Lights, camera, action! Amrou Al-Kadhi on taking their film Layla to Sundance

Over the years that I’ve been writing this column, I’ve avoided using it to ‘sell’ my career. But I’d like to make an exception this time to celebrate that my debut feature film, Layla, has just been invited to premiere at Sundance Film Festival in January.

Making a film is a truly magical, and often nonsensical, process, and I want to describe just what an uphill struggle and occasionally bonkers process the whole thing is. I pitched the concept to Film4 at the end of 2017, and they agreed to finance the development of a treatment and script at the start of 2018. The scriptwriting continued into 2022 (yes, four and a half years).

Our executives pushed and pushed for re-writes, examining the characters and the story from every angle, making sure every decision was the most surprising and considered, and that no avenue was left unexplored. Most screenwriters become resentful of the development process — including me. We cry, “LET US MAKE OUR MOVIE!” repeatedly. But having come out the other side of it, I am deeply grateful it took as long as it did. The development process is intentionally protracted to allow the characters to be fully realised and complex.

“A film is only possible due to the extraordinary diversity of talent that comes together”

When we got the golden ticket sign-off, we then had to source the finance. We are very fortunate in the UK to have public money invested in new filmmakers. If you strike it lucky and convince enough people to put money into your crazy idea, then comes pre-production.

In making Layla, I truly came to learn how a film is only possible due to the extraordinary diversity of talent that comes together. Production designers, costume designers, makeup artists, production teams, cinematography, camera wizards, sound technicians… each of whom have their own remarkable skill set that is beyond my capacity to understand. When directing, I felt more like the captain of a ship filled with geniuses than anything special myself.

That’s what’s so powerful about the filmic medium — its inherent power is in the collaboration and communication between a whole roster of creatives, and it’s a deeply beautiful thing to watch. Over the course of months, these teams come together to realise every detail of the script, and your words are translated into sets and costumes. It’s humbling.

Once every detail is meticulously planned out, production begins — and all hell breaks loose. Unforeseen challenges arise, meaning you have to change your script on the spot and improvise when things don’t work on screen like you had envisaged. If you go with the improvisational nature of this, surprising magic can occur and you’re given material that you never planned for. Actors bring in new possibilities and everything you thought you knew about your film changes… your own story transforms before your eyes. After six weeks of no sleep and gallons of coffee and panic, you have files and files of footage, a lot of it unusable.

“To have been selected really was the best day of my life”

Then comes the editor, who sifts through the carnage to find the magic. Months of editing occurs, which throws in new possibilities and story directions, and once again you are rewriting your movie, considering it with fresh eyes. Again, everything you thought you knew is out the window, and you discover elements in your material you didn’t realise were there when you were shooting. A new film is somehow born out of the ashes of the one you thought you were going to shoot.

The introduction of a composer then adds emotion to your image, before a harem of sound designers and technicians, mixers, graders, and more tweak every frame, so that the scenes and atmosphere feel real and detailed and your film is textured into a living organism. And so, six years is condensed into a single film.

Somehow, 5,000 of these features — each a labour of love, agony and blind ambition — are submitted to Sundance to fill only 100 slots. To have been selected really was the best day of my life.

So, I am taking today to celebrate myself and all the other indie filmmakers out there who unleash their souls and pour their passions into their work, no matter how impossible it is or whatever the outcome. I salute you all.

The Sundance Film Festival runs between 18 and 28 January 2024 in Park City, Utah.

This feature first appeared in Attitude’s January/February issue – out now.