Storyline

Set in Medellín, Colombia, Un Poeta captures how Oscar Restrepo's (Ubeimar Rios) obsession with poetry brought him no glory. Aging and erratic, he has succumbed to the cliché of the poet in the shadows. Meeting Yurlady, a humble teenager, and helping her cultivate her talent brings some light to his days, but dragging her into the world of poets may not be the way. The film is a drama-comedy, written and directed by the award-winning Simón Mesa Soto, born on January 23, 1986, in Medellín, Colombia.

Introduction

As a company, Momento Film doesn’t just like to facilitate or raise money for its movies. “We are deeply involved in human relations and creativity,” says co-owner and producer Michael Krotkiewski. Founder and co-owner David Herdies continues, “We met the Colombian writer and director Simón Mesa Soto about 10 years ago. Our long-established relationship began with the short film Madre, which competed in the main competition at Cannes. We got to know each other, synced professionally, and privately, and artistically built a bond. While working on Madre, the planning of Simon's feature film debut, Amparo, began. The film competed in the Semaine de la Critique at Cannes, and in connection with it, we began developing Un Poeta. We focus on shared visions and human relations: from the idea stage to the end.”

The project was very risky: budget and time-wise. “We like to be involved early and stay until the end of our collaborations. With Un Poeta, we financially took a great risk, and we hardly make any money on this. But we did it because we trusted in Simon as a director and the relationships we have. It's a long-established relationship, and for us, there were no questions because we believed in the production and Simon and the whole team. We felt that we could do something that would stand out and last in history,” says Herdies. “Since Simon had two short films and a feature film (and two awards) in Cannes before, for which we produced two, we saw great potential to enter Cannes with Un Poeta. Unfortunately, we didn't have all the financing in place. Also, we were now in early January, with the Cannes Film Festival in May, and the shooting hadn’t even started. Usually, a movie like Un Poeta takes around one and a half to two years from shooting to premiere,” says Krotkiewski. “We were way too close to the screening in Cannes.”

Dailies and production

For the 96th Academy Awards (2024), it was reported that roughly half of the nominees for Best Cinematography were shot on film. Although a different competition from the Oscars, the Cannes Film Festival winner Un Poeta makes no exception. Shot in grainy-hued 16mm by cinematographer Juan Sarmiento G., A Poet has a timeless look that emphasizes its heightened storytelling.

This was nothing short of a big logistical challenge, especially given the time frame: film rolls had to be sent from the filming location in Medellin to Bogota in Colombia, and then by plane to Stockholm, London, and New York for scanning, after which the digital moving images could be sent to the editor in London. “The shipping logistical problem was a headache. Customs between Colombia, Europe, and the US are not easy for anything, to say the least, and with analog filming, you are stumbling in the dark because you cannot see anything until the film rolls have been scanned,” explains Krotkiewski. To solve the problems, the film crew turned to the asset review and collaboration platform KLASH. The platform became the portal for the movie production. “With KLASH, we could watch the dailies immediately after the scanning. We would otherwise have had to wait until the material was physically transferred to Sweden. We could match and communicate post modifications and sound tests with the director in Colombia already during the shoot,” says Herdies.

The Un Poeta film crew made cuts almost every day, and the editor’s work could start in London as soon as 2-3 days after the film rolls had been sent by plane from Colombia. “The possibility to log in and see the dailies on KLASH was indispensable, says Momento Film’s post-production coordinator Anschul Brandt.

“Normally, after you've shot the film, you have around a year of editing and post, and we did it in around three months. Some film rolls got stuck in customs, and some rolls got delayed. So the schedule was completely crazy. But, four days after the last day of shooting, a rough cut was sent to us,” says Krotkiewski. “Everything worked incredibly well from the start. We had synchronicity, people working around the clock, and all the stars were in the right place. KLASH was absolutely indispensable, with the communication via the platform and the smart interface. Especially under such heavy pressure. Everything became so much easier. With KLASH, we had a central hub to communicate, send, and show things. We could watch dailies, the main story, and see scenes without sound already during filming. The team in Göteborg, Stockholm, and London could get an insight into what was happening in Colombia already during the filming. This was really important for us, for example, we could see via KLASH that this could be really good because we got to see scenes without sound but with the image cut during the film shooting. You could see the main actors, the cast, and the acting. You could see quite a lot of it. At the same time as the film shooting was happening, we were working in Sweden on post-production and sound. And in London, they were editing as we were shooting, so KLASH was at the center of all this and the portal between all three parties. A short summary is that we did everything at the same time as we recorded. KLASH became a portal between all of us where we could see the material, talk about the material, and yes, even cut material, so to speak. Even the sound design and music were done during recording, everything was done in real-time.”

Learn more about Movie productions - The dailies workflow.

Post-production

For post-production, Momento Film collaborated closely with Nordic United in Sweden. Since its start in 2005, Nordic United has built a team of dedicated professionals with a passion for film and TV drama. With creative studios in central Stockholm and Göteborg for editing, VFX, sound, and grade, Nordic United became a production hub that, together with the KLASH cloud-based platform, kept all production files at the team’s fingertips.

The Nordic United co-founder and project manager, Hans "HH" Engström, explains, “We were the technical hub and did VFX, foley, and dialogue. We received material and synced and sent it to cut, grade, and sound mix as well as did online and master deliveries”.

Un Poeta was filmed on 16mm film, and one light was used in Stockholm and then edited in London. The post was done with sound work and VFX at Nordic United in Göteborg, Sweden. The composer was Trio Ramberget with Matti Bye in Göteborg. The sound designer Ted Krotkiewski, who is also Michael Krotkiewski’s brother, did sound mixing at his studio on the island of Ingarö in the Stockholm archipelago, and grading was done by a colorist in Berlin. Scanning was done in Stockholm, London, and New York.

Nordic United uses KLASH on all their productions, where clients can view dailies shots and edited versions. “We also successfully run the KLASH remote streaming solution at grade on several productions, and it works great”.

Learn more about KLASH Live streaming.

Screening

Un Poeta premiered at the 78th Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Un Certain Regard jury prize. Soto decided that he wanted nonprofessional actors in Un Poeta to give a certain substance to the film; actors have a natural presence in front of the camera.

“The main actor Ubeimar Rios playing Oscar in the movie is a nonprofessional actor who had never set foot outside of Colombia, until very recently, when he was flown to the Cannes Film Festival in France in the very last minute, handed a tuxedo, walked the red carpet and entered the mighty Debussy Theatre together with his 17 year old son,” says Krotkiewski. “The tradition is to give standing ovations at the end of the movie, where every minute is counted. Now, what happened was that this massive audience gave ovations in the middle of the movie. The actor's tears were running down his cheeks in front of his son. It’s a moment I will never forget.”

Herdies continues on the aftermath of the Cannes screening: “What was so interesting was that we planned to make a Cannes version, which would be very temporary because it is impossible to finish a film for Cannes in three months. We thought that after Cannes, we would re-cut, we would do a new mix and new sound, and new grading. But after the screening in Cannes, everyone in the team felt that the film was kind of finished. And that was absolutely exceptional. We did some small modifications, but nothing big. Then, of course, it was great that we won the award in Cannes, and after that, the movie has been getting great reviews in the world's leading film magazines such as Variety, Cine, Cineeuropa, and Indie Wire. Luxbox has started selling it, and there is demand from all over the world.”

Indie Wire is writing ”The Colombian filmmaker certainly offers a welcome F-U to World Cinema good manners, but he’s not just taking the piss with his tale of a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn and no king.” (https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/movies/a-poet-review-1235124589/)

Besides the red carpet screening in Cannes, KLASH was used to share online screeners after the premiere. “With KLASH, you can have all your movie masters in one simple and secure location, with the possibility to send out screeners with security watermarking for people to watch and download,” says HH at Nordic United.

Learn more about sending screeners on KLASH in Sharing links with external users.

The bottom line

The Un Poeta project was a big risk for the stakeholders, with high own investments. With the goal set for Cannes, the problem was completing a movie in around five months that would usually take around a year and a half.

The solution was working with clips, sound, music, and post at the same time as the team in Colombia recorded. During the recording, film rolls were sent to Stockholm, London, and New York to be scanned and uploaded to KLASH. This proved a very smooth and extremely important workflow, as Un Poeta was filmed on film, and it was only when the film rolls had been scanned and uploaded to KLASH that all parties, including the recording team itself, could watch the dailies. KLASH became a portal, communication hub, and creative display window for all parties and the production’s infrastructure.

Thanks to synchronicity, well-established relationships, long-term cooperation, and good infrastructure, the film crew managed to deliver a finished film to Cannes in mid-May from filming in January.

Un Poeta got a fantastic premiere with standing ovations, and an amateur actor who had never left Colombia now stood and received a standing ovation in the center of fine culture. After winning the 78th Cannes Film Festival Un Certain Regard jury prize, the movie got great interest from all over the world and great reviews from the world's leading film press.

The film crew overcame problems related to time and distance, connected the analog and digital worlds, and won one of the finest prizes in the world. With the right drive and passion, shared visions, and human relations, together with a little help from new technology, the impossible task of completing a movie in three months, which would usually take around two years, became possible.

The Swedish team

Momento Film - David Herdies & Michael Krotkiewski, co-producers, Anschul Brandt, post-production manager, Iman Ismail, associate producer

Momento Studio - Sound Design - Ted Krotkiewski, Post sound supervisor / sound designer

Post-production house and supervisors - Nordic United Göteborg

Music - Trio Ramberget & Matti Bye

Scanning - Nina Boriri, Focus Film

Co-production structure

A Poet was produced by Ocultimo (Colombia), with co-production by ma.ja.de Fiction (Germany), ZDF Das kleine Fernsehspiel/ARTE (Germany), Momento Film (Sweden), and Film i Väst (Sweden).

World Sales

World sales are overseen by Luxbox.

Financing

Film i Väst (SE)

Swedish Film Institute (SE)

FDC - Colombian Film Fund (CO)

ZDF Das kleine Fernsehspiel/ARTE (DE)

Equity investments from Ocultimo (CO), Momento Film (SE), Momento Studio (SE), M.a.j.a.d.e (DE)