Film: Ultra Culture

Ultra Culture is a film about Europe's loudest and proudest football fans; known across the continent as 'ultras'.

The ultra movement was born in Italy during the 1950's. Groups of young fans began to congregate inside stadiums and they revolutionised what it meant to support a football team. They set about flying flags, banging drums and lighting hand-held signal flares, all in an attempt to create an atmosphere that would hopefully inspire their team to victory. The ideas spread across Europe and today most football clubs, in most countries, have a band of loyal ultras to call their own.

Aside from terrace choreography, ultras are often associated with football related violence. The defining line between an ultra and a hooligan is often blurred. For some, being an ultra is all about wearing your team's colours with pride and making yourself heard. For others, the passion spills over into bloodshed. This film will attempt to understand how the ultra movement has evolved differently around Europe and why violence is so ingrained within it. 

My first stop is Belgrade, capital of Serbia, and home of Red Star. Once a powerhouse of European football, Red Star Belgrade have struggled since financial instability followed the split of Yugoslavia in the 1990's. Despite a diminished standard of football and limited success, their fans have stuck by them.

Red Star's Delije in action

Red Star boast a huge fan-base that spreads across the Balkans and consists of numerous ultra groups collectively known as Delije, whose motto roughly translates as 'Red Star is life, the rest are little things'. They're a notorious bunch. I'll be talking to Bojan, a life-long fan and Belgrade resident, who will offer an insight into the motivations of Red Star's ultras.

I first met Bojan back in 2010 and accompanied him to a Europa League Qualifying match against Bratislava at the Red Star Stadium. The atmosphere was intense and unlike anything you'd witness during an all-too-sanitised match day in England, for a whole variety of reasons. It was raw and intimidating and it left a lasting impression on me.

Red Star's fans are certainly not lacking in passion, but for me, Borussia Dortmund fans (from the west of Germany) take the crown for their sheer dedication to large-scale displays of choreography. In the winter of 2011 I was at the Westfalenstadion, Dortmund's home ground, the day before they were due to host Wolfsburg in an ordinary mid-season Bundesliga clash. The stadium was already a-buzz, some 24 hours before kick-off; a group of ultras were preparing something that would be anything other than ordinary. Flares and pyrotechnics might be banned in German stadiums, but there are still plenty of factors that encourage a vibrant atmosphere. In Dortmund's case, the most important ingredient of all is the Südtribüne.

a shot from the film I made in Dortmund in support of the Football Supporters Federation's campaign for the introduction of safe-standing areas in British stadiums

The Südtribüne (South Stand) is the biggest standing terrace in Europe, accommodating 24,000 particularly noisy fans behind one goal. Collectively, they are known as the Yellow Wall. The Dortmund fans inside the stadium the night before the Wolfsburg match were putting finishing touches to an enormous banner and arranging thousands of pieces of material that would form an impressive mural when revealed in unison. What had taken an extraordinary amount of time and effort to prepare was displayed for less than a few minutes before kick-off, and then discarded of. These are the lengths ultras frequently go to in a bid to be the best, and ultimately, gain respect from other club's fans.

Dortmund will be another stop on a production that'll have me spanning Europe, meeting fans of clubs from across the continent, hearing the stories first-hand and piecing together what it means to be an ultra.

Film: Cape Town's White Elephant

On a cold, grey morning in early 2012 I received a letter that brightened up the day (I don't actually remember the weather, but it was February, and I live in England, so yeah). The letter was from my university informing me that my application for a study-visit-scholarship-thing had been successful and they were part-funding a trip to South Africa for me to make a film.

So, over the next few months I worked on pre-production whilst constantly reminding myself that this wasn't just a free holiday. I waited until England got cold again and then headed to Cape Town in October for a month of sunshine. Oh right, yeah, and filmmaking.

Cape Town Stadium

It wasn't my first time in South Africa. I was there for the FIFA World Cup back in 2010 and had taken my camera with me along with a vague intention of shooting something. I returned with a whole load of footage of football fans (some of which I used in White Elephant) and a pretty powerful interview with a girl named Nandipha. 

I had met her in the poverty-stricken township of Imizamo Yethu, near Cape Town, and she had explained how, what with all the hysteria and extravagance that surrounded the hosting of the tournament, she felt ignored and let down by her government.

I hoped one day to return to Cape Town with bigger film making ambitions; to perhaps make a film about the legacy of the World Cup. So, I was delighted when the aforementioned scholarship enabled me to do just that, and to finish what I'd started.

You'll notice that the film has nothing to do with elephants. The term white elephant refers to the stadium that was built in Cape Town especially for the tournament and what is now a severely under-utilised, and a drain of government resources. The more I researched, the more I was sure that the controversy surrounding the stadium should be the focus of the film. Therefore, the documentary questions the morality and logic of building such an expensive football arena on the doorstep of abject poverty when there were far cheaper, more popular options, all more viable in the long-term.

As I was making a film about a stadium I knew I needed plenty of shots of it. Exteriors were not a problem thanks to Signal Hill, which, although an effort to climb in the sweltering heat, provided breath-taking views of the stadium with a backdrop of the Atlantic Ocean. Interiors, however, were not so straightforward to attain, and my requests for access to the stadium were declined, meaning I had two options: purchase stock footage, or find a way in. Stock footage was too expensive, so I devised a cunning plan.

I had lined up an interview with a Cape Town Mayoral Committee Member (basically, someone quite important) with the intention of having some fun, playing investigative film-making journalist and grilling him with difficult questions. It was arranged that I'd meet him at his office in some government building in the business district, but I sent him an e-mail asking if there was any chance the interview could instead take place inside the stadium. He replied with a yes, and so I had the access I required.

As I had cynically expected, he avoided most of my questions, instead giving well-rehearsed and vague, robotic answers, so I decided not use any of the resulting footage. However, I did manage to shoot what I needed of inside the stadium whilst 'setting up' for the interview, so the day was a success. If there's one thing I've learnt through solo filmmaking on a budget is that there's usually a way to get what you want for free if you think on your feet. Luckily, the other contributors (Nandipha, Terry and Sean, to who I owe huge thanks) were all fantastic.

Imizamo Yethu © Ryan Chapman

I spent some time in the township with Nandipha, and she was kind enough to invite me into her home and show me around. It had improved a lot since the last time I was there and she was keen to show it off. As a thank you, and in an attempt to give something back to the community, I tried to help some kids with their homework. Unfortunately, all this revealed is that 13 year olds are better at algebra than me. That same afternoon, as if glutton for punishment, I also learnt they're better at football. 

During a 5-aside match, throughout which I was referred to as Rooney, my pass completion rate was terrible and my accidental hand-ball to give away the penalty that lost us the game didn't go any further to impress my teammates. In my defence, the surface was uneven and I wasn't wearing the right footwear.

The experience summed up the reason I was there quite fittingly. Cape Town Stadium lay just several miles away, but it might as well have been on the moon. I was playing football on broken concrete with kids for who football represents one of very few hopes for a better life, yet it will shatter more dreams than it can ever bestow.



I just want to say a big thank you to Kevin Wilyman, and his wife Karen, without whom I would never have met Nandipha in the first place, and wouldn't have a film. Kevin runs a volunteer company in Cape Town called Volunteers Direct and they do lots of wonderful things.