Documentary Pitch - 'Made in Sheffield'

Today's seminar was a pitching session, which our group found very helpful in terms of gaining initial reactions and feedback. The main idea that we pitched is 'Made in Sheffield' (working title); a documentary about the importance of independent stores in Sheffield, at a time where their future is unknown due to a threat of demolition plans.

The film will focus on the current redevelopment plans that are in question along Devonshire Street; an area of the city known for its independence and originality.
Through documenting one successful independent vintage clothing business, Syd & Mallory, the views of those on other independent businesses around the area and incorporating their story amongst a range of interviews and sound bites taken from discussions with a few selected regular customers and comments from the general public backing the campaign for their survival,  the documentary aims to be a collaborative film which discovers why these businesses are vital to Sheffield and  will uncover why so many local residents and  even one time visitors are fighting so hard for its survival. The documentary will capture a community of Sheffield residents and lovers of the city, and capture the vibrance of the area as it is today, and as it will hopefully remain in future.




















As filmmakers, and also from our perspective as students who only moved to and got to know Sheffield as a city last year, we believe that the independent businesses and areas to the city are integral to making it a unique place. Because we are passionate about the subject, we really want to create a film which captures this collective view amongst the people of Sheffield, and create a film which the viewer feels they are able to connect with the subject and the sense of urgency surrounding it.

(comment taken from: http://publicaccess.sheffield.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=neighbourComments&keyVal=NC1WIKNYFY000 )


We have been keeping a close eye on the progress of the plans online, through noticing
new news articles appearing and the rising numbers of signatures on fresh petitions to save the area, such as the one below. Reading the comments on these pages has provided us with insightful research into some of the reoccurring reasons that people have for their desire for the area to remain untouched. This research is on-going amongst the group and we will continue to monitor  the progress and any developments within the planned proposal throughout the production process. We understand that the nature of documentary filmmaking lends itself towards remaining open and adaptive towards change and being prepared to take risks and pick new parts of the story up along the way, and with such a current story this is something that we are aware might happen with our film.

Further plans

We have access to both the store and a few early contributors, but in order to develop our idea further we are going to visit and spend a lot of time around the Devonshire Green/Devonshire Street area over the weekend with a camera, taking photographs of interesting images that interest us in terms of thinking about the poetic and visual approach to the film. We have agreed with the store owners to take some recce images tomorrow afternoon and have a chat about the film in further detail, before writing up a schedule for the next few weeks. Overall as a group, we are all very passionate about this idea and organised in terms of planning our time at this stage. We will be holding a group meeting early next week before we begin filming to determine exactly what we aim to collect footage and sound wise and gather everybody's ideas and availability. We are also going to do some further research into similar documentaries and their styles and approaches, and spend some more time around the area at different times of the day in order to gather further inspiration.