Van Sanctuary
“I made all those ice cream stickers and they're kind of hilarious. They don’t make a lot of sense if you look close at them. But I kind of love them.”
Saleem’s quarantine hair look
Van Sanctuary is Saleem Reshamwala’s contribution to anthology short-film series, Becoming America.
What's the significance of the title Becoming America, and how did you get involved with a project like this?
Becoming America is the name that the producer Sameer Gardezi gave to this series. What he wanted to do was get people from different parts of the US to each tell a different story of embracing differences, so he had a group in L.A. and another in Chicago. Sameer had actually seen some music video work I did a few years ago. We’d chatted online about a project that didn’t come together, but then he reached out to me about this, and Durham became the third city.
You directed Van Sanctuary in this anthology. Why did you choose to tell this story?
As for the story, I've always been interested in immigration.
I'm from a community where there are immigrants of all different immigration statuses, which feels like a crazily random luck of birth situation to me. Anyway, when Sameer asked me if I’d write something, if I had any ideas, I actually went for a walk and saw a friend fixing up his van. I decided “hey, I'll try to write three stories- three pitches about vans!” So I wrote up three quick van ideas. This was the one that stuck.
We started fleshing it out and we brought on three Durham-based folks to act as writing consultants, Karla Jimenez-Magdaleno, Rahi Hasan and Monèt Noelle Marshall.
Is social commentary or entertainment more of a focus for you?
I don't think of either social commentary or entertainment as the main focus. I think if you make true work, the social commentary just emerges, right? For this kind of thing, I'm not sure that you have to spend a whole lot of time trying to think about what to say about society, but trying to make a piece that feels true, and build a world where that story might happen. Social issues or commentary will emerge and people will bring what they want to bring to it.
What message do you hope people receive?
The message I hope people receive is simple. You know, I think in life everyone's just trying to get by. Remembering that so many different kinds of people are all trying to get by can be a little hopeful. That doesn’t solve everything, doesn't mean we don't have conflicts, doesn’t mean we don’t need to act together to change things- but it’s a good thing to remember.
What effort did it take to accomplish Van Sanctuary from conception to completion?
Schedule-wise, it was quite a slam to make it happen so fast.
After the writing, we pulled together and teamed up with a Durham-based crew. I worked with DP Ismail Abdelkhalek; we met in the backyard. We socially distanced and just kind of wrote things out on a bunch of index cards. Mandy Padgett came on early as well. She’s a local, and frequent collaborator behind the scenes of many Durham video projects. I made a lot of mistakes, so it was a much, much longer first day than I’d hoped. Mandy really helped keep things moving on set. It’s a learning process, you know? But everybody came together and we shipped stuff off for post-production.
And we got a track from Kane Smego for the closing. I also did one of his music videos recently, for that track, so there was a lot of local collaboration.
How has Covid changed the way you make movies?
Covid has definitely changed the way I make videos. It changed everything for me. This piece takes place outdoors and everyone's socially distanced because I wanted everyone to be safe making it. So the story partially emerged from that.
So, you know, I don't want to risk any harm for a film right now. Especially when any risk we take with covid brings other lives into jeopardy, not just ours. So I'm only shooting outdoors. I think everybody's gotta make their own choices, so I'm certainly not judging how anyone else is doing things, just trying to be as safe as possible.
I’m also doing some indoor stop motion stuff, too, with my family. I'm being really careful around my parents who live nearby.
Where were you when 9/11 happened, and what is your favorite ice cream flavor?
I was at my parent’s house, and I’ve always been partial to Rocky Road.