Dead pigeons, live sheep, naked men: welcome to Kino Kabaret

Someone is looking for a dead pigeon," says Liam Mac an Bháird, a co-organiser of Kino Kabaret. "Does anyone have a dead pigeon?"

Film-making is a funny business. Mac an Bháird, a hirsute and ebullient presence, is sitting in the middle of a former factory space at the top floor of Applerock Studios on Foley Street, in Dublin, helping prospective film-makers as part of Ireland's first Kino Kabaret. Sitting beside him is Kino Dublin's more deadpan founder, George Hooker.

Behind them is a table with food. At the other end of the large space, laptops are ready for editing. Gathered before them are 55 amateur and professional film-makers, 20 of them Irish, who spent this week filming, editing and screening dozens of short films. “There’ll be very little sleep,” says Hooker.

Kino Kabaret involve a bunch of film-makers banding together to make a spate of short films in a short period. Kino started in Montreal in 1999 when a group of film-makers decided to make a film every month in the run-up to the millennium. It soon spread to other cities. Now there are more than 70 film-obsessed guerrilla Kino “cells” in different cities around the world. “There’s one in Mexico,” says Mac an Bháird with surprise. “I didn’t know that before, but I’ve just met a guy from Kino Mexico. He’s here.”

Hooker discovered Kino after finishing a college course in film. "I was feeling a bit disillusioned with film-making but then I heard about a Kino Kabaret in Prague . . . I didn't know anyone. I had no money. I just arrived in Prague and three days later I had a film."

Global network

Subsequently he’s been to visit kinos in Brussels and Strasbourg and this year, Hooker and Mac an Bháird travelled to Hamburg for the biggest Kino Kabaret of them all: “Two hundred and fifty film-makers made 150 films in nine days,” says Mac an Bháird.

What’s the appeal? “The kino motto is ‘do well with nothing, do better with a little and do it now,’” says Hooker.

“Film people often put a lot of emphasis on the finished product but not the process. The main thing with kino is breaking down economic and social borders and creating a global network. It’s about doing it rather than just talking about it.

“It’s non-competitive. It’s collaboration . . . Competition can be great for creativity but it can also stifle creativity. This is a festival where people are encouraged to work together for everyone’s good rather than competing.”

Here in Applerock, participants introduce themselves and outline what they can do. They come from all over the world. Many operate cameras and direct. There’s a make-up artist and a good smattering of actors and writers. There are also some less obvious cinematic talents. “I’m a mathematician,” says Hooker’s friend Sam Bouma to an enthusiastic whoop from the crowd. “So . . . if you need the trajectory of any projectiles calculated, I can do that.”

After the introductions, film-makers pitch their ideas looking for collaborators, equipment and props. Manchester man Stuart Alexander Rees needs help editing the footage he garnered in Belfast the day before. “We sent him up to Belfast and didn’t realise it was the 12th of July,” says Mac an Bháird apologetically.

Aideen McFadden needs a man "to get naked like in Terminator" for her film Microwave Man. "Oh and a smoke machine . . . I might need a smoke machine."

As I walk around the space, some groups are already heading out into the city with film equipment. There is a sheet on the wall with the words “Weird Stuff” at the top. This is where participants list cinematically useful but unusual possessions. Thus far the list includes “a pink wig” and “a fully developed script”.

Camille Dalo from Paris is looking for a sheep for the finale of her planned film, Relation-Sheep, in which a young woman finds contentment with a woolly grazer.

Jake Murray wants to film people from different cultures telling jokes. “I do corporate work to make money so it’s nice to finally get back to people who have a lot of passion for what they do,” he says.

Many of the people here work in the industry professionally. “Professionals do it because they love the vibrancy of ideas,” says Mac an Bháird. “Sometimes the industry can stifle ideas [this is] a wonderful kind of chaos. Some wonderful films get made.”

David Lojek, from Kino Berlin, is a veteran who became a "Kinoite" in 2004 after finding a flyer that said: "Shoot, cut and go. I hope everyone's energy holds," he says. "Ten days is not a game." By Wednesday's screening, the energy was still up: they had already made 43 films.

'Sleep-deprived'

George Hooker says the energy comes from the supportive community. “There’s a B-movie atmosphere [at the screenings] and people are there for that atmosphere.” He chuckles. “Also, they’re sleep-deprived . . .They say that a film is made three times but actually it’s made four times. Once when it’s written, once when it’s shot, once when it’s edited, and the final time it’s made is when it’s seen. We just bring the whole process together.”

The final screening of Kino Kabaret films is tonight at the Generator Hostel, Smithfield, Dublin. kinodublin.com