Boston International Kids Film Festival 2018 - The Children’s Mayor
Yassine has Moroccan parents and lives in The Netherlands. As a Children’s Mayor, he will do everything in his power to reduce prejudice.
Interview with Director Susan Koenen
Congratulations! Why did you make your film?
Because I am worried about the fact that quite a lot of people in The Netherlands try to blame Dutch-Moroccan immigrants for all kinds of trouble that they experience, especially since Dutch-Moroccan men and boys have to work twice as hard to prove they can be trusted. That’s why I was looking for a special boy with a Moroccan background who could be a role-model to other kids with the same background, and who can show kids with just a Dutch background that it isn’t fair nor easy to be a victim of prejudice. When I saw a video of Yassine giving a speech at Christmas Eve, expressing his beautiful message about inclusivity and embracing differences, I knew this was the protagonist I was looking for.
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
You should watch this film to really feel how it is being a child of immigrants and being treated unfairly, compared to people you feel or know you are completely similar to. To reconsider your own prejudices and start to fight against them (because we all might have some prejudices, unfortunately). And to get inspired to help this boy with his marvelous plan!
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
I tried to combine both. Yassine’s dream seems to be a universal hope for mankind, but the seeds for this dream were planted when he experienced prejudice against himself, being a child of Moroccan immigrants.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
I wanted to show much more than I had minutes. My film was limited to 15 minutes and my first cut was taking 59 minutes! It was a difficult puzzle cutting the film back to 15, and it still hurts that I left out some beautiful scenes. For example, Yassine asks everyone to exchange lives with someone from a different cultural/ethnic background for a day, to experience the similarities with people you’d think might be totally different at first glance. Yassine did this himself, too. He visited a Dutch blond girl for a day and accompanied her to her horse-riding lessons. She came to his house another day to play Monopoly and bake pancakes together. They found out they were very much alike. But during the whole process of filming and editing, the story had to be reduced to the core and we sadly had to leave out this storyline.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
People mostly are really fond of Yassine and they admire his ambition. They think he is brave and that it’s really good to see a nice Moroccan boy, speaking without any accent (he even has less accent than a lot of original Dutch people!). They believe they’ll hear more about him in the future. The negative feedback I got was that Yassine doesn’t really open up. He is mostly ‘in his head’ and thinking bigger than himself. Because of that, he doesn’t show a lot of deeper feelings or fears. Some people thought that was a pity.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
Yes, I think I should have tried harder to let him open up more – although I did try hard already, along with my camera crew, and that resulted in Yassine’s quote about suffering from prejudice himself. It seemed he felt so embarrassed that he at first didn’t want to talk about it. But I explained to him that people would be able to feel along with him better as soon as they heard him open up about this, and he understood that well.
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
That more people get inspired by Yassine and by giving children a voice through Children’s Mayorships.
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
Journalists, film festival directors, buyers
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
Yassine started the #WeAreConnected and it would be fantastic when this would become trending!
What’s a key question that will help spark a debate or begin a conversation about this film?
Are you friends with people with a different ethnic or cultural background?
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
I am working on great new projects, but they’re still secret!
Interview: November 2018
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTQIA+, POC, First Nations, scifi, supernatural, horror, world cinema. If you have just made a film - we'd love to hear from you. Or if you know a filmmaker - can you recommend us? More info: Carmela
The Children’s Mayor
Yassine has Moroccan parents and lives in The Netherlands. As a Children’s Mayor, he will do everything in his power to reduce prejudice.
Length: 15 minutes
Director: Susan Koenen
Producer: Albert Klein Haneveld
About the writer, director and producer:
SUSAN KOENEN (The Netherlands, 1974) is an Amsterdam-based documentary filmmaker. She is an experienced short youth documentary director: in the past, she made 'Laura & Anne 4 Ever' which won the Cinekid Kinderkast Audience Award 2009 and from then on, a lot of other successful documentary shorts followed, like 'I am a Girl!’ that won more than ten awards worldwide and screened in 35 countries at about 100 filmfestivals. One of her recent documentaries is ‘Ahmad’s Hair’. This film won the audience award at the International Documentary Filmfestival Thessaloniki, Greece in 2017. Susan’s work can be described as showing (young) people with remarkable personal courage, in a non-judgmental, sympathetic way. In the opinion of Susan Koenen, ‘a great documentary should broaden your view’. Her carefully selected subjects have the power to simply inspire others.
ALBERT KLEIN HANEVELD is a producer who mostly produces youth documentaries.
Key cast: Yassine Mellah
Looking for: buyers, festival directors, journalists
Facebook: De Kinderburgemeester
Instagram: @susan_filmt
Funders: NPO FONDS, KRO-NCRV
Made in association with: KRO-NCRV
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month? DOKKINO – Nationwide Children’s Filmevent, Helsinki 2019; Boston International Kids Film Festival (BIKFF), Boston, USA 2018; Smile Int’l Film Festival for Children & Youth, New Delhi, India 2018; International Kids Film Festival (IKFF) in various countries: India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Philippines, Morocco, Tunisia, England, Ukraine, Tanzania and Switzerland 2018