Unpacking "IT'S LIT": Where Are the Children Headed?

It’s Lit is a deeply reflective South African short film that confronts the emotional realities facing a generation caught between promise and disappointment. Through poetry, striking visual symbolism, and immersive sound, the film explores themes of youth, identity, inequality, and hope; asking the urgent question: where are the children headed? Rather than offering answers, the film invites audiences into a shared reflection on the state of modern South Africa and the futures young people are being forced to imagine for themselves.

At the centre of this conversation are three creative voices: poet and executive producer Les Makotoko, whose writing forms the emotional heartbeat of the film; director Hallie Haller, who translates that emotion into a surreal visual language; and composer and final mix engineer Pasja Schneider, whose haunting soundscape carries the audience between collapse, tension, and hope. Together, they shape a film experience that feels intimate, unsettling, and profoundly necessary.

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Les Makotoko (Executive Producer and Poet)

“It’s Lit” feels like both a warning and a love letter; what emotional truth were you trying to hold onto while writing the poem?

At the time the injustice of being a graduate with degrees but sitting in a shack is what I wanted to capture. The idea that you’ve done all you can and all you were told to do to make something of yourself, only to be left disappointed and hopeless. In addition to that is the awareness and worldliness you experience through social media- you deserve all that the world has to offer but it feels so far away from your reality.

You speak about “doing everything right and still not being enough”. How personal is that line to your own journey?

It’s true that as a black person you half to do twice as much to only get half of what our counterparts get. Whether it be recognition or opportunity. This is an experience that I have been through and seen. On the other hand, I’m a good example of doing it your way and not allowing yourself to be defined by a certificate or a mark. I’m a good example of that. I don’t have the formal qualifications but managed to thrive by putting in the hard work and backing myself. 

The film questions the promise of education and freedom. What do you think replaced that promise for today’s youth?

That’s a great question. And it isn’t easy but those promises have been replaced by a hyper-fixation on material wealth and material gain. Our society has become very transactional. We even try to sanitise it by calling it a “networking culture”. But when you undress it it’s just people looking out for their own self-interest. Ubuntu replaced with “black excellence” and “for us” replaced with “for me”.

There’s a thread of hope beneath the heaviness. Where do you see young people already “saving themselves”?

There’s absolutely hope. So much hope. I’d argue the youth are one of the best things about this South Africa. Culture is one of our biggest exports and that’s a youth lead movement. I love the idea of creation as a form of resistance. That’s exactly what the young people are doing. They are creating their way to freedom and hope. Fashion, music, art, food, SA is thriving culturally on a global scale and it’s all lead by young people. The fire that stays lit inside us and drives our passions and creativity is a big theme in the poem as a light at the end of the tunnel. Ultimately South Africa is one of the most talented places in the world. 

If the film leaves us asking “where are the children headed?”. What societal obligation should we adhere to and what response do you hope to invoke?

This is a question I want to leave to the audience to answer. But we all have an obligation to do right by young people by creating real opportunities for them and helping them hone their talents through better infrastructure support and of course, jobs. Jobs jobs jobs. 

Hallie Haller (Film Director)

You chose surrealism to tell a very real South African story. What does surrealism allow you to express that realism can’t?

Abstraction forces interpretation from the audience. And that in turn demands presence and consideration. I chose surrealism because it leads us into the work of critiquing and co-authoring. And that means making the audience active in the conversation, which is what the film aims to do.

How did you translate Les’s poem into visual language without losing its intimacy and urgency?

Honestly, I moved from intuition. These are the images that came to me while hearing the poem. So, I allowed the film to tell the truth but in the language of the subconscious.

The film turns everyday realities into almost nightmarish imagery. What was the most difficult scene to conceptualise or execute?

Getting the Greek Chorus to all wear Les’ face and perform as the rising voice of the public was technical. Christian Van Der Walt, our online FX artist, was an incredible support in bringing that black and white world to life.

You mentioned we’ve become desensitised. What moment in the fi lm are you hoping will “wake people up”?

All of it :) The whole.

As the director, how often did the inner reflection of your own journey help shape the responsibility of a generation's lived trauma?

I think the more relevant truth is that I am a South African artist. Which means I exist in a long history of culture workers who used their talent to interrogate the present of our country. This poem from Les was an invitation to do that. And to invite others to come together and answer – is this reality acceptable to us? And what do we do if it isn’t?

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Pasja Schneider (Composer & Final Mix Engineer)

The soundscape plays a huge role in shaping emotion. How did you approach scoring a film that sits between poetry and surrealism?

Delving into the piece was made easy because I had the advantage of being on set with Hallie , Jason and the rest of the crew. I was able to base the music on what I felt in reality on the day. Then stepped into the subconscious realm, attacking the text, from both Les and Hallie afterwards. I remember starting the score right after that first day on set.

What sonic elements did you use to reflect tension, collapse, or even provide hope within the film?

Representing tension, a Japanese Taiko drum, used in the boat making scene. The snapping of a dry reed and a high pitched scream created in collaboration with our brilliant editor Evy Katz represented an utter collapse of the children’s world. To bring hope into them realm, I leaned on sampling a Whale’s Call, and created an instrument out of it. This allowed me to shape hopeful polyphonic harmony, with the grounding sounds of Mother Nature

How closely did you collaborate with Hallie and Les to align the music with the film’s message?

I wrote over 18 cues for our piece, titling them after script headings without seeing a single frame. All the pieces were conceived from memory from the feeling on set and the text. Hallie and myself had a spotting session a few weeks later, where they picked the cues that resonated best with them. We landed on 5 cues. With Les, we worked meticulously through the poem, replacing the dialogue in studio for each sequence. For The idea of the Greek Chorus, we used ‘Valhalla Room’ and tonnes of fun delay automation to get that other worldly effect. This was overseen by both Les, Hallie and myself

Was there a specific moment in the film where sound took the front seat as the primary storyteller?

The shells. For me the Music is the supporting hand in this piece, but when the children start hearing Les’ Poem through the shells, The sound Design takes over as a strong part of the narrative. How the dialogue pans around the ear of the both the actor’s and the listener gives us a strong indication that Les’ is breaking through to our characters. We are essentially connecting portals, through sound.

If the film is asking “where are the children headed?”. What instrument (tone/timbre) best captures that question.

Our use of 80’s and 90’s inspired synths at the end scene, in a cue called ‘Isuzu Sonata’ is a deliberate dog whistle to the the Born Free generation and all the generations that will blossom from them. Using synths that were intended to signal ‘the future’ at one point are now leading us in an unknown passage, and they sound worn and beat up, yet hopeful.

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So Where are the Children Headed?

In the end, It’s Lit does not seek to resolve the tension it presents it asks us to sit with it. Through poetry, surreal imagery, and sound, the film opens a conversation about the emotional weight carried by South Africa’s youth and the systems that continue to shape their realities.

The voices of Les Makotoko, Hallie Haller, and Pasja Schneider come together to create a work that is both deeply personal and collectively felt a reminder that art can still challenge, provoke, and illuminate the path forward, even when the future feels uncertain.