Behind The Lens: Serious Tingz
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Film/Photography
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BEHIND THE LENS: SERIOUS TINGZ
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Words by Luc HinsonArtwork by Tom Shotton
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With appearances at Raindance, and the BFI FIlm festival under its belt Serious Tingz is proving a hit with industry critics. But long before its appearances at film festivals, the short film was born out of barbershop visits and conversations amongst long-time friends. Through Serious Tingz, filmmaker Abdou Cisse presents a modern critique of masculinity. One that explores the iconic screwface, its lasting consequences, and the need to don an expression of self-defence in the inner-cities. Cisse laments how different life could have been, if as young men we were encouraged to smile more, to open up instead of closing ourselves off. In his work, he’s exploring the habits and contradictions that form around masculinity. Motivated by a desire to give back and make a difference, Cisse with his experience working in branding is looking to extend the film beyond the screen, to really connect with audiences and offer them the cheat codes to masculinity. Our full Q&A with the filmmaker continues below.
[/et_pb_text][et_pb_code admin_label="Code"]<iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/320695531" width="640" height="360" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen></iframe><!-- [et_pb_line_break_holder] --><p><a href="https://vimeo.com/320695531">Serious Tingz</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/abdoucisse">Abdou Cisse</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>[/et_pb_code][et_pb_text admin_label="Text" text_orientation="center" text_font="neuzeit|on|||" text_font_size="11" text_text_color="#bababa" text_line_height="1em" custom_margin="||0px|" custom_padding="||0px|" inline_fonts="Bree Serif" /][et_pb_text admin_label="Text" max_width="3000px" text_font_size="15px" text_line_height="2em" text_line_height_phone="1.5em" text_line_height_last_edited="on|phone" custom_margin_phone="|-15px||-15px" custom_margin_last_edited="on|phone"]
BB: Abdou, tell us a bit about Serious Tingz, what message are you trying to get across?
AC: It first came about from a series of conversations I had with my friends. Whenever I go back to ends and get a haircut and bump into my friends, I reminisce, I look back at what you used to be like. Back being 13, 14 we all thought we were men at a very young age. You realise now, we used to do some really dumb shit at a really young age. Our whole perception of being a man was very skewed. The idea of what a man is and what a man should be is kind of predetermined, now having grown up you realise our definition of masculinity has been one big game of Chinese whispers. The whole film is really talking about the power of a single expression and the ripple effect that expression can have, I just wanted to spark a conversation about what masculinity is and that's the long and short of it.
I love reminiscing and a lot of my ideas are rooted in nostalgia and that's where I tend to draw stuff from. In terms of my style, I love to play with habits and contradictions, I saw a lot of stuff, a lot of the behaviours and rituals in masculinity there's a lot of contradiction in them. In this case, people see smiling as a for, of weakness and feel they have to shut themselves off to be strong. But for me, that’s a huge contradiction because if you feel like you can't smile and you're not comfortable enough isn't that a weakness in itself? It's really interesting when you dive into the habits and contradiction for who we are as people.
BB: The most obvious contradiction that relates to that is the idea that men don’t cry, but the idea of smiling is that exact same contradiction played out at an even more basic everyday level...
AC: There are so many contradictions in the habits that we've formed. I find it really interesting looking back as a man now, there were a lot of things where I wonder what would have happened if we had allowed ourselves to smile and not be so closed off? The whole film is kind of a conversation with myself and my co-writer, asking ourselves if our perception of masculinity was different back then where would we be now?
BB: How did you get involved in film making in the first place?
AC: I grew up in a family surrounded by arts. Both my parents were artists themselves - my mum pottery and my dad illustration, so everyone in the family is kind of into something. I guess it's weird to say I love watching films as everyone loves film right? But I've always loved really good storytelling.
With film making I’d never studied film or done any traditional course, I studied architecture and now work in advertising. So I think filmmaking came from not being able to execute the types of creative ideas I had at work, and from an innate love to make and tell stories. I'm self-taught and love being able to capture stuff that's unscripted. More and more these days I’m looking into doing more narrative-based film that tells a story and takes control of a narrative. Serious Tingz was an introduction into being an independent filmmaker and making stories outside of selling a product which I do in my day-to-day.
BB: Do you feel constrained at all by the format of short films?
AC: I'm quite fortunate actually. As I work in advertising, I’ve learned how to craft stories in a really concise way. That's what I've really learned in advertising, to tell a story in a really concise manner but to be able to land a message in that time.
I like shorts as I feel like today, no one has the time to sit down and watch long films anymore. We are really impatient now and I love being able to tell stories in a really short space of time. You become more creative and you're able to say a lot more with less time and I think it sticks with people longer. I tend to think the best films make the most out of every minute.
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"NOW HAVING GROWN UP, YOU REALISE OUR DEFINITION OF MASCULINITY HAS BEEN ONE BIG GAME OF CHINESE WHISPERS."
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BB: Why now? Why did you feel the need to put Serious Tingz out now?
AC: I feel like you can only be a critic for so long, I see a lot of films that are out and there’s only so long before you're going to have to participate. I told my creative partner that we need to take control of our own narrative, but I felt I wasn’t confident enough to do it fully yet so we decided to make small films that talked on our experiences and document that.
I think it's a really interesting concept to think that people are going to look back on our generation in 10, 20 years time, I like to wonder what will that look like to them, what will we leave behind? At the moment I feel like only a small segment of what our life is really like is being told. There are so many facets of inner-city life that never get told. Take TV programmes like Top Boy and Kidulthood, they show our experiences, but that’s the only way that inner cities are being presented, there is so much more going on in these inner cities that we are just choosing to not explore and tell.
The film itself could've been about guys not smiling but instead, we focused on the screwface. It's a term we all grew up with and are aware of. But it comes back to the idea of the habit and contradiction, people think it’s a form of intimidation but I see it as a form of self-defence, people in that space don't want to wear the screwface but you don't want to show weakness or vulnerability. It's not being put on to be intimidating, it’s like how a ladybird has spots to make predators think it's poisonous but it's not.
BB: What emotions are you trying to evoke through your films?
AC: Obviously you make a film to provoke certain emotions at certain moments. But my thing has always been being able to tell a story in an authentic way but in a way that people can really relate and connect with it, regardless of where you live. Essentially with Serious Tingz, you could be from Scunthorpe and connect with it as I'm talking about masculinity and its prevalence in every culture.
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"YOU COULD BE FROM SCUNTHORPE AND CONNECT WITH IT AS I'M TALKING ABOUT MASCULINITY AND ITS PREVALENCE IN EVERY CULTURE. "
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BB: What does home mean to you?
Home has changed for me. I used to think of it as Ends, where my friends were at, where my family was at. But as you get older and you travel more you start to see the country you live in as home. That said, home for me has always been my family and friends.
BB: What's the first thing you think of when I say Britishness?
Britishness… That's a hard question. It’s so different now, do you know what I mean? If you really deep it British values have been spread so far and wide across the world that you see it everywhere. It's so difficult, because now if you were to say Britain is British what does that even mean? There are so many different cultures now, is even being British a thing anymore? When you think about the languages we speak, the music we listen to the food we eat is any of it British? I don't know.
What is next for Serious Tingz and yourself for the rest of the year?
With Serious Tingz, and with my experience working in branding, I see how from working on Harry Potter you learn how you can take a film beyond the screen. They've created a world for people to live in, Harry Potter fans to this day will do break down videos, and go to Kings Cross to take pictures. There’s a thing here that not a lot of people are tapping into which is how do you take the story of your film beyond the screen so people can explore that. With serious Tingz we wanted to turn that into a book, an educative book, to kind of be the book with the cheat codes for masculinity, that's what we wanted to do. If you want to make something educational you really have to do it justice, so that's still on the cards.
This year has been good, I made Serious Tingz to build confidence in a kind of storytelling. I just want to continue doing what I’m doing now, do a few more shorts and get better at storytelling. I have a few feature film ideas but I want to hold off on that, I really want to develop how I tell stories first. It's very easy to be like BFI, Raindance, I'm ready for the big screen. I really want to be in this game long enough and make a statement. I want to take my time with that and develop my skills as a writer and a director. I don't want to name the projects, but I just can't wait to get making.
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