Producer promotes education, rights rights

By ALPHONSE BARIASI
SPENSER Peter Wangare worked for only two years as a doctor before turning back to his childhood dream to be a film producer.
And today, as he steadily gains confidence in the business, one of the strongest motivations in his work is to turn government policies or laws into short movies.
He explains that Papua New Guineans by and large, an oral society so if we can produce films on government policies, that will better carry the message across to the masses.
Very few of us read government policies and fewer still do grasp the intent and spirit of such written documents.
That is what motivates Wangare to produce films based on social issues especially. He has so far produced or had a hand in the production of a few short documentaries and feature films.
Wangare studied medicine at the University of PNG and upon graduating, he worked for two years at the Alotau General Hospital in Milne Bay.
But while still in the fifth year of medical school he did concurrently an online course on film making and graduated with dual qualifications.
His first film An Epidemic was about diabetes.
The 15-minute film was a result of his desire to educate the mostly illiterate sections of the population about the dangers of diabetes. It made the Human Rights Film Festival in 2015.
From 2103-15 Wangare was involved in the McPolly Koima mini-series Grace as cinematographer.
Also in 2015, Wangare helped produce Lukim Yu produced by Canadian Christopher Anderson. It took three years to complete.
In 2017 Wangare started, with assistance from the NCDC Youth Desk, started a post-production and training office at Rainbow Estate. He scouted talents mainly from settlements to be trained as producers, directors, script writers, cinematographers and actors.
He has so far trained 50 youths out of the production facilities based at Rainbow. He says 15 members of the group are still with the training centre pursing their dreams in film making.
To pass their training, the participants have to produce short films themselves and practice everything from pre-production to post-production.
One of his trainees, Philemon Tonny has directed the short film A New Dawn Break which is one of the two submitted for the 2019 PNG Human Rights Film Festival running between September and October in Madang, Lae, Port Moresby and Goroka. A New Dawn Break is about violence against women and girls, Wangare says.
The other film is Lukautim Mi, a short exposition on the Lukautim Pikinini Act of 2015.
Wangare explains that “PNG is an oral and visual society. The Government can make policies but with the country’s high level of illiteracy, there’s very little hope for people really understanding what those policies mean. My vision is to present those policies in stories through film and tell the public what those policies are about.”
Wangare had also helped in producing a short film based on the lives of transgender people in the country. Another company was engaged by the United States embassy to produce the film but the quality turned out to be poor so the US-based producer Tim Wolff approached Wangare to see if he could do it.
“I got my team and we went around NCD and Central interviewing transgender people, among them the late musician Moses Tau. We were working on a script but when the muscian died, we focused on his story. The final product, I’m Moshanty; Do You Love Me? has received reviews and acclaim by many independent film producers around the world, Wangare says.
It has also won 10 awards at international film festivals.
Wangare is now focusing his energies and talent on producing feature films one of which, titled Blood Revenge, is about tribal fighting and payback killing, based on a real event. The completion of that project, he says, depends on the availability of funding.
Another action-packed film in the pipeline is Black Python featuring martial artists Stanley Nandex and Master Jamuga Stone. It is about illicit drugs and other urban youth issues in NCD.
Wangare is working on the script and incorporating helpful critics from peers including an expert from India’s famous Bollywood film studios.
The script is based on a universal story line crossing language and cultural boundaries so it is important to receive feedback and criticism from around the globe, Wangare says.
This year he submitted four short films to be included in PNG Human Rights Film Festival and two of them were selected – Lukautim Mi and A New Dawn Break. The unsuccessful entries were The Chicken Project and Forget the past.
In Port Moresby the film festival was held at the Moresby Arts Theatre from Oct 17 to 20.
Wangare used the opportunity to speak about the need for censorship and more local content rather than foreign material being screened on television.

Synopsis of A New Dawn Break
Berry and Betty live in Port Moresby with sons Jordan and William.
Berry is employed as a tipper truck driver. On paydays Berry spends his money on alcohol and women. When Betty ask for money to buy food and stuff for the house or for children’s bus fare or lunch, Berry starts beating his wife as an excuse for misusing his money.
One night, when heavily drunk he goes home at 2am, enters the bedroom and drags Betty out and beats her. She screams and runs.
Jordan and William hear their mum scream and also scream. Things fly everywhere; there is a huge bang. It’s the TV set crashing on the floor.
A bleeding mother and two scary kids run out of the house into the dark, cold night.
Betty’s life is a real mess when she meets Jenny who tells Betty of her own experience in a similar situation. Betty takes Jenny’s advice and follows her to church.
In church the pastor speaks about how God helps desperate people out of their misery.
The pastor talks about a paralysed man who sleeps by a healing pool for 38 years. Every time the water is stirred up, the sick jump into the pool and get healed. But this poor one had no one to take him into the water until Jesus himself came and healed him.
Betty cries bitterly and prays that Jesus will also heal her broken home. She believed in God’s word and prays a lot.
Soon Betty really changes; she does everything with patience, without arguing or complaining for Berry’s fortnight pay or about his ways. Instead she supports the family from her ice block sales every day.
Berry starts noticing the change in Betty and realises she is not the woman he had known but a new Betty.
He feels a conviction within his heart. The furious Berry becomes a humble, loving an adorable father to his family through the power of God’s word.
Moral of the story: Some issues are solved by police or the justice system but when real changes does not happen, there is one person – the Great God of the universe – who will and can settle matters permanently. While depicting the plight of countless women, the film also posits that there is hope for them still.