Waterpolo players become heroes for documentary

John Bland and Nanna Nielson, film-makers from the firm Me And The Music Films Ltd, have been in Malta for the past 28 days filming a documentary about waterpolo.

The focus of the one-and-a-half-hour documentary Water Heroes: The Waterpolo Movie will be the celebrity status of the waterpolo players, primarily the Neptunes and the Sliema ones because they enjoy great rivalry and a vociferous fan base.

"We will concentrate a lot on the social life around the pitches and the family atmosphere around the game."

Asked how the documentary will interest an international audience, Mr Bland noted that "the players are attractive because our target is an MTV generation aged 15 - 35. We had talks with MTV Films Europe and they would like to have the right of first refusal on the movie".

The film will be presented in festivals in Australia in April next year primarily because there is a large Maltese community there and also a large waterpolo following.

From Australia, they will participate in film festivals in New Zealand, Canada and the US and also in Europe.

"We have the players taking us to their favourite natural location so Malta is shown as the beautiful place it really is," Ms Nielsen pointed out.

The film will start with a five-minute animation of the history of Malta. About two-thirds through the film, a section focuses on the history of waterpolo and the kind of humour that surrounds the game.

"The film will have MTV style graphics making for very snappy and fast moving footage.

"The basic human characteristic of the Maltese is their nicety which is kind of disappearing from western societies. Our aim is to catch the friendliness here and the way kids can run around without being supervised at the pitches. No parent would be able to do that with confidence where we come from," Mr Bland noted.

Ms Nielsen said that there is this huge rivalry in the game that they hope to catch. The Maltese have very polar opinions: it's either supporting one team 100 per cent or supporting the other team, 100 per cent.

"But after the games and the results are out and after the fans have been abusing each other with quite humorous taunts, everyone is friends again and this is strange."

Jamie Decesare is the musical director who has written the theme song with Ira Losco. The song, embodies everything the film-makers want to say about Malta: young, uplifting, positive and frothy, the film makers said.

Anyone who has a humorous or unusual anecdote or photograph about waterpolo is asked to contact Mr Bland or Ms Nielsen on 9945 7870 or at meandthemusicfilmsltd-john@btconnect.com.