Our School Film Festival
The School’s Arts Club organized a Film Festival on women. We chose three films with strong women characters and films by women directors. The three films were: Daughters of the Dust, Down in the Delta, and City of Angels. The Festival lasted 3 days, 15-17 January 2015. The Festival was concluded with a ceremony presided over by Revathy, an actor and film maker from South India.
The first film shown was Daughters of Dust, released in 1991. It is the story of a family living in America whose ancestors were brought as slaves from Nigeria. The matriarch of the film summarises the issues presented in the story by saying, “We are two people in one body.” There is the African in them and then there is the Western. It talks of the generational split. The Direction and Screenplay is by Julie March. Music is by John Barnes. Barbara Jones, Alva Rogers, Cora Lee Day, Vertamae Smart-Grosvenor and Bahni Peazant play important roles. It is a good film that vividly portrays both Africa and American life.
The second film shown was Down in the Delta, released in 1998. In this film a family matriarch sends her two grandchildren and her drug-addicted daughter, Loretta, to small Mississippi town to save them from the dangers of the big city Chicago. There Loretta gets work in a chicken joint. There she and her children prosper. The film is directed by Maya Angelou. The main actors are Alfre- Woodard, Wesley Snipes and Will Sinclair. It is a good film that tells us that even drug addicts can be reformed and brought back to’ g0od life.
The 3rd film shown was City of Angels, released in 1998. This is the story of Seth, an angel who wanders the Los Angeles area invisible to humans. As persons are about to die, he becomes visible to them and becomes their travelling companion during their trip to the other world. Soon angel falls in love with Maggie, a beautiful heart surgeon. She becomes interested in Seth, but his condition as an angel becomes a barrier than a gift. A choice must be made between celestial duty and earthly love. Although this is an impossible story, it is told in a nice way and thus it becomes an interesting film. The director is Brad Silberling, Music is by Gabriel Yared and the Screenplay is by Dana Stevens. Nicolas Cage, Meg Ryan Andre Braugher, Dennis Franz and Colm Feorare in the lead roles.
The Film Festival concluded by a closing ceremony presided over by the famous actor and director Revathy. She said that Indian women are not coming forward to make films because they think film direction is mainly meant for man. In Kerala we have so many famous film directors but they all are men. Not even a single female director with any name. This has to change. There are famous women directors like Meera Nair. She hoped that the new generation in girls will venture into film direction that they can tell the story the way they want. After a Vote of Thanks by the Secretary the Ceremony came to a close.
Liz Job
Secretary, Arts Club
