Behind the scenes of black tulip's films

Sonia Nasser Cole of female directors found that making a film in Afghanistan would kill him. The most powerful proof is that a few weeks before the filming, local Taliban militants in Afghanistan cut off the heroine's feet. However, Ms. Cole did not flinch. After returning to his hometown, the Afghan exile firmly carried out the filming plan. Because her work "black tulip" is an anti-Taliban film, even if the heroine is injured, she can't find a replacement, so she has to play the No.1 woman herself.

"If I don't succeed, I'll start shooting," Sonia said. In fact, as a filmmaker, she is still a novice, because her previous job was to run the Afghanistan International Foundation, a charitable organization that mainly serves women's rights and Afghan refugees.

Sonia has dual Afghan and American citizenship and now lives in Los Angeles. As early as 1980s, as a young refugee, she wrote a letter to Ronald Reagan, then US President, calling for assistance to Afghanistan occupied by the Soviet Union. Reagan also warmly invited her to visit the White House. Since then, she has been working to help Afghan refugees, and also wrote a famous memoir about her experiences before she fled the motherland from 65438 to 0979.

Her black tulip is a love tragedy, which is scheduled to be released by Warner Bros.. The world premiere is scheduled to be held at the Ariane Theatre in Kabul on September 30th, and the military said that it would provide security, because a NATO high-level meeting would be held at the same time. Sundance Film Festival will be the next stop of this film, and it is reported that the Afghan government also plans to send this film to participate in the Oscar competition for best foreign language film.

Ms. Cole has only directed one film before-a short documentary "The breadwinner" in 2007, which tells the story of an 8-year-old Afghan boy who makes a living by selling calendars. In order to shoot "black tulip", she widely mobilized all the contacts accumulated by her long-term charity work, and even the famous former US Secretary of State Dr. Kissinger ran for it, and was finally allowed to start the machine in Afghanistan.

Despite all kinds of support, making black tulip is still an unprecedented challenge. "Every day's work starts at four o'clock in the morning, because security work is easier to do at this time," said director sonia cole. Since she returned to Kabul last autumn to prepare this film, she has been threatened by bombs, machine gun bullets and death calls, warning her to "go back to the United States" quickly. She didn't give in, but the most important behind-the-scenes creations of the film: photographers, producers and graphic designers all gave up halfway and quit shooting. Photographer Keith Smith said, "I know it hurts her, but I smell death and I don't want to lose my life."

She managed to hire a new photographer, David McFarlane, from LA. He said, "As a director, her task is to let us concentrate on our work and not be afraid. What did she say? Oh, I left a note saying that maybe we will all die today, so, well, at least do our previous work. "McFarlane said that it was not until the film was finished that female directors told him why he wanted to make this film. Another female star of this film, Surifa Jahan, hid in a relative's house in a remote area under the arrangement of Sonia and others.

The only person who knows female directors's mood is her son. Last autumn, his mother gave him a list, all of which were "explaining the aftermath". Chris Cole said that the list said, "If I am kidnapped, don't negotiate with them and let them kill me." Chris quit his job in the bank and went to Kabul to help his mother finish the filming. "It's terrible to hear my mother say that, but she insists."

Cole did not disclose the budget of the film, but it is said that she mainly raised money by selling her poems, taking out mortgages and relying on credit cards. But we know that this film is expensive, because in the interview, Cole mentioned that she spent $5,000 on an old recording microphone. The seller originally quoted $ 10000, but photographer MacFarlane had to drive around Kabul for countless hours to find a light bulb for photography.

"I spend more money on security than I can count," Sonia joked. "They threaten me to go on strike every day unless I give them a lot of money." "It's easy for you to become paranoid because you don't know whether your people are coming to work for you or to kill you."