Caribbean themed film festival to launch this month
Posted by Elena del Valle on September 14, 2016
Third Horizon Film Festival
Image: Third Horizon Film Festival
This fall Miami, Florida movie lovers will have Caribbean themed film options during the first Third Horizon Film Festival. Thanks to funding from The Miami Foundation and the Knight Foundation (the festival was winner of the 2014 Knight Arts Challenge) between September 29 and October 2, 2016 the festival will showcase the work of Caribbean filmmakers at O Cinema, Wynwood, 90 NW 29 street, Miami, Florida 33127. Plans are in place to highlight eight full length features and a few short films.
“The Third Horizon Caribbean Film Festival aims to celebrate and empower filmmakers from the Caribbean and its diaspora,” said Donnamarie Baptiste, a consultant to the festival, by email. “With the democratization of filmmaking, the barriers to making a film have become less prohibitive. The festival aims to seize this moment to connect promising Caribbean filmmakers with the resources and opportunities they need to take their films to the world.”
When asked about the selection of films Baptiste said, “First and foremost, we’re looking for films that have relevance to the people of the Caribbean. To that end, we’re focused primarily on filmmakers from the Caribbean or of Caribbean parentage who live outside of the region. That said, in an effort to encourage filmmakers outside of the region to set their films in the Caribbean, we do consider films by non-Caribbean filmmakers based on their relevance to the region.”
The festival’s line-up of movies is selected by a committee appointed by the festival, comprised of Jonathan Ali, Romola Lucas, Jason Fitzroy Jeffers, Keisha Rae Witherspoon and Robert Sawyer. Jason Fitzroy Jeffers, Keisha Rae Witherspoon and Robert Sawyer are co-founders of the festival. A spokesperson declined to identify a budget or staff numbers.
“The name Third Horizon comes from a feeling that popular entertainment is not diverse enough, and that every child should see themselves reflected in what is considered global entertainment,” said Fitzroy Jeffers, who is also executive director, from Barbados via a spokesperson, when asked about the meaning of the festival name. “Growing up I felt I was less than because of the color of my skin, and believed I was from the ‘Third World’-although we know that the ‘first world’ is powered by the blood, sweat and tears from the ‘third world.’ So Third Horizon is that moment and space where the stories, sounds and visions of the so called ‘third world’ find the support, audience, funding and distribution needed to give us equity.”
Full length films scheduled include: Ayiti Mon Amour, Memories of a Penitent Heart, Generation Revolution, The House on Coco Road, God Loves the Fighter, The Stuart Hall Project, Pressure and Crumbs; and shorts include: ABCs, Alto Vista, Antiman, Auntie, Doubles with Slight Pepper, Field Notes: An Unexpected Journey, Mommy Water, Parish Bull, and Short Drop.
