Beej Harris’ School Exclusions takes us on a wonderfully creative, light-hearted journey where we see a young student exceed his potential and almost reach the moon – but unfortunately, his lived reality isn’t quite as celestial. Commissioned by the charity Coram to launch their new online resource School Exclusions Hub, which provides families and young people with the vital information they need to understand the exclusion process, Harris’ campaign short was designed to be accessible and engaging to arm its young target audience with the knowledge that help is available for those who might find themselves in the precarious situation of being expelled. DN invited the Uncle Films director to speak to us about revelling in the freedom provided by the brief, shifting aspect ratios to differentiate between the imagined and reality, and how they ensured the language used in the film was reflective of the current lexicon of students.
How did you come to team up with Coram for this campaign film?
Coram approached us with a very broad brief – to highlight the work they do supporting young people facing exclusion. The film was to be aimed at young people to introduce them to the help that they can get, and make them aware you can get help at all. The budget was small – as such, we agreed to take on the job pro-bono and put the budget into the production (key cast, location and kit). From there, I went away and quickly wrote about 10 different topline concepts in different directions. Initially, there was going to be a big name talent leading it, so most of them included him, but in the end the client went for this script.
As a filmmaker what drew you to want to take on this project?
It was a very broad brief so we were able to take it in any direction we fancied and we genuinely didn’t know that young people could get legal advice and contest their exclusion so it was worth shouting about. I think what attracted us at Uncle Films to this brief was two things: we believed in what Coram were doing in supporting/advocating for young people facing exclusion and we also loved how open-minded they were to any and all ideas.
My natural leaning is always towards comedy and I think it was the ridiculousness and humour that got us all excited from the start.
From that point, it was always important to the client, and to us, that we incorporated young people in every stage of the process. As such, we ran a few workshops surrounding pre-production. The most enlightening of these was the writing workshop, where they took the script and helped with some of the more nuanced lingo that they would use in schools now which was definitely helpful as we are a bunch of 30-something filmmakers! “Baddest man” / “Bare smart” / “Low it man”, etc.
Why do you think this particular script landed so well with Coram?
A key part of the brief was to appeal to young people at school/college, so we knew it had to be funny and as un-boring as we could possibly muster. My natural leaning is always towards comedy and I think it was the ridiculousness and humour that got us all excited from the start. The initial script had the plot going even more wild but budget and time reigned us in a little! Besides, the other script involved Lewis Hamilton and he wasn’t available, so needs must.
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How did you find working for a charity as compared to commercial projects such as your work with Amazon or GiffGaff?
The pre-production process was very similar to commercials, as we effectively treated this like an ad from the off. How it differed was the creative freedom we were allowed and the scope we had to play around with, especially in post, with very little feedback or amends. Essentially, the team from Coram were incredibly trusting, which I’m extremely grateful for and felt like a rare treat! It was also a welcome change not to have to shoot coverage to appease multiple edits or have backups for safety. We were able to focus on a few considered set-ups and spend time nailing them – a dream scenario.
You essentially create two worlds for Jordan, the real one and the one in Seth’s imagination. Talk us through the creative techniques you employed to distinguish the two.
We wanted the two worlds to feel distinct. As such, the ‘real world’ seen in the bowling alley was shot more naturally, handheld with Mamiya primes at a normal 16:9 ratio. It was made to feel as if we were sitting there, nothing out of the ordinary, with that ubiquitous tragic amusement soundscape as a backdrop. In contrast, when we delve into Seth’s story, and his imagination, it becomes far more stylised. 4:3 aspect ratio, all locked off with big wild zooms to add pace and movement, helped by the beauty/beast that is the Angineux 24-290. I wanted each vignette to feel a little far-fetched, without letting on too early that Seth was making it all up.
When we delve into Seth’s story, and his imagination, it becomes far more stylised. 4:3 aspect ratio, all locked off with big wild zooms to add pace and movement.
There’s a slight Wes Anderson aesthetic to your film, the blocking, almost theatrical planning of scenes and so forth. How did you go about conceiving and working through them?
I always like to lean towards one considered take, executed well so the way we planned and shot this film was right up my street. As previously mentioned, we were able to focus on a few highly choreographed shots rather than dash around shooting for coverage. Myself and Freddie Reed, the DOP, storyboarded out each scene almost second by second to fit with the script which meant for most set-ups we only need one good take of one/two good shots. There’s comedy to be had in those camera movements and zooms so we were just trying to fish out those moments.
How did you find bringing those storyboards of pre-planned shots to life? And tell us more about the process of nailing the vignettes that are in your film.
Freddie and I like to storyboard with very shabby hand sketches so we can hash it out together, then I add a little blurb on each which probably only I can understand. There’s always a bit of give and take on the day but for the most part, we stayed pretty true to how we storyboarded. Some scenes like the fight sequence were a little looser as we let the camera find the moments of action. Whilst others, like the trio of handshake vignettes, were incredibly deliberate. We would try them over and over and over (and over) until the 1st AD, Zac Crawley, pretty much pulled the battery out of the camera! As we were locked off in those scenes whilst attempting big zooms, it took some practice to get the zoom/pan/tilt/focus/action all in perfect harmony.
Some scenes like the fight sequence were a little looser as we let the camera find the moments of action. Whilst others, like the trio of handshake vignettes, were incredibly deliberate.
How do you think those workshops with students helped with the language, accessibility and appeal of the film?
Coram were brilliant at encouraging young people of senior school age to be involved in every stage of the film so we had a number of workshops on Zoom in the pre-production. For me, the most useful of these was the script workshop. I had written the script as I saw it but was keenly aware that I’m not a school kid any more and don’t necessarily know the lingo. In a hilarious hour, we went through line-by-line and assessed how they might say what I’d written. Humbling! What came out was something that, hopefully, felt a lot more true to life and applicable to someone watching who might be at college or school.
How did you find fusing the different aspect ratios and alternate realities together in the edit?
The edit came together pretty smoothly in the end, as we had timed each shot to the script and knew where each part of the sequence should land. Our edit assistant Recce did a cracking job of marking takes and picking out the belters and all that was left was slotting them each into place. I was keen not to flick back and forth between the two aspect ratios too much so only used the 16:9 as a bookend and to break in the middle between the two acts.
And finally, do you have any exciting up and coming projects? Perhaps another ‘big name’ actor in the works?
No big name actors (shooting an ad with Pete Wicks tomorrow – does that count?! Probably not.) but we are in pre-production for a short film as we speak, shooting in the summer. A British comedy set in and around a quintessential country pub.
