PRESS RELEASE – “POETRY Is An Island” will be screened today, Saturday, during the 2nd Barbados Independent Film Festival Week at the Daphne Joseph Hackett Theatre, Queen’s Park, Bridgetown, Barbados.
Among other Caribbean films at the festival are the full-length documentary, “Machel Montano: Journey of a Soca King”, which was screened last Wednesday; and Michael Anthony’s “Green Days by the River”, directed by Michael Mooleedhar, which was screened last Thursday.
“Poetry Is An Island” is produced and directed by Surinamese Ida Does and co-produced by Rebecca Roos. Does is an award-winning filmmaker, who at last year’s CaribbeanTales International Film Festival in Toronto was bestowed with the Cine FAM Award for the best filmmaker for women of Color.
Field producer, Gandolph St. Clair, will represent the producers at the BIFF screening. The film’s photography was by Ingmar Maduro and original music score by Andy Narell. The film features the first ever life documentary on 1992 Nobel Laureate for Literature, Sir Derek Walcott, filmed entirely in St. Lucia during 2012 with Derek Walcott interviews and readings, with additional clippings from Stockholm and Trinidad and Tobago.
“Poetry Is An Island” features his boyhood friends, the late Sir Dunstan St. Omer, Arthur Jacobs; Sigrid Nama, his companion; Peter Walcott, his son; Michelle Serieux and Natalie La Porte. The late celebrated Irish Nobel Laureate, Seamus Heaney, is also part of the cast as well as Poets/Professors University of Toronto’s Christian Campbell and ex-University of Essex’s Glyn Maxwell among others.
The 82-minute film has been shown in Trinidad & Tobago where it premiered, as well as in Havana, New York, Aruba, St. Maarten, Cayman Islands, Amsterdam, St. Lucia, Washington, and London and is subtitled for Dutch, Chinese, Hindi, Polish, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, German, French, Italian and Indian audiences.
The film, won the Piton Film Festival Award in 2014 for best film and the Jury Award for best documentary at the CaribbeanTales International Film Festival in Toronto, among other awards.
Writer Andre Bagoo, in his review, said, “It is a startling and moving achievement. Ida Does’ use of imagery is simply magnificent, bearing the hallmarks of a great film maker.”
Pertinent issues arising out of the film are Walcott’s vision of the Rat Island Foundation and the intention by the St. Lucia government to set up a museum in his boyhood residence along Chaussee Road.
The festival includes filmmaker workshops by Robocop writer and creator, Ed Neumeier, today and an Independent Film Workshop by Dan Mirvish, founder and filmmaker of the Slamdance Film Festival, concluding with a workshop by National Geographic’s filmmaker, Martin Edstrom on Virtual Reality and 360 Photography on Sunday.
The 2nd Barbados Independent Film Festival opened on Tuesday with a Gala Night at the Walled Garden Theatre, Barbados Museum & Historical Society. The Barbados Independent Film Festival ends on Sunday when the BIFF Awards will be presented.
The director and producers of “Poetry Is An Island” sincerely thank, BIFF co-founders/co-directors, Sir Trevor Carmichael of Chancery Chambers and Jennifer Smith-Bent for the film’s participation.