Interview (Part 3): Minhal Baig

I first met filmmaker Minhal Baig at the 2013 Black List Screenwriters Lab in Las Vegas. She struck me as a bright, ambitious, and talented storyteller. Since that time, I have followed Minnie’s progress with great interest. This week she is launching a Kickstarter campaign for a short film called Hala. It tells both a compelling and important story about a Muslim-American girl who faces the tensions between faith, family, and sexual exploration. This project is hopefully a first step toward a feature-length movie.

As I see part of the mission of this blog to support independent filmmakers, I took the opportunity to ask Minnie some questions about her background and what she envisions for the Hala project.

Here is Part 3 of our conversation:

Scott: Let’s talk about your upcoming project Hala. We discussed the idea at the Black List Screenwriters Lab — a coming-of-age story of a Muslim-American girl who faces the tensions between faith and personal and sexual exploration. I remember encouraging you to tell that story as it struck me as one which needs to be told. What was your inspiration for Hala?

Minhal: About three years ago, I knew I wanted to make a film, but I wasn’t ready to tell this story yet. I operate from the “use what you have” philosophy of filmmaking; three years ago, I didn’t have what I needed to make Hala but I had the resources and relationships to make One Night, so I made that film first. I learned everything I could. Now I’m ready to make this movie.

Hala is inspired by my own coming-of-age. As I entered my teen years, I drifted from my parents; I began to question the faith and principles with which I had been raised. I wasn’t comfortable pretending to be one person at home and another at school. Managing two very different and separate existences became an impossible task. Eventually, they collided, and not without consequences. I was discovering who I was and what I cared about, but the process was not an easy one. I had to hide a lot from my family. I was raised in a socially conservative household, one in which sex was never discussed. I’m not even sure the word was ever spoken out loud in my house. Hala was written as a way to explore the anxiety of adulthood that I personally experienced.

Scott: Why do you want to tell this story?

Minhal: Hala is a very personal film, but it’s not autobiographical. Although I never had to wear hijab, my experience of growing up as a first-generation Muslim American has shaped the script, as well as the experiences of other Muslim American girls I knew growing up. I knew I wanted to tell a coming-of-age story and this was the story that I knew the best and was most fascinated by. As filmmakers, we shouldn’t just chase the stories that we think are interesting, but the ones that we have a distinctive take on. I asked myself an honest question: “Is there a story that only you can tell?” The answer was Hala.

Scott: Why are you crowdfunding the short film first?

Minhal: Now that I’ve directed a feature film, I know how important it is to provide as clear of a picture as possible of what the film will be. Many directors have found success in finding financing for their feature films by directing a short first. A few notable examples: In 1993, Paul Thomas Anderson directed Coffee & Cigarettes, on the basis of which he was accepted into Sundance Labs, where he then developed a feature version of the story, Hard Eight (1996). More recently, Damien Chazelle directed a scene from his feature feature script to raise money for Whiplash (2014). For a character-driven drama that is largely execution-dependent, a short film can help investors see what the eventual film will look like. One of the goals of a director is to present a project with as many of its elements as possible — producers, talent, crew, schedule, financing, locations — so that the film will appear as real and feasible as possible to interested investors. My team and I plan to use the short film to raise financing and present a clear picture of what can be expected from the feature.

Scott: How have you gone about building an audience/community around your film?

Minhal: The process of building an audience around Hala is actually inspired by a lot of literature on crowdfunding philosophy. Crowdfunding has become a very legitimate means of providing a way for people to financially support a project they believe in. Crowdfunding isn’t begging. It’s building a community around art, which has becoming increasingly necessary so that your art has an audience. It’s more important than ever to give an avenue for your audience to engage with you. Crowdfunding is just one of these many avenues.

The first effort to create and engage a community around Hala was to shoot and share teasers that demonstrated the tone and texture of the film. The teasers were both shot one night in downtown Los Angeles and a Burbank parking lot with a four-person crew: me, my cinematographer, focus puller and actress. Almost all of our camera equipment was borrowed. I edited both of the teasers on Adobe Premiere and we released them within two weeks of each other. The response to our teasers has been unexpected and enormous, both inside and outside of the industry. I am so grateful for everyone who has come out in support of Hala.

For the last two months, I’ve reached out to my contacts about the film for contributions. Slowly, the teasers, the website and tweets pushed the project in front of a lot of people, many of whom might never have heard about the project if it hadn’t been for social media. I’ve had people reach out to me to about contributing to the film, donating equipment/labor/production and post-production services, as well as investor interest in the feature film.

I opened up avenues for people to engage with Hala. I was never afraid to ask for help. I don’t take no for an answer and I don’t wait for permission. Building a community for this movie has been very empowering as a filmmaker, in a climate where I was used to hearing that I would have to “wait my turn” or “build my credibility” or that the film was “too niche” and “indie” to be worth making. There is definitely a market for this film; the people who have come out to support and engage with the movie have already proven that.

Scott: What do you hope to achieve with Hala?

Minhal: My hope for Hala is simple. I want to tell a personal story as authentically as possible. I want to take emotional risks and dig deeply. I want Hala to be a visually aggressive experience: a burst of feeling, full of rich color and texture. This film is a subjective, intimate portrait of a girl becoming a woman. It’s a departure from the dialogue-driven One Night. I wanted Hala to be spare in its dialogue and driven by images instead. There’s a lot that I’m excited to discover with this next movie. The height of filmmaking is making an honest movie. If I can do that with Hala and it resonates with people, I will have accomplished everything I hoped to achieve with this story.

Scott: Why should people contribute to this film?

Minhal: There are a few major reasons to support Hala. The feature is a coming-of-age story, which is one of the most accessible genres in storytelling. If I represent an experience as authentically and personally as possible, it will emotionally resonate with a wider audience. Blue is the Warmest Color had a wide audience that extended outside of France and the LGBT community. Blue is a love story that happens to have lesbians as its main characters. Similarly, Hala is a coming-of-age story that happens to have a Muslim American teenager as its protagonist. This is a deeply personal story for me but it is also universal and accessible because everyone has had an adolescence.

American cinema lacks female representation, in front of and behind the camera. Compelling female protagonists are challenging to find in mainstream film. They are often relegated to demeaning, sexist or sidekick roles that don’t take advantage of their full talents. The film business is slowly realizing that there is a real demand in the market for compelling stories about women. Additionally, there aren’t many films that have explored what the Muslim diaspora looks like in America, or the first-generation Muslim American experience. Hala explores both from the perspective of a teenage girl.

I also want to briefly discuss the underrepresentation of women in film. In 2015, Sundance, in association with Women in Film, conducted research on the barriers and opportunities facing independent female filmmakers. At the highest platform of theatrical distribution, male directors outnumber female directors by a factor of 6 to 1. The gender gap is also widest in top-grossing films; of the 1,300 top-grossing films from 2002 and 2014, only 4.1% of them were directed by women. There is a great misconception that films featuring women or created by women won’t perform at the box office. That could not be further from the truth. Women consumers are an untapped economical force. If you believe in diversity and women making movies, support those voices and the stories you want to see on screen. Every time you support a film like this — by contributing or going to see it in a theater — you inform the market that there is a demand for such movies.

By supporting Hala, you aren’t just supporting this film, you are also supporting me: a first-generation, minority female filmmaker. I do want to be clear: I didn’t set out to make a film to break glass ceilings or affect social change. I hope, through telling an authentic and personal story, that it resonates with you. If this is a story you want to see on screen, I hope that you support us by contributing or sharing the campaign with others.

For Part 1 of our interview, go here.

Part 2, here.

About Hala: Hala, a sixteen-year old Muslim teenager, has a rich and complex inner world, which serves as an escape from her socially conservative home. When she meets Jesse, a boy from the skate park, she experiences a real and immediate connection. Hala must keep their relationship a secret from her religious parents. In their Islamic faith, dating and premarital sex are expressly forbidden. Her twin identities, however, inevitably collide, and not without consequences.

A teaser for the project Hala:

You can read more about the story here.

Minhal’s director’s statement here.

The Hala team here.

The movie’s website here.

Twitter: @minhalbaig.

Declare Your Independents! Support Minnie and her movie project Hala by donating to her Kickstarter campaign here. And spread the word!