We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Lubeera Saphina. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Lubeera below.

Lubeera, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about a time you helped a customer really get an amazing result through their work with you.

I am a filmmaker and my major strengths are in writing and directing. So during my second year at Kampala Film School, a call for a grant came through for us to apply and get a chance to win 10,000$ as a development story fund.
I put my pen to paper and started drafting my pitch and treatment as the application process required. So towards the end of the grant call, a male friend of mine (I won’t mention his name) came to me for assistance in writing his treatment and editing his story to make it better for the grant call.
Because I love helping people and his story was very nice (it was about the post Gulu war in northern Uganda about a girl who witnessed her father being killed by rebels and mother being raped).
I decided to pause on mine and help him finish his story because I felt he stood a better chance to win so I put all my heart Into it.
The deadline ended and we all submitted our projects. The emails for the winners came through after like a month and I didn’t win but he was shortlisted among the winners.
I wasn’t hurt because mine didn’t win, but I was happy that at least something I was part of won. So it was a win for me as well.
When you win this grant, you get a chance to visit zanzibar film festival, you meet International producers who have potential for producing your film, you get a chance to pitch your film to executive producers and also attending meaningful masterclasses. Ofcourse I didn’t attend them but he did because he was the director of the film and owned it.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am an upcoming filmmaker from Uganda and a graduate from kampala film school. During my childhood my mother used to act in a local club in our town and watching her act birthed the love for arts in me and I knew from childhood that I would either be an actress or film writer.
When it was time for me to go to university, ofcourse I chose bachelor’s in filmmaking and that is how I joined the industry. Not forgetting that I also acted in a serie called “yat madit” in 2015 which aired or Ntv and Ubc.
At Kampala film school I met my teacher Lucky Loura Atwine who greatly inspired me to be a writer because of the wonderful films she had made. So I developed my writing skills and indeed it is starting to pay off slowly.

What sets me apart from others, I think is the authenticity of my stories. I love telling stories near me, stories everyone can relate to from the people I know. You know most fiction stories are for entertainment but all my stories I have written so far are addressing a pressing issue , some which have been ignored by filmmakers who copy the trend “American films”.

So when I make these films like my first documentary “GHETTO FIST” which won an award in the Uganda film festival gives me great joy to see that such a community story can be recognized.
A brief about Ghetto fist, its about Hellen Baleke a ghetto girl who was sexually molested by a man and she couldn’t fight him. Her love to revenge this man drove her into learning boxing which she later achieved but it became a passion for her to be a professional boxer. She pursued this journey amidst the segregation of being a lady who is boxing. Part of her mission was teach many young girls freely for self defence and she is achieving it right now.

This film also won an award in Russia for Global values during Vgik and yes I am super proud of it.
It was also nominated for Sony Future filmmakers awards and many more.

Currently I am trying to make short films and market myself.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative is seeing my stories evolve and change people’s lives. So when I created my film Ghetto fist, Hellen Baleke has a family of over 26 children under her care in the ghetto and she lucked facilities to take care of them all. So because of her story, Niklas Enander a dear friend of mine picked Interest and started fundraising funds for the family to cater for food, school fees and health.
To me that is rewarding and fulfilling.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal is to create a facility where I can teach ghetto kids who have the love for film freely. I want to impart the art to them and see them evolve.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Sweetlah Charis Riddim
• Facebook: Sweetlah Charis Riddim
• Youtube: Sweetlah House of Production