Jamaica’s 4th Reggae Film Festival to take place May 23-27

The Jamaica Film Academy has announced final plans for the 4th Jamaica Reggae Film Festival to be held at Studio 38, Trafalgar Road, New Kingston from May 23-27.

A main focus of interest at the festival this year is the Make A Film In 24 Hours competition, in which teams will use any media to make a 5-minute film in 24 hours and compete for prizes including cash, Jamaican vacations and entry in international film festivals.

UNESCO, through the Jamaica National Commission for UNESCO, is supporting the Reggae Film Festival as an event celebrating the UN Year of African Descendants which will be celebrated at the Festival on May 25, African Liberation Day. UNESCO will present the Honour Award for Best Documentary.

Entries in the Reggae Film Festival have come from the USA, UK, Antigua, Poland, Brazil and Catalonia, with the largest number of entries from Jamaica whose 11 entries include animation, short and long features and documentaries.

Films include Rocksteady – The Movie, a feature film starring Cedric Sanders, and David Hinds, lead singer of reggae band Steel Pulse, which provided the film’s soundtrack; Reggae Britannia the February 2011 BBC documentary tribute to Jamaica’s reggae and its influence on Britain, Intensified, a look at the British band that revived interest in Ska in the 80s; Bob Marley – Making Of A Legend – Rare footage by Jamaican actress Esther Anderson of Marley and musicians in the early years before the Catch A Fire album and Room For Rent, based on Ginger Knight’s popular roots play, starring Volier Johnson and Deon Silvera.

This year’s festival includes five films by female directors, including the short features Dinner by Tameka Jarvis-George of Antigua, and Reckoning by Jamaican film student Jovel Johnson.

Innovative entries from Jamaica include animated films Bad Influence by Reinardo ‘Menta l’ Chung and Cabbie Chronicles by Alison Tabois Latchman.

Among the unusual entries are David Is Dying, — a Black British

feature by director Stephen Lloyd Jackson and Bubblin, a feature by new Jamaican director Denisse Campbell in which a country girl turns go-go dancer to make ends meet. Both films will be shown in the Midnight Movies programme to be screened after midnight.

Reggae Film Festival May 23-27

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