Documentary filmmakers working in developing countries often find themselves in the conundrum of being surrounded by a host of stories that demand to be told, and a lack of funds to tell them in the best possible way. When I first visited Hamburg, a tiny Eastern Cape village, on the banks of the Keiskamma River in 2004, I knew that I would make a film about this remote, but inspiring place. I wanted to be able to invest my time, to shoot a film over a period of 1-2 years. In 2005 I started filming Keiskamma, before we had any funders or broadcaster on board. Since we own our own camera equipment, we could do this, although travel to Hamburg from Cape Town (a two hour flight or 12 hour drive) did demand a certain hard cost investment.

I was in Hamburg, filming the heart of the film, when we received the news that we had received the Alter-Cine Fund. This great news couldn’t have come at a better time! Not only did it help us financially, but also emotionally! It was a great honour and vote of confidence in the story of Keiskamma that a Canadian fund saw fit to support us. This boosted our morale and gave us the encouragement we needed at a difficult time in the production. It has always been a pleasure to communicate with the Alter-Cine Foundation, whose support and encouragement has been constant for the last 2 years. We hope and trust that the Alter-Cine Foundation will continue to support filmmakers from developing countries, often telling non-mainstream stories of people who don’t have a voice in the world media!