Sauti Magazine Issue 17 // ONLINE EXCLUSIVE

AUG-ONLINE ISSUE //17

HASSANALI

spearheading Innovation in the digital landscape AND his love for making film.

BTS

BEHIND THE SCEENES

Movie news, new release dates and some 411 on what to expect

ITOWANT GET TESTED

BUT WHERE & HOW?

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TABLE OF

Contents I WANT TO B E T ES TE D P

A

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E

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COVID19 has changed our lives so much, we have been forced to look at so many things differenty.

But before anything we must first understand our responsibility to each other and more importantly know our status, so that we can be able to take care of ourselves and those we love,

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MOV I E MANI A We are all pretty bummed out that alot of movies that we were looking forward to watching got puched back.

Here is the low down on whats happening with thier release dates and some juicy gossip about the cast behind the projects.

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I WANT TO GET TESTED

BUT WHERE AND HOW? Written by: Ricky N. Muganda @RickyNe Have you been tested? This question has two interpretations these days. Before March in Kenya, that question only referred to your HIV status. This is because of the largely available information on HIV, the testing that is accessible countrywide and the time and effort that has been put into sensitizing the masses on the disease.

We hope that one day the public will be as informed as they are on HIV with COVID19 but as at now, there are too many an answered questions about the Covid test.

H

ave you been tested?

For a greater number of us, the answer to that question is no, and the reason for this is varies from person to person. But the main 4 are 1. I am not experiencing any symptoms 2. I dont know where to get tested 3. I am scared 4. I cannot afford it Lets first understand what and how a Covid test is carried out . COVID-19 tests are critical to measuring the spread of the disease and determining how to handle the pandemic.

The two types of COVID-19 test - serology

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tests and viral tests - serve different purposes and have different limitations.

Viral Test Basic facts about the test A viral test is an oral or nasal swab or saliva test that looks for evidence of an active viral infection. There are two major types: a PCR test and an antigen test.

PCR tests look for the presence of a virus’s genetic material, while antigen tests look for specific proteins on a virus’s surface.

Antigen tests produce results more quickly but may be less sensitive.

Viral tests do not indicate whether someone was infected in the past.

Serology Test Basic facts about the test A serology test is a blood test that looks for evidence of someone’s prior infection with the virus.

The test provides evidence that someone may have been exposed to the virus in the past, potentially even if they did not have symptoms, by detecting antibodies specific to the virus.

........ It’s alright to be afraid, we all have something and or someone to live for.

The test does not diagnose an active infection or identify who is protected from reinfection (antibodies have not been proven to guarantee immunity).

Courtesy of file published by Johns Hopkins University

To answer some FAQs Where can I get tested in Mombasa?

In Mombasa, you can get tested at the Public Health Department building.

How much does it cost to get tested?

It will cost you Ksh1000/- of you present yourself for a test. The test is only free if you are to be part of a contact tracing group that was identified after identifying a positive case.

Mombasa Governor Ali Hassan Joho had stated that treatment in Mombasa for all COVID patience is FREE in all government hospitals and it still is.

Things to remember 1. Step Up your Hygiene, if you thought you were clean; I guess you need to get cleaner 2. Stay home, stay sane and if you cannot follow the directives laid out by the Ministry of Health i) Maintain Social Distancing ii) Wear Your mask iii) Wah your hands with soap and water (reccomended) or Sanitise with HAnd Sanitiser 3. Testing in Mombasa is at the Public Health Department Building

4 . There is currency alot of stigma that patients and survivors of COVID are experiencing, does the county government have any programs to tackle this?

The County government is currently carrying out aggressive radio campaign to sensitize the people of Mombasa on the disease with the tag line Sanitise don’t stigmatise, they also have County health workers who make visits to the community to ensure the public of the health status of their neighbour who may have just been released from isolation and do their absolute best to ensure they understand that he/she is COVID free.

The fear: It’s alright to be afraid, we all have something and or someone to live for. So that is your purpose, that is your reason to take care of yourself. If you do feel ill, you know what to do and how to handle it gives you the best tools to take care of yourself and your loved ones to ensure we beat this disease.

If you do feel ill and or experience any of the symptoms of COVID-19 (fever, dry cough, tiredness to mention a few) call a healthcare provider or the number provided by the Ministry of Health 719 Stay home, stay safe, stay sane and if you must leave the house; wear your mask, practise social distancing (even our article heading is practising social distancing, you should to) wash your hands with soap and water and sanitise.

By working together we can beat this disease.

References: Mombasa County Government (Public Helath Department) Online Reference: Johns Hopkins Unversity of Medicine

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Written by: Tony Kamau anthony.kinyua62@gmail.com

F

or loyal fans and diehard movie lovers,2020 has been beyond devastating.

Delays occasioned by the unforeseen circumstances of the pandemic have had a rippling effect that has cut across Hollywood, Theatres, and Actors as well as Actresses.

Closer to home in Mombasa, scores of movie fans can only hope and wait with baited breath. For life to return to normal in the film sector. Netflix and other Video on Demand (VOD) platforms on the other hand, have benefitted immensely. As they currently hold a make shift monopoly on the sector.

2020 was one filled with promise and excitement for movie lovers. The number of big sequels, and new releases that were lined up had us pumped full of excitement and anticipation. After the pandemic hit a number of big releases first announced delayed releases and when the situation got worse the most ended up being pushed back a whole year. This also forced some big studios to expedite their plans to jump into the VOD market to release their new

movies. Here are some of the big releases that we were excited about and info on their new release schedules.

James Bond: No time to die James Bond No time to die was the first to announce some delays, it all started with a rumour here, a tweet there, a contingency plan to skip China on the international promo tour and then boom: an official statement by the studio that the movie will not release this year at all. This was a significant hit, and what I believe was the first domino to fall.

No domino falls alone, and thus this stared an unprecedented

domino effect in Hollywood unlike no other ever seen before. The movie had already started of rocky when the lead man Daniel Craig at one point having have pulled out from the franchise but eventually decided to return. A decision that he later came to appreciate after the fact given that it got him to visit Jamaica.

Being in Jamaica is just exciting on so many levels for me. I haven’t been here for one. But also, this is where Fleming wrote them so they were created here. There’s always been a connection, a whatever family connection.

Somehow, he’s always ended up here for some reason or another. A lot of the movies have been shot here. We’re just incredibly fortunate to get a chance to be here and we’re getting looked after so beautiful. The sunshine, there’s a beach over there. I’m so happy; I just can’t tell you. - Daniel Craig

The movie is now set to release on 11 November given the global situation improves. We definitely hope that it does. We are excited to see the Sexy Charismatic spy James Bond back on the silver screen.

The Eternals This movie had been on the minds of the Russo Brothers and Kevin Feige who are the crème de la crème when it come Marvel Studios because after Avengers: End Game which happens to be the highest earning movie in present

times with a record-breaking USD 2.79 Billion, there had to be a continuation and the Marvel Studios Superhero Franchise still possesses the Midas’ touch so it was best to concentrate on its golden hen that still lays the golden egg hence development and pro-

A-list bankable names, from the gorgeous Angelina Jolie, the exquisite Salma Hayek to the hilarious Kumail Nanjiani duction of The Eternals and other marvel movies like Black Widow had to done.

I found the cast to be well balanced, taking into account the different personality types of the characters in this film.

Distributed by Walt Disney and at a production cost of over USD 100 million, the movie is the 25th instalment in the Marvel Studios roster and has brilliant variety of A-list bankable names, from the gorgeous Angelina Jolie, the exquisite Salma Hayek to the hilarious Kumail Nanjiani who was in Stuber and the fearless Kit Harington who is famously known for his role in Game of Thrones.

The movie boasts a wide range of serene and breath-taking locations.

From the Canary Island to the busy metropolis of London and to the little-known Island Fuerteventura.

Release date was pushed to February 12th,2021 from November 6,2020.

More on the The Eternals can be viewed on the Marvel Studios Official Page and website.

Mulan The feature film release of Mulan is one that had been requested for years and anticipated for even

longer. When the project finally got greenlit by the Walt Disney studio, the next big question was?

Was this going to another “white wash” of Asian culture in an effort to cast big names to draw in crowds and recoup on investment?

Nope, seems Hollywood finally learnt that people from Asia aren’t white and they need to be depicted as they are. The casting team on the film did a great job, if i do say so myself casting Asian American actors like Tzi Ma (you will know him from productions like The Man in the High Castle, 24, and Rush Hour) and Jason Scott Lee in the film, Jet Li is also cast in this movie.

The movie is a story of a young woman who, to save her ailing father (played by Tzi Ma) from serving in the Imperial Army, a fearless young woman disguises herself as a man to battle northern invaders in China.

The movie is packed with intense and meticulously choreographed fight scenes, and a tonne, I mean a tonne of Asian culture and heritage, was set to release on the 9th of March but was since then pushed indefinitely An article on entertainment website the verge.com that was

published on August 4th stated that Disney Executives have decided to release the movie on their new Video on demand platform Disney+ on September 4th. That’s just next month.

An extract from the article reads; Disney’s live-action adaptation of Mulan will be released on Disney Plus on September 4th for $29.99, the company announced today.

We thought it was important to find alternative ways to bring [Mulan] in a timely manner,” Disney CEO Bob Chapek said. In countries where Disney Plus is not available, Disney is releasing Mulan in theatres on the same date.

We do not have a confirmed date when our cinemas will open here in Kenya. Will we be open by the 4th?

I am sure movie lovers and the hundreds of Kenyans whose jobs and livelihoods depend on the movie business definitely hope so.

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Status quo, Regular BEYOND THE

BEYOND THE

Hatim Hassanali; spearheading Innovation in the digital landscape and passion in film making.

Written by: Ricky N. Muganda @RickyNe Funny thing is that Hatim actually reached out to me mid last year. I think it was. He was interested in placing an advert in the magazine. We spoke on and off for weeks but alas in the end that little piece of business fell through.

I was the chaser at that point, and I would call him and he would always answer his phone and even when he didn’t he always returned my call. That level of professionalism and humility given his status was always mind-boggling to me.

S

o fast forward to the day of the interview and due to the current state we could not do the traditional sit down on a table across from each other or something. I would ask my questions and he would then respond and expound on his answers.

A great tool for me to get to know my interviewee and be able to not only listen to his answers and stories but better yet experience them with him

and be a part of them. We opted to embrace technology and set up a video call.

I couldn’t get to immerse myself into his story but I could at the very least see my subject.

Hatim’s story began in Canada working on a couple of things, one of which was a record label. He has always been involved with multimedia in one way

or another. He and his friend and eventual partner who then lived in London would talk and communicate exchanging ideas and dreams. With the significant time difference, it did take some serious time management to even get to talk, with them trading the need to stay up late so they could have some conversations.

Hatim and his partner; Shahidali Khaki are both Kenyan born so when they finally had the basic idea of what they wanted to do, they decided to come back and execute it at home because as they say “Charity begins at home or home is where the heart is” doesn’t really matter all they knew is that this is where they wanted to do this. “Why

the hell would we go elsewhere…”

Unlike a number of companies who will tell you about all the meetings and deliberations, they had, in the beginning, deciding on their name and brand identity it wasn’t so as the two came up with their company name.

“We knew we like to do things fast, like mara moja and that was it Mara Moja Productions was born”.What came together as what some would call a fluke, in my line of work; this is termed as a stroke of genius. Not all great ideas require days let alone hours of thought and deliberation.

Mara Moja productions describes itself on their website as an independent

full-service advertising, film and digital media agency with a forte in creating world-class content for clients who value innovation.

We don’t have a manifesto stating why we’re different or better than anyone else. We simply live by one term every single day. “Go beyond the status quo, go beyond regular” This is a very wide landscape and if we did delve into it fully, I would end up writing a book instead of an article. To give ourselves the best chance to keep this grounded we decided to focus only on the film section of their business and his thoughts and opinions on the Kenyan film industry.

This was a good choice because right off the bat you could tell this is something that he is very passionate about. One of his early on most memorable projects was a documentary titled “Kazi na bidii” the idea being to illustrate just how hard the average Kenyan has to work on a daily. His most memorable part of this documentary is where he actually had to pull a mkokoteni (hand kart) from Kongowea market to the ferry. “It was hard by the time we reached the ferry I couldn’t carry on …..” Making that documentary gave him a

“It was hard we reached t couldn’t carr

d by the time the ferry I ry on …..”

newfound respect for the average joe in Kenya and to this day he will not even hoot at those mkokoteni guys on the road, because he has had a taste of what they go through, and that was only for a day.

Hatim speaks about the film industry with such passion and devotion you can literally feel the love for it in his voice. He knows that there are alot of Kenyan film makers and creatives who are capable of amazing things. But they are crippled by the environment that they have to work in. It all starts at the top, first the government needs to create a better environment to allow a more feasible environment for production companies and filmmakers to be able to live off film.

Digressing into TV too, the terms that are offered to production teams to produce content are unbelievable and in that situation the quality of the product will obviously suffer. He put forth an example of some of the big series that we watch everyday, “these guys take their time and put out something and then make you wait and entire year for the next one” This gives the production team enough time to put in a good

amount of effort to make sure their final product meets a particular caliber.

If we adopted this same practise at home, it would challenge all our creatives and production companies to ensure they put out quality work because they do not want to be left behind and this in turn ensures the consumer gets a quality product.

“If we start demanding quality and start producing quality this will in turn create a war between producers and that war is going to be a very positive war.

Everybody will want to standardise to a certain standard of quality” Lastly, we need to consume our products. “We are almost 40 million Kenyans, just imagine if only 1 million went to the theater to watch a Kenyan film and paid the 400-500 ticket price…..”

He is not just talking about all these ideas he is implementing them in his work. The business model of Mara Moja Productions is very different from the norm. He has walked away from projects because he felt that the conditions and terms being presented to him were inadequate. The ability to tell a client that “hey your idea is sh**, and I think we should take this in another direction” is a concept that would make a lot of people cringe. You know because the customer is always right.

You do not just need to do something for the sake of it, you must be proud to put your name on it and stand by it at any level.

...a war between producers and that war is going to be a very positive war.

CON TRIBUT ORS 1

Tony Kamau anthony.kinyua62@gmail.com Calling Tony a MOVIE BUFF Is an understatement. Tony and films are like a Saxophone and Jazz music; They are Inseparable.

2 3

Ricky Nelson @RickyNe Cheif Editor and writer at Sauti Magazine.

Ricky is also a video blogger and an avid community and social activist.

COULD BE YOU!

WANT to be a Contributor?

Send us a 250-300 word article (topic of your choosing) to our email address contributor@sautimag.co.ke Shortlisted writters will be contacted with further details on the next steps to having their article feature in the Magazine.

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