The short film Daqqet ix-Xita / Plangent Rain produced by Lighthouse and Ashley has won two awards at the Malta International TV Short Film Festival Awards.
By the end of the year Daqqet ix-Xita/ Plangent Rain will have travelled as far west as Mexico and as far east as China, with several countries and continents in between- Paula Fleri-Soler
In a televised ceremony aired on TVM last Friday week, the film beat foreign competition to win the awards for Best Cinematography (David Pisani) and Best Direction (Kenneth Scicluna, who also wrote the screenplay).
Daqqet ix-Xita / Plangent Rain is a dark and disturbing yet oddly moving account of a young man’s futile attempts to escape his aimless and mundane life.
Following in his late father’s footsteps, the nameless boy spends his days rowing his rotting boat across the harbour, while dealing at home with the tainted union between his overbearing mother and weaselly uncle.
Inspired in equal measure by Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the city of Valletta, the short film is an ambitious project, and in its brief running time Scicluna has succeeded in creating a fascinating story, examining the psyche of a troubled young man, set against the underbelly of the capital.
Because of its very nature, a short film does not have the luxury of time to waste on trivial details and Scicluna is to be credited for his minimalistic approach, establishing his scenes in seconds and using little dialogue to push the story forward.
Scicluna is served very well by his principal cast, especially Sean Decelis as the boy, Polly March as the mother, Philip Mizzi as the uncle, and Ilaria Falzon and Manuel Cauchi in smaller but crucial roles as the girl and the passenger respectively.
Kudos to Ruben Zahra for his evocative score, which, coupled with the excellent sound design by Andrew Christie, makes the Plangent Rain of the title an equally important character.
I spoke to Scicluna about the film and started by commenting that I found Daqqet ix-Xita a powerful title, yet I was also moved by the English version Plangent Rain.
I found it truly captures the mood and tells the audience what to expect: something ‘plaintive’ and something which immediately makes you think of crying, ‘piangere’.
“The title came only after the edit was locked,” replies Scicluna. “The film was rechristened many times, bearing the names of Hamlet of Strait Street, Strait Street and Strada Stretta in its gestation. As resonant as Plangent Rain may be, we would have not come to it without Daqqet ix-Xita, which was coined by Andrew Christie.”
He continues, “What I love about the title in Maltese are the many layers that it weaves into each other – in that first word it immediately manages to elegantly collide both the notion of a tune – recalling Hamlet’s use of musical metaphors, and tying in beautifully with Ruben’s score, which in turn evokes the use of the Shakuhachi in Ran, Kurosawa’s adaptation of King Lear – with that of a violent hit.”
As to the English title, Scicluna explains that it was born after several discussions with Saviour Catania, who served as artistic consultant. “I am very happy that Plangent Rain manages to retain the richness of the Maltese title, and at the same time enshrouds it in tones of a resoundingly melancholic tragedy.”
The second thing that struck me, I tell Scicluna, was the caption “imnebbah mill-Hamlet ta’ Shakespeare u mill-Belt Valletta”. How did these two radically different elements come together, I wonder?
“They are not radically different,” he says. “From Hamlet we sought to extract the darkness and the fluidity, both of which spell Valletta to me. Of course, in doing so we stood on the shoulders of giants, like Grigori Kosintsev (the Soviet film-maker who directed what I feel is still the best adaptation of Hamlet to date), and the analyses of film and play by Dr Catania.
“The ‘leperous distilment’ is present in the wind, in the waves, in the rain, in the damp eating away at the walls. The blackness that Hamlet enshrouds himself in is there in the shadows, in the musty grime.”
Hamlet is one of Shakespeare’s longest and most complex plays, and Valletta boasts a rich history spanning almost half a millennium, yet in the film the director/writer succeeds in capturing the essence of both and tells an intricate story with fully-developed characters in the space of a mere 13 minutes.
“I cannot say that I was wholly successful in capturing the essence of either, and in that respect the faults are all mine,” he says unassumingly. “What I did try to do is to bring together aspects of both Hamlet and Valletta that I found most poignant, with new and particular elements, to create the deeply personal film that is Daqqet ix-Xita.”
Commenting on the challenges of telling a story in less than 15 minutes, Scicluna says it is difficult to present fully-developed characters in a short film, although traits that suggest depth can be shown.
“The short film is to the short story what a feature-length film is to the novel: the language is different, and at best all you can do is to sketch in sufficient detail to evoke an emotion. Therein, I believe, lies the strength of the short.”
Asked about the difficulties or otherwise he encountered to get the film made, Scicluna explains that Daqqet ix-Xita / Plangent Rain was the first film he undertook without Jean Pierre Magro – the only true international screenwriting professional we have in Malta – and although he admits it was tough going, he wanted to explore his boundaries.
“From then on, I was blessed because the film found the support of so many people – from Roderick Muscat Monsigneur, head of Lighthouse and Ashley (the agency where I work and where the film was made), to the Malta Film Fund which co-financed it, and all the other people and institutions in between.
“I was also lucky to have had the chance to collaborate with so many professionals in Malta and in Greece who all gave their utmost, be it before or behind the camera. Each and every one of them contributed something special – from people who overcame their fear of water to board a rickety boat, to others who withstood a full day, well into the night, soaked to the bone; to those who know each shot and sound effect intimately; to those who ran around Cannes sticking up posters; to so many people who said: ‘Of course, no problem.’ They made it easy.”
So what next for Daqqet ix-Xita? “We will keep sending it to wherever people will want to watch it,” he says.
“Being the first Maltese film to be transferred to 35mm in recent history, I am glad that international audiences (the first being at Raindance in London, and the Mediterranean Short Film Festival in Tangier) will get to watch a film from our shores in the same quality of any other film, and I hope it will also be screened in local cinemas before feature presentations.”
By the end of the year Daqqet ix-Xita / Plangent Rain will have travelled as far west as Mexico and as far east as China, with several countries and continents in between. For some festivals it will be the first Maltese film ever to be screened.
“My hope,” says Scicluna in conclusion, “is that other Maltese films will follow suit, and tell a different story, and speak a different language, on faraway shores.”
A trailer and details of future screenings can be found on www.stradastretta.com.