Tintin moves between continents

Tintin moves between continents

Zora Rahman, Contributor, Jakarta

First-grade students at Allermoehe junior high school, Hamburg,
Germany, will probably not easily forget the Indonesian guest who
dropped by last month: Maria Clementine "Tintin" Wulia.

There, the architect, film music composer, short film director
and lover of children made use of her stay at the International
Short Film Festival Hamburg in June, and asked for an animation
workshop with the German schoolkids.

The result was a short animated film about a Hamburg boy who
falls asleep in a train on the way to school. When he wakes up
much later, he feels very hot and hears strange voices: The sign
in the station shows that he has arrived in Bajawa, Flores.

"This idea developed in its own way because of the children's
spontaneous fantasy when I told them about their contemporaries
in Flores," Tintin Wulia said. "It might now become an
intercultural bridge between the kids here and there."

Bajawa is where the multitalented Balinese is currently
working as a video specialist for the Nusa Tenggara Timur Primary
Education Partnership (NTTPEP), an initiative funded by the
Australian government with the aim of improving teaching
techniques at primary schools in East Nusa Tenggara province.

"We must prompt the children to think critically -- short
films are a very suitable medium to stimulate this," Tintin said.
"We should made use of this and not just leave films as a product
for passive consumption."

Thirty-year-old Tintin took a roundabout way to becoming a
filmmaker. She studied architecture in Bandung and film music in
Boston. While working for a multimedia agency in the U.S., she
was introduced to the basics of filmmaking and started shooting
for herself.

Returning to Indonesia in 1998, the difficult economic and
political situation meant that Tintin still could not focus on
films yet. So she started working on TV ads, composing the music
for spots and trailers. By 2000, she had accumulated such a huge
stock of private footage that she felt she would have to do
something with it -- if only to satisfy herself.

There was a quick response: Her experimental film Violence
Against Fruit, inspired by the May 1998 riots, was given an award
at the Indonesian Independent Film and Video Festival (FFVII)
2000 and since then has been shown at several international film
festivals.

The three-minute short shows the cutting of a kaki fruit in
close-up after it has been unwrapped from its Chinese packaging.
In the background, two voices discuss cruelty to animals. There
is no complicated technology, no political discussion, but the
message is clear: "Sit back, relax and enjoy the massacre in
front of your eyes," says Tintin in the introduction to her film.

But the director who dared to take such a cynical look at the
awful happenings five years ago -- herself of Chinese origin --
does not want to be perceived as politically motivated.

"I don't really want to make political statements; ultimately,
I also don't know the one and only proper way," Tintin said. "I'm
rather interested in human and social impacts."

Tintin's most successful film so far is Ketok (Knock),
produced in 2002. The short documentary tells the story of her
parents' experience with a mysterious knocking, when they moved
into a new house. Using very simple methods, including crayon
drawings, shadows and photo collages, the filmmaker continues in
the tradition of story-telling without resorting to high-tech
tricks.

It is a piece of work being honored at several events: Ketok
was the best film at the FFVII 2002, was nominated for the Silver
Screen Award at Singapore and received a special mention at the
International Short Film Festival Hamburg 2003.

Tintin's parents, whose voices are used in the film, were
really surprised at its success: They have never really
understood their daughter's engagement, in which she even shoots
or edits films while relaxing. Nevertheless, they have never
hindered her -- quite the opposite -- they even supported her in
building a film community at the parental music school in
Denpasar in 2001.

So Minikino was born. Inspired by the repertory cinemas Tintin
saw during a journey to Australia in 2001, twice a month it shows
a selected short film program.

"We focus on short films, because they are more pithy and
easier to discuss afterwards than full-length feature films," she
said. "But our program could be extended by films that do not
benefit from any other distribution."

Minikino, which started with a handful of friends from Bali,
has already grown into a respectable network. After hosting some
international films at Denpasar, the program is now also shown
once a month at Oktagon gallery, Jakarta. Communities in Bandung
and Yogyakarta are interested in becoming partners, as well as
the QB bookshop chain.

Following the good response to her films at several festivals,
and the extension of Minikino, Tintin has hardly any private time
left anymore. "Sometimes I wish I had a more settled life," she
said, "but if I stay too long in one place, I get itchy feet and
want to move on again."

She will have the chance to move a lot in the near future,
having been invited by film festivals in Australia, France,
Taiwan and the U.S.

"I would like to seize the opportunity offered by these
invitations and intensify my intercultural work. I dreamed before
as a child of one unified world, where people from everywhere
share mutual relations and live in peace with each other."

As a first step, the "children freak" wants to establish
intercultural relations between the kids in Hamburg and Flores:
With another animation workshop planned with pupils in Bajawa,
she aims to continue the intercontinental story.

"Ideally, the Hamburg boy acquires a friend in Flores and
travels to Darwin next September."