Girlworld fits the Sundance documentary mission so perfectly.  Sundance funds feature documentaries “about pressing human rights, social justice, civil liberties and related topics from the US and internationally. Proposals to the Documentary Fund are evaluated on effective storytelling, global relevance, originality, artistic innovation and potential social engagement.”

How Girlworld is that? We have to apply.

Sundance wants to see AT LEAST 20 minutes of continuous footage. At first I was simply going to submit our 30 minute short, Three. But as I was writing the description of the work sample on the grant application, it didn’t feel right.

So, I called up our documentary Guardian Angel, Chris Boulton. He tried to keep his feedback light and simple. He knew what he really wanted to tell me would mean hours more work for me at the editing bay. But he had to let it loose. And let loose he did.

“Cut the music,” he told me.

My stomach tightened and for just a small moment stopped liking Chris, our dear friend and reliable consultant, altogether.

“What was I thinking, asking for feedback? I don’t really want feedback!”

I love our Nepali music. We have the rights to it and everything.

“Don’t use the music as a crutch, ” Chris said.

I will break down his argument in list form here (in my own words):

The music takes away the tension. These girls are in life or death situations. The music is… nice. Saccharin.

The music gives the impression that this is another movie for westerners to feel guilty-yet-hopeful about the human condition and about the poor brown people living somewhere over there.

The music is manipulative.

Did the Maysles brothers use music in Salesman?

Chris, say no more. Thank you for the intervention.

I cut the music.

Here is our new 20 minute trailer:

If you want to see it bigger, head over to Vimeo and watch there in full, glorious HD.

What do you think?

Mangal Maharjan of EMW Records (left), with Siddhartha, Rashil and Gurun of Kutumba

Music is huge, right? I won’t wait for you to answer; it just is. Until now, in our little films we have relied mostly on some pretty good royalty free music we found on the internet. It works, but, it’s not quite all that.

Two days ago I had a nice sit-down with Raju, who runs our local snacks-and-beer emporium (as well as the laundry and phone office opposite and the music/DVD store next door. Industrious and very sweet fellow), to talk over music for our film.

Turns out most of what I ended up liking was produced by East Meets West Music Box, a little record store that became a locally important music label.

There was a number on some of the records, and I called it and was fortunate to arrange a meeting with Mangal, the owner. Quick like a bunny, I drafted a little two-page proposal explaining what we’re doing, what we’re looking for, and how we think it might be in his interest to help us out with some film rights to his label’s music. I took it with me to the shop.

At our appointed meeting time, Mangal was not there, and I left disappointed, expecting that was that. But 90 minutes later, I got a call–Mr. Maharjan, with apologies. He’d seen the proposal and liked it. And why don’t we meet?

Brilliant meeting. Nice guy. He’s the producer on a lot of his artists’ stuff–including Kutumba, a progressive folk ensemble that a couple of his sons are in. A couple of the musicans were there as well, and we all had a nice talk and a pleasant listen to records from the EMW catalog.

They understood what I was wanting, and if I read the situation right, they were as excited by the prospect of having their music in our modest little movie as I am. We liked each other. It felt good, and authentic, and on a very small scale, kind of high powered.

I was completely clear that our film is more likely to be seen by a relatively small audience than it is to, like, go big or anything. But that didn’t seem to matter to Mangal and the fellas. They love music, and they want it to do its job, which is to move people, tell stories, make connections.

That’s what we’re going to do with it. We’ve picked out eight CDs with a range of useful and accessible (not to mention quite beautiful) music on them. If all goes to plan, tomorrow we’ll have a signed agreement (in my hack legalese) giving us full rights to use them in our Nepal based films.

I do love it when things work!