By Alemayehu Seife-Selassie

“Democracy is Fair Play”, a film by Yared Shumete, has received the most vote as the best video film in the Democracy Video Challenge contest. The short film, which is about the Ethiopian traditional game of “More”, had been chosen as one of the top three films from Africa to compete in the challenge in the month of May 2010. And just end of last week, the Ethiopian film was chosen as the most viewed film making Yared Shumete the lucky winner.

“I heard that my film has won on Monday morning. Mr. Matt Endria, a movie buff who sponsored cameraman Tamirat Mekuria’s lesson in filmmaking, called me and told me my film has won.”
Democracy is Fair Play shows a children’s game in Ethiopia where two boys throw rocks towards a drawn line on the ground. Whoever gets the closest then climbs on the back of the other and will ride the loser to where the rocks are. Then the winner throws first and the carrier gets a chance to throw and hit the rock the boy on top has thrown. If he succeeds the roles will be reversed. The film suggests that everyone gets a chance to be on top.

Yared’s film was one of the films which received several comments in the competition. According to some of the comments the theme exists only in games and not in reality. To which Yared replied, “I made the film with the concept of democracy in mind. I did not make it with the idea of showing what the situation is everywhere in the world but what it should be like.“

“I have received enormous positive feedbacks and only five disapprovals; I am guessing those were made by the other filmmakers that I triumphed over,” Yared teasingly said.

At the beginning Yared had thought that he would have made the film a bit differently. “I would have made the rock throwing scene, which was taking a bit too long at first, shorter. But I later found out that it was a natural scene. When the boy is carrying his friend he threw faster and it is just the truth. Somehow my subconscious told me to let it stay long, and now, I would not touch a single frame.”
Yared will be among the continents’ winners that will be traveling to the United States to get a first hand visit to Hollywood studios. Being a nominee and winning the contest has facilitated conditions for his film ventures. But the filmmaker states that the film has paved the way for lots of filmmakers in Ethiopia. “It is not only for me but also for the rest of the filmmakers in Ethiopia. The fact that my film won the competition will probably set an agenda for the American Embassy in Ethiopia to feature Ethiopian films in their program.”

So far for Yared, the film has paved opportunities to work on several short films, but it has also limited his feature length projects. “Some filmmakers who were thinking of making me their film editor have revised their thoughts because I might be traveling in the middle.”

Currently Yared is finalizing “Introducing Ethiopia to the World”, a documentary that is aimed to be distributed at the 2010World Cup in South Africa.
Yared has plans to study film directing and minor in film editing in the US or anywhere there is a professional school. But that depends on finding sponsors. “I do not have dreams of making films in Hollywood yet. I think that will be a farfetched dream. My visit will help me to get an exposure into how they do things there.”

This filmmaker has worked on films for the past eight years. But for most of his life, he has been working as a film editor than a director. “So far my experience as a director is in for short films and I want to gradually increase the duration and get to a stage where I will be able to direct a feature length film. Haile Gebreselassie did not get into marathon right away; he started with 5,000 and 10,000 meters.”

Yared all-time favorite film is the Iranian Majid Majidi’s “Color of Paradise”.

As for the short film, Yared states that he owes a gratitude to Manyazewal Endeshaw, a film director, his cameraman Addis Tesfa, the two children in the film, Yohanes and Shegaw, Ato Zeray, Getu Temesgen, Baher Jibril and the entire US Embassy staff.