​I’M RUMEENA MIRZA
AND I’M THE PRODUCER. 

Working as the producer for our documentary has been one of the most chaotic, thrilling, and strangely joyful moments in this journey. This project constantly kept me on my toes, shifting between excitement on set to sheer terror every time a deadline crept closer than expected, while somehow we plan everything but still end up in the last minute scenarios, I think that’s the case with every assignment submission I’ve ever done. I genuinely looked forward to these days, our days of shooting to have the time of my life and get the work done alongside. I’ve gathered amazing memories along the way. And our team work concentrated towards one goal has been the key aspect for things to turn out in their best capabilities. We were definitely part of a solid crisis when we had no definite locations in mind, as you know this place is a lot stricter than ever thought. 

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While we were trying to incorporate the historical approaches, The Burnout Society was literally the perfect fit. The complaint of the depressive individual, “Nothing is possible,” can only occur in a society that thinks, “Nothing is impossible.” (Han, 2015, p. 11). This line taken from the book correlates with the message we would like to convey the silent battle of us between an individual and the society. And these ideas couldn’t be compiled in a closed room, we did spend our time out while I have covered a few locations to visit in Dubai thanks to our outdoor discussions and we carried our liveliness everywhere. 

But every sudden change in direction were the jump scares I had, but that is definitely the part of a progressive agenda here. The slight pressure to keep the project moving even though we had immense obstacles, ideas out of relevance and having their own limitations which caused a lot of pauses.

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Some nights were long, some revisions were endless, and deadlines truly tested my patience. But this also helped me with how to troubleshoot faster, and how to keep a team motivated even when the clock wasn’t on our side.

The Catalyst, being our backbone and all the efforts applied to bring this character to life with the overall storyline was indeed challenging, hoping we have connected the dots well enough.  And our theme started being involved in my daily life, somehow everything I was trying to capture felt dark to me alongside my other assignment for the other subject. 

Similar to how Oppenheimer and Niels Pagh Anderson edited the conflicting scenes of Congo in The Act of Killing, one expressing regret, another imagining praise from his victims and had to navigate contradictions within our own documentary Koch, K. (2022). This contrast forces the audience to question which version to believe and why. And that's what we are going to incorporate and click our audiences perspectives. 

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(Nichols, 2017)’s “truth of what it feels like to experience the world in a particular way” under the performative documentary notes, we have made truth our central aspect from our title to everything we tried to involve revolves around truth as mentioned in class as well. How much of it is the truth and how much is portrayed. And linking this to our documentary made us go the semi-performative way in terms of the mode and style. 

“The crewmembers must comprehend both the details and the totality of a project, and see how to make the best contribution at any given moment.” (Rabiger, 2014, p. 136) While we can’t expect the same energy for all at once and even being consistent, that's why we “The Rough-cut Crew” together help balance and coordinate with our batteries and energy levels, once we are together. 

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And talking about the conflict of perspectives within the team, especially regarding the structure and parallel storyline, was challenging but necessary. We didn’t always agree. Sometimes our ideas contradicted each other. Sometimes we were so deep into our own thoughts that we overlooked the simplicity we were searching for. But those disagreements were part of the magic. They forced us to articulate our ideas better, and eventually merge them into something far more compelling than what any of us could’ve created alone.

 

Through this journey, I learned that producing isn’t about perfection at all, it’s about persistence. It’s the ability to stand at the centre of a storm be it creative, emotional, or even logistical and still by all means move forward. It’s the art of balancing chaos with clarity. And above all, it’s the commitment to guiding a team even when you yourself are uncertain about things, trusting that the process will eventually reveal what the story needs to become.

 

References 

Han, B.-C. (2015). The burnout society (E. Butler, Trans.). Stanford University Press.

 

Koch, J. J. I. (2023). The truth of reenactments: Reliving, reconstructing, and contesting history in documentaries on genocide. Studies in Documentary Film, 17(3), 320–337. 

 

Nichols, B. (2017). Introduction to documentary (3rd ed.). Indiana University Press.

 

Rabiger, M. (2014). Directing the documentary (6th ed.). Focal Press.