Roxbury Reprise

Films by once local Cam Mason and Faith Kakulu return to Boston in Roxbury Film Festival’s Best Short Films, screening this month at the ICA.

By Nikki Chase

Laivan Greene as Nina.  [Click to enlarge]

Since 1999, Filmmakers from all over the world have sent their films to the small Boston neighborhood of Roxbury to be shown in what has become the largest film festival in New England to showcase films by or about people of color.  

The Roxbury Film Festival is co-produced by the Color of Film Collaborative and ACT (Arts, Culture & Trade) Roxbury.  This year, to make way for their tenth annual festival coming up in July, they are featuring some festival favorites from last year in a film series held at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Boston.  Filmmakers Faith Kakulu and Cam Mason, both with local ties, talk about their films screening this February in the Best Short Films. 

Nina Baby

After graduating from Harvard University with a degree in English and visual arts, Cam Mason made his way out to Hollywood to work for the bigwigs at Lions Gate Films and New Line Cinema.  At the instruction of director, Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don’t Cry), Mason made his first short film, Veronia, which gained him admission into the directing program at the American Film Institute.  Nina Baby is his first film since leaving the program. 

The 14-minute short follows 13-year-old jazz aficionado, Nina Wright, as she walks through the streets of Los Angeles with her trumpet and spouts her opinions on hip-hop music, prejudice, hopes and dreams.  Throughout her journey she sees flashes of her dead brother, and chess-obsessed father.  The path Nina follows eventually leads her to take the biggest gamble of her life.  

Nikki Chase: How did you go about developing the concept for Nina Baby?  

Cam Mason: The concept for Nina Baby came out of wanting to make a film that was a love letter to hip-hop.  However, when I started working on the story I realized that while I love hip-hop there are aspects of it that can be misogynistic and crude so my film ended up being critical of those aspects.  As a counterpoint to the youth fascination with hip-hop, I thought I would create a character who was into jazz because that would make her an outsider and someone who was going against the grain.  I think many of the greatest artists were choosing a path that was less popular and that was what I wanted for Nina in Nina Baby. 

NC: Nina spends much of the film venting to the camera.  Are any of her rants things you sometimes wish you could say yourself?  Do you and Nina share many opinions? 

Mason: I think that Nina’s ideas that she states in the film are a combination of things that I think, but also things that she as a character believes. 

NC: Is the character of Nina based on anyone you know? 

Mason: Nina is not based on any one person, but is a composite of different people that I’ve met in my life. 

NC: What is your goal as a filmmaker? 

Mason: The best-case scenario is to try and bring attention to issues or aspects of our life that have been overlooked and hopefully get people thinking and talking about these issues.  I hope that Nina Baby effectively addresses issues of culture and how music reflects culture, racial stereotypes, age biases, and faith. 

NC: How did your achievement at the Roxbury Film Festival last year affect the success of Nina Baby and your career as a filmmaker? 

Mason: The Roxbury Film Festival was a great festival to be a part of and the co-sponsors of the festival, The Color of Film, gave me a grant to make Nina Baby so without their support this film wouldn’t have been possible.  Also, the fact that the Roxbury is screening the films again in public…should provide new audiences with the chance to see films by people of color. 

NC: Any projects planned for the future? 

Mason: I’m currently writing a full-length film that I plan to make independently, it is tentatively titled, The Innocents. 

Open Secrets 

Though her family encouraged her to go the route of becoming a doctor or a lawyer, Roxbury native Faith Kakulu knew she had something inside her dying to create.  As a Japanese major at Wellesley College, she found her niche in directing college stage productions, but couldn’t help feeling a certain emptiness after the final curtain closed and she had no lasting record of her work.   

Memories of an unknown film she viewed as a toddler pulled at the corners of her mind.  She remembers being riveted by it, thinking it was something important.  She didn’t know what it meant until one day her aunt brought to her attention the value of experiencing beauty in life.  It was in that moments that the pieces fell into place for Kakulu.  “I need to bring beauty to those who can’t afford it,” she thought, and the way to do that is through film.  Shortly after, Kakulu got her masters in film at Florida State University. 

Her seven-minute short, Open Secrets, follows Justin, a docile teenage boy with recurrent childhood nightmares.  His ornery sister, Rhys, becomes the unexpected connection between his dreams and reality.  Justin makes a discovery that forces him to hurt a loved one in order to help another. 

NC: Last year, you were the winner of the Roxbury Film Festival’s Most Original Voice award.  Why do you think you received that honor and how did you go about developing the concept for Open Secrets?  

Faith Kakulu: Secrets came to me.  I was working on a writing exercise, and this scene just showed up.  I wrote it down; but it would not leave.  I kept writing.  I wrote so many drafts…and I was totally terrified that it made no sense, that it was no good.  But, when inspiration comes, I’ve learned to heed my pen.  So in a way, I wrote with my eyes closed, because I really had to trust myself from start to end.  Also, music is a big part of me.   

A music box is a visual of innocence, nostalgia, and even inheritance...when you think how a parent often gives it to a child, mixed with the jewels, and this gem of a girl that may as well be mute amidst what’s going on with her..but the story could not be about her. That is so old and told.  But what if a brother told it?…so I kept writing.   

I was really fortunate to have a creative team that got me right away and supported me.  My DP was “in” the story with first read; I loved that!  When we talked storyboards, she’d finish my sentences.  You can’t ask for more.  I found a musician, who really loved the story, to work magic creating a score…to match the strength he believed the film possessed.  I really believe [the film] was meant to be made.  

NC: Do you identify with any of the characters in the film?  Are any of them based on people you know or members of your own family?  

Kakulu: Yes.  I knew way too many people growing up who had been abused.  In college, a guy friend said he’d never met a girl who hadn’t been molested.  That statement’s always stayed with me.  I guess Open Secrets was its incarnation, so to speak.  My decision to make the story about a boy is really a dedication to my brother, who made a statement when we were teens about the kind of man he wanted to be versus what he feared he might be.  I guess Justin’s character was my way of encouraging him that we have a choice and a will to do whatever it is we choose. 

NC: How did your achievement at the Roxbury Film Festival last year affect the success of Open Secrets and your career as a filmmaker? 

Kakulu: It’s still in progress, but I did get some positive reception.  I got two great mentors as a result of that event who are now helping to chart my future.  Some great contacts, and invitations to other fests that I may not have heard of or that wouldn’t have considered me were it not for that win.  Additionally, I got some requests to return to my alma mater and guest lecture in film.  Exciting. 

NC: What is your goal as a filmmaker? 

Kakulu: Ultimately, I want to improve the quality of how people live through my films.  I want to place the beaten and disillusioned in floodlights of hope.  I want to encourage women and youth, whose causes get lost in adults’ hustle of life’s pursuits.

NC: Any projects planned for the future? 

Kakulu: Always!  I’m working on about five different story ideas, presently, and focusing on a rewrite for my first feature.  It’s very rough, between work, etc.  I think I have to do another short soon, to get my mind off it, so I’ve started writing that.  A feature is quite a different beast from the short, but thankfully, I read a ton of scripts, which greatly helps my learning curve.   

Visit www.roxburyfilmfestival.org and www.icaboston.org/programs/film/.

Nikki Chase is a freelance writer in Boston. She can be contacted at nikki_chase@emerson.edu.

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