Happen Films November 2019 Update

A couple of months ago we sat down to think about “What Next?” for Happen Films. We’ll always be making short films on a range of topics within the resilience/sustainability space because we love that work, but we also loved the experience and format of this year’s Fools & Dreamers and we wanted to tackle a similar sized project with a similarly important message.

There are so many issues, all of them connected in one way or the other. How to choose one?

We think we’ve settled on the subject of regenerative farming practices. We want to explore just how critical the regeneration of the world’s soils will be in the global response to our climate and broader environmental crises, as well as how those farming practices – vegetable, animal, arable – affect discussions about food sovereignty, land sovereignty, food ethics and more generally human and animal health and well-being.

We’ve come to see land regeneration as potentially one of the fastest, most effective and most critical responses to the civilisational crisis we’re currently facing. It’s also a big and complex subject, fraught with controversial elements, and somewhat daunting to approach. What’s more, our challenge will be to make the subject of healthy soils sexy and engaging to all those among us who are not (or not yet!) farmers.

We’re really excited to be underway with this project. We plan to go deep and we aim to really do justice to the subject. If you or someone you know would be interested in supporting this project – which will be bigger-budget than usual for us – please get in touch. We’re in the process of writing up our funding proposal and we’re well into the research phase. It’s exciting! It will be a long-term project, so we’ll keep you posted as we go.

Yesterday we were recalling the very first short film we set out to shoot together, back in August 2015.

We were pretty nervous rocking up to Limestone Permaculture in NSW, with little idea of how to prepare for a film shoot, and having pulled over to the side of a back-country road five minutes from the farm to scribble down some interview questions as an afterthought – upon reflection we were completely unprepared! These days we’re a whole lot better organised on film shoots, but luckily the awesome folk at Limestone gave generously and amicably of their time and knowledge.

Our first short film looks pretty amateur to us now, but Brett Cooper’s responses to our questions were so insightful, passionate and informative that he made the film the much-watched success it is today (nearly 1 million views!).

Brett and Nici are now full time on their property, bringing permaculture and an abundance of veggies and goods to their community and beyond. So inspiring! Our “update” film on Limestone Permaculture, four years on, is coming soon – can’t wait to share with you how far they’ve come already!

Those of you who’ve been following us for a while might recall mention in a newsletter, about this time last year, of a video Jordan had made showing the retrofit of his lovely old Toyota van in Australia.

That video is now on 5 million views! We sold the van when Jordan moved permanently to New Zealand this year, and we’re saving up to replace her. Naturally, we’ll do another retrofit (and video!).

Meanwhile, subscribers to the channel keep asking for more… So we thought it would be great fun to add video tours of other people’s vans – there are so many people travelling in beautiful vans, in interesting ways, e.g., Ollie, pictured, who travels with his cat, Marbles 🙂

These films are great fun to make and provide us with something a bit different alongside the Happen Films channel. We’ll let you know when they’re out!

We’re often asked how we make ends meet, given most of our films are free to view, and how our lifestyle aligns with the messages of our films. We’ve just updated the Support Happen Films page on our website to provide more detail about how we work. Interested? Visit the Support page and, if you’re on your phone, scroll down to ‘Philosophy’.

Thanks for checking in on our blog and for reading all this way in the midst of your busy day – we love that you’re interested! Please feel free to write with thoughts and ideas about our work – we’re always keen to hear from you 🙂

With love for all
Antoinette & Jordan