What was the starting point of Bergie? 
There were three elements that lead to Bergie’s conception. I live in Cape Town where it is a very common sight to see people sleeping on sidewalks. I heard a story about a person that was homeless who died, but people thought he was sleeping. I wondered for a long time how long it took for people to realise that the person lying there was actually dead. Secondly, there are a lot of homeless people close to my apartment. I sometimes see how law enforcement wake them up and remove them, while other times there are activists who try to block their removal by serving court papers. The scenes taking place behind our apartment block are usually quite dramatic. The third element that triggered Bergie was that, in the same area, there is a 5km fun-run every Saturday morning. Just after the start of the race, we would pass underneath a bridge where a lot of homeless people would be sleeping and, in the process, our running and stomping would wake them up. While running one of the races, these three elements clicked together as I thought that one of the ways in which you would realise a homeless person has died, is, unfortunately, when he or she is in your way. And usually, law enforcement deals with such a situation, not us. I therefore wrote the script with this location in mind, close to my apartment, where these different events were taking place. 

Can you explain what the word “bergie” means, in South Africa? 
The term “bergie” is a South Africanism that refers to people that are homeless, since they usually sought refuge on the slopes of Table Mountain (called “Tafelberg” in Afrikaans). As in Dutch and German, the word for “mountain” in Afrikaans is berg. With the “-ie” at the end, the word becomes a diminutive. 

Most of the shots are focused on the main character’s face and reactions. Did you shoot your film that way to enable the viewer to really invest themselves emotionally? 
Yes definitely, but another reason is to cut the rest of the world out. The camera not only captures what’s in front of it, but also eliminates the world around it. And that is important, because, in a similar way, there is a lot of information in real life that we do not have access to. I think this is a more honest way of storytelling, because it reflects our individual and limited experience of the world. I therefore not only wanted the audience to witness the main character’s reaction to the situation, but also to encourage the audience to use their imagination with regards to the off-screen space and, as a result, take part in the film’s meaning-making process. 

How do you hope audiences will react to the film?
I hope audiences will be encouraged to think about their own relation towards people that suffer and what such a responsibility might entail.

What is your favourite short film?
It’s a tie between Qiu Yang’s A Gentle Night and Sameh Alaa I Am Afraid to Forget Your Face. Charlotte Wells’s Laps is a close second.

What does the Festival mean to you? 
For me, Clermont-Ferrand represents a celebration of the short film format. While a lot of people see short films as stepping stones to features, I think it is a medium or format in its own right and, in many ways, can be more flexible and daring than features. The possibilities of pushing the short film format are endless. 

Bergie is being shown as part of the International Competition I5.  

What inspired you to make a mockumentary? It’s quite an original format! 
Clara: I wanted to portray the performative state of the present time. Not only the scene’s time, but also the speech, which always appears to be spontaneous. Inspired by YouTube videos and the works of the documentary maker Eduardo Coutinho, I understood that to make a work that would express the simplicity and greatness of the Brazilian marginalized women living in the state of Rio de Janeiro I would need to seek an absurd intimacy, between the documentary and the fictional world. It was important to ask, to confront, to doubt, to distrust and to find in a simple and intimate way to portray deep Brazil. Subversive not only in its noisy image, but also in its scenic and linguistic restraint. It is perhaps, for me, the best way to say that the improbable and the absurd can be totally real when we talk about cinema and Latin America. 
Gabriella: As a filmmaker, I’m always interested in the “betweens”. My previous films reflect this hybridism between documentary and fiction. Afeto (2019; 15′), for example, was an experimental documentary that used science fiction/ horror devices to question the symbolic erasure of women in Brazilian cities. To do so, I mixed archival footage, interviews, direct cinema, and academic research, creating a fictional narrative for concrete data. 

Who is Rose? Is she based on someone real?
Clara: Rose is a character I created inspired by the women in my family. She also represents – in a “decolonised” way – the spirit of the women who inhabit the outskirts of Rio. 

Where did you shoot the film? Whose house was it? 
Clara: It is my house. I chose it because of the metalanguage between character and author. I am interested in the fact that Rose has entered my house and is possibly fabricating my existence. The second reason is the desire for a documentary record of the house. The scene takes place in this real, living space, where nothing was altered for the film to be shot. 

How was it working as a directing duo?  
Both: We are a interracial female creative duo  living in the Brazilian diaspora, and we are interested in discussing the space of ugly films made in a country that exports beauty. We share a great creative affinity, but also inhabit experiences that differ greatly. ESCASSO ends up being the fruit of this as well: of these encounters and mismatches of our bodies and experiences.  

What are your respective filmmaking backgrounds? What projects do you have in the pipeline?  
Both: We are currently focusing on developing our solo projects, although we have some projects together for the coming years. 
Clara: Escasso is my first film. The result of long years of aesthetic and linguistic study. A materialization of the concept I have been developing: decolonial melodrama. I studied aesthetics and theatre theory at UNIRIO.  I am a black woman raised in the suburbs of the city of Rio de Janeiro, I grew up in the “Pedreira” slum. Amidst a lot of culture, manifestations of African religion, and violence. Melodrama allows me to explore this popular culture. In 2021 I was selected by Netflix to join the “CoCreative Lab” program, a course for black writers in Brazil. My next works are related to this concept of mine, the Decolonial Melodrama. My next film is about memory and settlement. It is called Retract, it is about identity, registration and celebration. 
Gabriella: I have two projects in the pipeline, a short-movie and a feature film. Both are focused on latin american women and use fantastic realism devices to tell histories of women and their mythological-ancestral relationship with the sea, which has been my research for some years. Miradas (que ya no se encuentran) is fictional short movie that raises questions about the construction of “border identities” in a context of globalization and clash of cultures of a megalopolis like São Paulo. The other project I would like to focus on is Ejá, my first feature: I study indigenous and Afro-Brazilian foundational myths to draw a direct dialogue with Barravento, the first feature film by Brazilian filmmaker Glauber Rocha. Escasso is my 5th film as a director, but the second as a co-director* – an arrangement I truly believe in. I’m definitely influenced by where I grew up and the women who raised me. I was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, more specifically in Tijuca, a neighbourhood surrounded by samba schools, bars, favelas and middle class apartments of military families households. My work is focused on narratives of strong female characters in decolonial perspectives. I’ve been working developing audiovisual projects for Brazilian companies such as Conspiração Filmes and currently Delicatessen Filmes. I’m writing a doc-series for HBOMax Brasil while I direct commercial projects. 

What’s your favourite short?  
Clara: República by Grace Passô, Zombies by  Baloji, Alma no Olho by Zozimo Bulbul, Dias de Greve by Ardley Queiroz and Rap, o canto da Ceilândia by Ardley Queiroz.  
Gabriella: I’m sure I’m forgetting here movies I love and that were fundamental to me, but here we go… Blue by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, República by Grace Passô, Fantasmas by Gabriel Martins , Big in Vietnam by Mati Diop, Dreaming Gave Us Wings by Sophia Nahli Allison.  

What does the Festival mean to you?  
Both: We believe in the power of the ” short film” format. As independent Brazilian filmmakers, being in Clermont-Ferrand, one of the oldest and most important short film festivals in Europe, represents a lot! Escasso was financed by the two of us and our scarce resources. We made the film in the pandemic, with the help of collaborators who, like us, believed in the idea and the power of the film. To see where Ms. Rose and this story has taken us, is the realization of many dreams. It’s also the accomplishment of a lot of hard work! Being in Clermont means the possibility to exchange with filmmakers and film lovers from all over the world, and hopefully create viability for our future projects – as a creative duo, and individually. 

Escasso is being shown as part of the International Competition I14.