A Salvadoran boy in El Espino, 2006
A Roma girl in Ukraine, 2008
LUND--I am (I hope) declaring "News From El Salvador: The Children of the Mangroves" finished, done, complete--at least in its present form. There were always some parts I wanted to tighten, a music track to add, a short interview to add and one or two or three parts of different interviews to cut. That is all done, finally, and if it isn't perfect then it will remain imperfect until I go back and spend a month in El Espino getting the footage the film deserves for a second incarnation. But this incarnation is done and better still, it is accompanied by a 20 minute short version that concentrates solely on the currileros, the clam-digging children of the mangroves. The short omits a lot of the background interviews and footage on the state of El Salvador today and though most of the footage it contains is present in the long version they are really different films. But both, along with a slide show, are contained on the DVD.
It is good to get that finished. I want to go back and will just as soon as I can find the funding to do so. But in the meantime I have been putting new galleries up on my website www.andrewtonnphoto.com so go and check out Faces of Transcarpathia and one of a Roma settlement outside of Barackzas, Transcarpathia. Both were taken this summer while I was in Ukraine with SARA. If the unrelenting black and white social documentary gets to you then check out Swedish Summertime in Skåne for a colorful look at the lighter side of life. Now it is time to begin editing the Ukraine footage in earnest.
