So, remember that accidental masterpiece I stumbled into by complete chance? Well, before Sir's one-liner response and my revelatory nap, there was a whole other saga of creative destruction I need to tell you about.
Rewind the tape to when I was part of the infamous Phupho Production, the most intimidating name in student filmmaking since... well, since we made it up two weeks prior. Originally, this wedding sequence extravaganza was just supposed to be our preliminary task, but Zaina and I were so attached to the concept that we were determined to carry it into our final project too. Spoiler alert: the universe had other plans.
Our meetings were a tornado of ideas that changed faster than my moods. Every day or two, someone would pop up with "Wait, what if we..." and just like that, our entire script would get tossed out the window. We'd spend hours perfecting a scene only to completely reimagine it 48 hours later. Script drafts piled up like my unread textbooks.
The actual shooting day was... an experience. Props everywhere, nobody remembered which version of the script we were even using, and the constant changes had left us all confused about what we were actually trying to create. By hour three, tensions were higher than my stress levels during exam week.
The whole thing got so overwhelming that Zaina completely lost interest in Media Studies. That's right—our shoot was so chaotic it made someone question their entire academic choice. Meanwhile, I was feeling like I was trapped in a creative tornado where everyone was spinning in different directions while I was desperately trying to find solid ground.
When the dust settled, I had my epiphany: this wasn't working for me. The constant changes, the indecision, the group chaos—it was all getting on my nerves more than people who walk slowly in shopping malls. I needed to be in control of my own creative process without having to navigate five different opinions every other day.
So I broke free from Phupho Productions with all the quiet determination of someone who's finally had enough. No dramatic speeches, just a simple "I think I'm going to do this on my own."
Then came the three-day brainstorming marathon, most of which happened under my blanket at 3 AM. The kind of hour where yesterday and tomorrow blend together and your brain starts thinking peanut butter and pickle sandwiches sound reasonable. Picture me with my phone flashlight making me look like I was about to tell the world's most dramatic ghost story, scribbling down ideas that only make sense when you're running on two hours of sleep and pure determination.
My middle-of-the-night ideas ranged from the ridiculous to the impossible:
• A psychological thriller (with my acting skills? Ha!)
• A nature documentary (that's... not me? get it?)
• A mysterious crime drama (where the only crime was my attempt at serious filmmaking)
• A musical (tried to watch Joker, slept under 2 mins—the movie didn't even start yet but yeah musicals aren't for me)
The only genres that really tell my personality would be rom-com, comedy, coming-of-age... and yeah, you know which one I chose in the end.
Just when I was about to give up and create an interpretive dance piece about the stress of creating a film opening, inspiration struck from the most obvious place. But that's a story for another section of this blog...
Stay tuned to discover what brilliant idea finally emerged from this creative wasteland, and how I transformed my middle-of-the-night mental breakdown into cinematic gold!
