countries. She also writes Television Drama for some of the important Scandinavian production houses. Marietta is the Minister of a micro-nation called Elgaland-Vargaland, or KREV.
Antoine Le Bos
Lab Mentor
Antoine Le Bos is a French screenwriter and script consultant. Following a first life as a sailor and an interrupted PhD in Philosophy at the Sorbonne, he graduated from the CEEA (the French conservatory for screenwriting) in Paris in 1996. After writing and directing award-winning short films and on-stage experiments, he co-wrote the 3D animated series Ratz, worked in cinema with various directors including Atiq Rahimi and Lucile Hadžihalilović, and won the Gan Foundation Prize for writing in 2005. In 2007, Le Bos created Le Groupe Ouest in Brittany, a European film lab that has hosted and coached more than 500 writers and filmmakers over the last 10 years. In 2010, he co-created the Cross Channel Film Lab experience with partners in the UK, and more recently created Less Is More (LIM), a European development platform for low-budget feature-length films. Since 2007, he has been a tutor and script consultant for TorinoFilmLab, as well as for NFDC in India, among others.
TorinoFilmLab
TorinoFilmLab is a year-round, international laboratory that supports emerging talent from all over the world – with a special attention to those working on their first and second fiction feature films –through training, development, funding and distribution activities.
Linked to the Torino Film Festival, TorinoFilmLab is promoted by the main film institutions established in Turin and Piedmont – Museo Nazionale del Cinema and the Film Commission Torino Piemonte.
The four main fields of intervention of TorinoFilmLab are training, development, funding and distribution.
TorinoFilmLab runs several activities and offers various forms of support in each of these fields. The training initiatives Script&Pitch, AdaptLab, Story Editing, and Audience Design, as well as the pre-production- and development-focused FrameWork programme run parallel during the year. They all reach their conclusive moment at the TorinoFilmLab Meeting Event during the Torino Film Festival in November, when projects are presented to a selected group of producers, sales agents, distributors and other professionals working in independent filmmaking all over the world.