Nassau, Bahamas – Bahamas Film Festival and C2it Productions team up to present a Young Filmmakers Night. This Thursday, December 15th at 7:00pm at Galleria Cinemas West, a few of our nation’s budding young filmmakers will share their stories and their life observations in a public screening dubbed ” The Young Filmmakers Series: Our Stories”. On this night, Bahamas Film Festival (BFF) will team up with C2it Productions to introduce numerous young filmmakers, featuring films that these students have written, directed, cast and starred in themselves.
As adults there are many things that we tend to worry about on a daily basis; paying bills, visiting the doctor for possible life-threatening illnesses, dealing with divorce, losing a job, or enjoying a new relationship. As we live our lives, deal with our dilemmas and make our daily decisions, the children who are in our lives, must also deal with these same issues themselves. They worry about mommy when she is ill, or wonder why daddy hasn’t visited them as often as he used to. They feel mad, get frustrated or worry about family tragedy, break-ups, being bullied at school and in some cases – being the bully. They make decisions every day about how to handle the various situations, not only in their lives, but in the lives of their family as well.
Filmmaker and Director Moya Thompson (Full Circle, First Impressions), the director of C2it Productions, has been a teacher for 12 years and has acted and performed for many years in films and stage productions locally and abroad. The Camp was C2it Productions’ 3rd endeavor. The Company was responsible for the stage/film production of “Das A Vibe” in November 2006 and April 2007, and is presently producing a Bahamian family sitcom called “It Takes A Village” which will debut in 2012. She says that she would like to provide more opportunities in filmmaking and drama such as these, for kids and teens in The Bahamas. She hopes that this event is the beginning of many more premieres and youth-based initiatives of its kind, and that it opens the door to opportunities for kids to be able to make their own films and have a voice on issues that concern or interest them. And she anticipates that they in turn, will lead the way in showcasing The Bahamas in the world film scene.
Meanwhile filmmaker Celi Moss (Ball’s Alley, My Old Man) continues with his desire to see Bahamian filmmakers highlighted. He says, “The objective of the Bahamas Film Festival is to develop, display and promote Bahamian filmmakers. Last year we paid tribute to Bahamian actress, Vivica Watkins and featured “Women in Film”. This year I thought it would be a good idea to feature young, upcoming filmmakers.” He further goes on to explain his work with one of the filmmakers that will be featured, “I got a call from Ms. Aisha Johnson about her daughter’s interest in the arts, as far as writing and acting, and her desire to do a sort of reality show, like “A Day in the Life of” kind of thing. I told them that I would be willing to come in and shoot once everything was in place. So she got all of the actors and cleared all of the locations and everything done was Taina’s work and her ideas.”
Five of the other young filmmakers that will be featured on December 15th, are students that took part in the Summer Film Drama Mime and Art Camp that was hosted by C2it Productions. The program catered to more than 20 students for 4 weeks and allowed them opportunities to express their creativity and develop an awareness about the filmmaking process. Participating in this program as guest speakers and/or instructors were many of the nation’s active filmmakers, artists and actors such as Celi Moss himself, Special FX Make-Up Artist Deborah Thompson (Daylight Make-Up), Bahamian filmmaker Kareem Mortimer, Ric Von Maur (Stray Dogs Entertainment) young actress Justice Von Maur (Windjammers), Filmmaker Kent Minnis, drama coach Jovanna Hepburn, Mime Instructor, Lenelle Sawyer and actor and artist Matthew Wildgoose.
When talking about the camp, Thirteen year old Katya Saunders, who directed both Moss and Thompson in the film “Declined” states “I learned a lot about camera angles, how to direct a movie and how to write scripts and treatments, and a lot of acting techniques. It was very informative. Everything I learned is helping me in one of my English classes this year, where we will have to write and direct our own film as a part of the course”. Fourteen year old Anastacia Hutchinson, who is the lead actress in Bernard Farquharson’s film “Behind These Eyes” says, “My experience was life changing. I got to meet new people not only from my age group but also younger children. And I got to interact more instead of sitting at a computer all day I got to come out and do actual fun things. I miss all my friends from camp. I am glad to get to see them again (on premiere night) and I hope we get to have the camp again.” When speaking of her movie-making experience, she says, “I got to see more of what actually goes into a movie. I’m used to seeing the finished product and I’m not used to experiencing the labour that actually goes into a movie. It was a lot of work.” Dudrie Minnis whose father Kent served as the camera man on most of the films, is not a fan of acting or drama but he was a huge fan of the Art classes taught by Mr. Wildgoose. However he was happy to learn how to write a script, and when making movies he says, he enjoys seeing everything come together.”
On Thursday 15th December, we will feature the following films – the drama, “Behind These Eyes” by Bernard Farquharson (17 years), a drama “I Am Beautiful” by Omega Curry (17 years), a comedy “Declined” by Katya Saunders (13 years), a comedy/drama “Dare Me” by T’Nique Brown (11 years), a drama “Dating” by Jillian Ferguson (12 years), another drama “Ticket To Nowhere” by her sister J’Dawn Ferguson (10 years), and a drama/comedy “A Day in the Life of Telena” by Taina Johnson (10 years). These young filmmakers are vibrant, creative, and full of potential. So watch out Speilberg, and beware Spike Lee but Bahamian young filmmakers are on the move.
