From night ‘Queens’ to ‘Green Days’

He has brought sex workers, coming of age Indian girls and Laventille artists to the big screen. Now his latest project is an adaptation of beloved literary staple Green Days by the River.

Mooleedhar, who had the phrase “addicted to progress” on his clothing, spoke about the upcoming project and his two films Coolie Pink and Green and City on the Hill currently showing at Digicel IMAX during an interview last week.

Asked how he got into filmmaking Mooleedhar said in retrospect the field chose him. In his secondary school days he was not “about school” but had fond memories of his literature classes at St Mary’s College. The teacher was very passionate and it was one class he would never miss and this sparked a love for creativity.

He got into the film industry at first as an usher at MovieTowne cinemas and he would get to watch all the films for free. “I used to think I could make some of these movies better than these people,” he recalled.

He left MovieTowne to begin working with an insurance company doing data processing.

Mooleedhar was bad at the job because he was so uninterested. He could not understand how people could do such a job every day.

While at the insurance company he saw a film degree opening up at the University of the West (UWI) Indies and decided to quit his job.

“This is not the life for me,” he recalled thinking.

He got another job at a telecommunications company call centre which was worse than doing data collection so he quit that job as well. He was accepted at UWI to study film, the first year was very theoretical due to problems with the equipment. In the second year they got the equipment and the class was anxious to put into practice all they had learned.

Mooleedhar praised the UWI film programme and described himself as a “home grown” filmmaker. It was at UWI in 2008 that he shot into spotlight with his controversial documentary Queens of Curepe about transvestite sex workers for his school project. He recalled that he wanted to present them objectively and without judgment and was inspired by documentaries he had seen on US cable station HBO. To his surprise the film was extremely popular at the cinema and sold out theatres.

Mooleedhar said people were surprised to know these things were happening in their own backyard.

The film also attracted the attention of the police who began cracking down on the sex workers in Curepe. The Family Planning Association (FPA) had concerns about the film’s content but Mooleedhar subsequently met with officials of the FPA and gave them permission to use the film for advocacy purposes. The organisation hired him to do other projects for them. The film is now “underground” but he hopes that possibly decades in the future it will be released again to the public. At the meeting with the FPA he met future collaborator Professor Patricia Mohammed and the two began a friendship. Mohammed asked Mooleedhar to collaborate on a project with her called Coolie Pink and Green, a personal story for the scholar.

The short film is an experimental documentary fusing poetry, narrative and beautiful, mesmerising visuals. It tells the story of a young Indian girl seeking love and knowledge of herself within both traditional Indian culture and Trinidadian culture and the elder who urges her not to forget her history and her roots.

Mooleedhar served as editor on the film while Mohammed directed.

He recalled that he does not know how he edited the film as he had “tapped into something at a level I was not at yet”.

The film, released in 2009, won the People’s Choice Award for Best Short Film at the TT Film Festival and the following year was shown in India at the Pravasi Film Festival.

ANOTHER SIDE OF LAVENTILLE In 2010 Mooleedhar would co-direct with Mohammed on Seventeen Colours and a Sitar, which focused on interweaving interviews with abstract painter Rex Dixon and Mungal Patasar. In the same year he edited The Audacity of The Creole Imagination and collaborated with Dr Kim Johnson, and also worked on countless other productions including helming The Cool Boys in 2012.

Last year he again joined forces with Mohammed to co-direct City on the Hill, a documentary about the history, culture and diversity of Laventille and Belmont.

Mooleedhar explained that he sees film as an “argument” and within every film there is a built-in message which could be just one line in the film. For him the argument for City on the Hill was to change the perspective of Laventille from the stigma of crime, violence and the lower class to “how great it is” and what it has given to this country.

The film includes interviews with pan tuners, mas men, Hindus, Orishas, a sculptor, a folk dancer and residents. It also features amazing archival footage of Carnival.

Mooleedhar recalled that everyone that came out of the film remarked that they did not know there was so much in Laventille and that culture existed.

“What other places besides East Port-of- Spain creating culture right now?” he asked rhetorically.

Mooleedhar recalled that people were upset that he did not cover the violence of the area; there are references in this film but they are fleeting. He countered, however, that the crime and violence is in the newspapers every day and he did not want to tell the audience something they already knew.

BRINGING GREEN DAYS TO LIFE Mooleedhar’s current project is directing Green Days by the River, a film adaptation of the 1967 coming of age novel written by Michael Anthony.

He noted that he sees documentaries in his head and they can be done for no budget; but narrative films are more difficult and more valued.

He has been involved with Green Days for the past year and a half and has been working with producer Christian James. He recalled that James returned to Trinidad in 2014 from a Master of Fine Arts Creative Producing programme and the two wanted to work on a project together.

Mooleedhar recalled a number of scripts that had been shown to him one for a Green Days film three years prior and the two decided to pursue the project.

James, in an e-mail interview, recalled that Michael Anthony was “very elated with the prospect” and their vision for the first film adaptation of one of his more than 30 books.

For the film they saw more than 150 actors and, as it is set in the 1950s, they will have to recreate some locations.

They have scouted a number of locations including Mayaro, Moruga, Caroni, Gran Couva, Icacos and Paria.

Mooleedhar noted that “Trinidad is beautiful” and hopes that Trinidadians would “feel like tourists” when they see the sights. He explained that he is treating Green Days like his first film with everything else leading up to it. It will be his first feature length narrative and should run about 120 minutes.

He said that it will be a story set before Independence and would showcase an innocent time when school children wore suits and dresses to dances and did the fox trot and the waltz.

Mooleedhar noted that while the story showcases Trinidad culture and is part of the Literature it was very difficult to secure funding. Blink | bmobile came on board as the major sponsor and Mooleedhar added that opportunities for other sponsors for the film are available.

James said the positives of the local film industry are the opportunity and perspectives to stories that we could bring to the world; while the negative is the lack of funding opportunities for certain types of projects.

“Funding films is difficult and competitive all over the world, however, what we lack is the opportunity. We can fund a lot of documentaries and small scale projects meant for Trinidad audiences, but in order to go to the next level of narrative feature filmmaking that can travel to foreign markets, outside funding is needed,” he explained.

He called for more funding opportunities, investors, corporate support where applicable and experienced crew.

Mooleedhar expressed hope that as the local film industry grows and filmmakers show what they can do people will be more willing to invest.

Green Days by the River is tentatively scheduled for a 2017 release and Coolie Pink and Green and City on the Hill are currently showing at Digicel IMAX.