Director’s Statement

“I had been living in Cape Town, South Africa, for a year when the city experienced its worst drought in over a century. People were ordered by the government to not use more than 50L per person per day. One morning I read an article about a study which showed that less than 60 percent of the Capetonians took the water restriction seriously, which means that 40 percent still used a tremendous amount of water, despite all the warnings. 
Out of anger and disappointment, I decided right there and then to write THE RAINMAKER, to hopefully make people think about how they use water daily. 
But I wanted the story to come from a person that felt misplaced in this society. Someone vulnerable that the audience could relate to on an emotional level. During my youth, I struggled with serious OCD, and it made me feel like an outsider because it was not something you talked about. I decided to write about Megan, an amateur dancer who suffers from social anxiety disorder. Her illness is holding her back from her dream of becoming a professional dancer, and because mental illness is still a very taboo subject, I let her frustration go out over the water crisis by not taking the restrictions seriously. 
In the end, the film is about facing the deep dark personal struggles and fears we all carry within ourselves in silence.”

— André Havéus —