Zakka West

Watch Zakka West on Instagram - the first feature film in Instagram format!

We’re a generation of individuals. We don’t need anyone. We can do it all ourselves. The pursuit of Self overrules the search for Love. Olly & Lulu know that. In each their way, they’re living the individual dream.

But what if two proud individuals are presented with proof that they are meant to be together? That would mess with their plans for independence, sure, but it would also force them to react. Zakka West is a simple film with a complex, emotional undercurrent. Like the generation itself.

Released in 2003, Zakka West was called “Denmark’s first indiefilm“ by the Danish newspaper Politiken.

Watch it on YouTube.

The process - the making of an indiefilm

What started as a creative rebellion against the ‘safe’ and pedantic Danish film industry that neglects young filmmakers, ended up as a fantastic filmmaking experience.

In conversations in Rome in 2000 with one of Europe’s great screenwriters, Suso Cecchi d’Amico, the director, Mikael Colville-Andersen, heard her talk about what became known as Italian Neo-realism. She mocked the label, which had been slapped onto the films by someone else, somewhere else in the world. Because all it was, was a group of friends with a shared desire to make films who headed out onto the streets and began shooting.

With that in mind, Zakka West was born. The director, Mikael Colville-Andersen was granted carte blanche and, as a result, he chose to go the whole nine yards and accommodate every whim of the team - most of whom had just graduated from The National Film School of Denmark.

The writer/director played the leading role. The producer wanted to film chronologically. The sound designer wished to compose the original soundtrack. The cinematographer wanted to shoot the whole film on the new Aaton Minima super 16 camera. The film was edited on Final Cut Pro – the first Danish feature to do so. Shooting wrapped in just 19 days - because that’s how long Wong Kar-wai took to shoot his early films.

The entire crew were given free reign to test their own creative limits - because film should be an ongoing experiment containing constant doubt, passion and room for personal creativity.

The result is a ‘French film, in English, in Copenhagen’. Whatever the hell THAT means.

Watch Zakka West