This film won an International Medallion. In 2002 a project started in the south of Holland to bring together different disciplines of amateur artistry, namely writing, filming and acting. Groups of film makers chose a short story to turn into a video production.  One group in particular experienced increasing difficulties in deciding what the screen play should be about. All productions had to be ready by November 1st of 2004 and in January of that year the now five people of this same group were further apart than ever on deciding which way to go. Three of them quit to concentrate on shooting their other film for this project.

Hilbert Nijzink, who did not have another production going, simply refused to pack it in and in March of 2004 came up with the idea for Packin' it in.

Emile de Gruijter, part of the original group and the man who was to produce this film, insisted that the number of scenes in the screen play, as well as the number of actors and special effects, be kept to a minimum. Otherwise there would simply not be enough time to write the screen play and story board, look for locations, find actors and crew and especially dates on which everybody would be available.

Setting up shots	The results in the movie.

Hilbert came up with what was basically a key scene for a longer story, flanked by a beginning and end, using newly acquired screen writing techniques to cramp a complete (hi)story in this essentially one scene.

Late April he had found the right actors and in May 2004 he, Emile and the actors Karin van der Laan and Perry Boomsluiter met for the first time. Instead of having the actors come in at the last stage to say their lines and make their moves in front of the camera, Hilbert wanted them to be instrumental in forging the characters and have them be the part, not just act it. He would complete the screen play only after the now necessary rehearsals.

Although none of them had worked this way before, they decided to take Hilbert's word for it and have a go. In just three days of extensive improvisations Hilbert led them towards the characters he wanted for the film.

All this was recorded and some of their dialogue was used in the screenplay. Because of the holidays, just two and a half weekends were available for shooting.

The film took less time to make from start to end than any of the other participating productions.

The result is a testament to what you can do with limited time and means as long as you make proper use of the talent that is available, especially the actors who had much to give of themselves, very little time to do it in and had to blindly trust someone they hadn't worked with before. The same holds true for Peter van Leerdam who had to write the score to fit the images even before editing was completed. Finally, only due to the producing skills of Emile everything actually came together.

- Hilbert Nijzink    March 2006

Page updated on 21 March 2008

Authors' views are not necessarily those of The Institute of Amateur Cinematographers

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