Tourists or filmmakers? Impressions of the 1st locationtour in Cambodia

They look like funny tourists, but they’re bad-ass filmmakers on the quest for locations.

I was lucky. Because of a long term knee injury of screenwriter Ruth Thoma I was allowed to participate on Bucks second journey. Actually this would have been the trip of Jan Brandt, the production manager, since it should be already about concrete preparations for the production and location scouting. He arranged various appointments with filmmakers. The first meeting was with Sovichea from the Bophana Center, he was going to be our line producer.

For our first location tour we headed to country. We agreed on motobikes. Jan Müller our man for everything brought his own – including his girlfriend Siyan. At the evening before we rented two more bikes, which took us several hours and drinks, among others because Jan Brandt, as production manager committed to money, wanted to negotiate a good price and didn’t want to be confused by touristic generosity. A strength he could maintain until the end of the shooting. Sithon, the Cambodian location manager picked us up the next morning, jumped on the bike behind Jan and off we went.

The highlight for me was the village on the mountain. As I sat on the bench and was looking over the country I could feel for a moment why some want to stay.

Wenka

Following also some impressions for you: