EIGHTY six films. Nine days of screenings. Perhaps the most striking feature of the Bermuda International Film Festival (BIFF) is the remarkable growth it has seen since it was first established by a handful of passionate film lovers hoping that the wider community would share its love of independent works.BIFF is one of those events that most of us probably take for granted. However the fact that a tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic is able to showcase award-winning independent films from around the world — films that aren’t being shown the world over — is nothing less than fantastic.

Its success derives from the efforts of many volunteers and a staff of two — director Aideen Ratteray Pryse and her deputy, Duncan Hall.

“The idea was to bring films to Bermuda that aren’t ordinarily seen at the local theatres,” the director explained. “And that’s where it started, with a group of people interested in the arts. Having already started (The Bermuda Festival of the Performing Arts), they realised that films were still not being showcased as an art form in Bermuda and turned to a group of us and said, ‘Why don’t you do something?’ And we thought we’d do a film festival.”

One of those behind the proposed venture was Mrs. Ratteray Pryse’s father, the late Stanley Ratteray. A founder of the Bermuda Festival of the Performing Arts, it was his idea that his daughter get involved in this newest venture.

“I like films,” she explained of his encouragement. “And I was also the only daughter in the house at the time, married to a person who also loved films.”

The director said she was introduced to independent films while a student at Montreal’s McGill University.

“I was president of the McGill Film Society. That’s actually where my interest in foreign language films and documentaries came from — I didn’t get it ‘til I got to university. They weren’t screening Hollywood blockbusters and so I went to see what they were screening. And whad’ya know? They were actually screening really good films. And that’s how it started.”

The Festival boasted a catalogue of 22 films in 1997. Initially volunteer-driven, the hiring of a permanent staff saw the number of films increase. By 2000, BIFF’s line-up had swelled to 28.

“Before then people were using all their vacation time (to produce) BIFF,” explained Mr. Hall. “Everyone had been doing it on a volunteer basis. Aideen came in on December 1, 1999, and I came in on October 1, 2000. Suddenly you had some staff to throw at it and that’s when the growth really started because we had some resources to throw at it. It went to 49 films, to 55 films. It’s been around the 70 to 75 film mark for three years and this year — 86.”

The growth is impressive for a community of Bermuda’s makeup and size, placing BIFF on par with regional film festivals in the United States.

“If we were in the United States they would call us a good regional film festival,” said Mrs. Ratteray Pryse. “We’re probably a little smaller than (those) they have in the States. The Hamptons (International Film Festival), I think, is roughly around 150 films or so. So we’re still a little smaller than those but what we’ve tried to aim for is quality rather than quantity and do the things that we think will work for our audiences, for our volunteers, for our sponsors and for Bermuda as a whole. And that’s kind of where we are — so we don’t start screening at 9 o’clock in the morning because, who’s gonna watch them?”

Added Mr. Hall: “There isn’t a large student population for example, which would normally support a film festival. That’s clearly one of the markets but we really don’t have that kind of population here.”

The event is also limited in that Bermuda only has a handful of suitable movie screens — the Liberty Theatre, the Little Theatre, the auditorium at the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute and Southside Cinema.

“In a lot of places you find cineplexes with eight or 12 or 16 screens,” Mr. Hall explained. “It means we’re kind of limited in how big we can grow. So as Aideen said, we’ve kind of focused on quality although one thing we did do was to extend BIFF to nine days for the first time last year which gave us some more screening spots and allowed us to grow a little bit.”

Cash incentives, courtesy of award sponsors, and recognition by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, have boosted BIFF’s appeal to filmmakers, the director added.

“One thing that certainly has made a difference to our short film line-up is that we’re now a qualifying film festival for the Short Film Academy Award,” she explained. “That means the winner of our festival is automatically on the short list for consideration by the Academy. It’s definitely brought more of the better short films as submissions to our festival. It’s made a big difference.

“And we’ve been fortunate to have, starting last year, sponsors for some awards for the film festival. That also is an incentive to a filmmaker, to know that the prize is not just a return trip to Bermuda — which it always has been — but that they would have some cash incentive to send their film to us.”

Trips to more established festivals have also enabled BIFF’s growth, she added.

“I would say over 2000 and 2002, we spent some time going to a variety of other film festivals to see what they had to offer and which would suit us and we basically discovered which ones would — Toronto in September and Rotterdam at the end of January. So we go to those film festivals as well and we can round up our line-up more, if permitted, by selecting films from (them).”

The programme was restructured a few years ago to include a broader selection of award-winning films.

“When we started we were really focusing on the films that had fallen under the radar of the larger festivals,” the deputy director said. “But about four years ago we broadened that approach to include a World Cinema Showcase. So for example this year we’ve got five award winners from Cannes, two from Berlin, the winner of the People’s Choice Award from the European Film Awards, The Lives of Others <$>which won the Foreign Language Oscar and also won best film at the European Film Awards — so some really big titles, again keeping with the original idea that they’re not coming to the cinemas here.

“We wanted to have — a little bit — in the World Cinema, a kind of festival of festivals approach. So we kind of cherry-picked from the best festivals in the world and grabbed some of their award winners. And so, you don’t have to go to Cannes or Berlin, come to Bermuda and see the full slate.”

An added bonus was the boon BIFF has provided to local filmmakers.

“The film When Voices Rise premiered here, and then went on to screen at other festivals as well,” said Mrs. Ratteray Pryse. “We’ve always had some local film content, but I would have to say it’s certainly getting more sophisticated now, what we’re getting from the local filmmakers. And that’s fantastic. We are seeing our film festival help local filmmakers to springboard their films to other film festivals. Lucinda (Spurling’s) film,>Rare Bird, has travelled to other film festivals. Errol (Williams’) films have travelled to other film festivals. Al Seymour’s animated films have travelled to other film festivals as well.

“So that is great for Bermuda. It gets the word out that there is a small, filmmaking community here and that the filmmaking community that is here, is producing a quality product.”

The achievements of noted Bermudian actor Earl Cameron, whose most recent roles were in The Interprete$>with Nicole Kidman and The Que<$>with Helen Mirren, will be celebrated as part of this year’s event. Following the screening of his first foray into motion pictures, the actor will sit down for a public chat with Peter Rainer, film critic for the Christian Science Moni<$>and a regular reviewer for National Public Radio. A past chairman of the National Society of Film Critics, he wrote and co-produced two documentaries for A&E on Sidney Poitier and the Hustons, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Criticism in 1998.

Said Mr. Hall: “I think one of this year’s highlights is the Conversation with Earl Cameron. At 1 o’clock on (Saturday, March) 17, we’ll screen Pool of Lon<$>, which is his first film — it was released in 1951. And then he’ll sit down with the film critic Peter Rainer and chat about his career. I certainly think that’s one of the highlights, having a Bermudian come home and be honoured is, I think, for our tenth, most appropriate.”

Mr. Cameron has in the past been honoured by the Bermuda Arts Council for his achievements as an actor but the festival felt it important they should also acknowledge his considerable talent.

Said Mrs. Ratteray Pryse: “We’re taking the opportunity obviously to educate people on the importance of Earl Cameron and his contribution to films over in the UK. To me it’s striking that, I think when people think about films that have themes of racial integration and segregation and so forth, most people think of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?, which was in the ‘60s. Earl was doing these things in the ‘50s. I think everyone always thinks of Sidney Poitier when actually Earl was there before Sidney. So it’s interesting from that point of view.”

Mr. Hall described the entire upcoming event as a “celebration” of films and filmmakers, and highlighted the difference between BIFF and some of its trailblazers.

“The nine days is about a celebration of the art form of film. We’ve tried to put together a line-up that is as broad as possible, both in terms of the countries where the films are made and the genres and so forth. It’s not a star-driven festival like Cannes or parts of Toronto or how Sundance has sort of become. We try to stay true to our roots of being a filmmakers’ festival. People can come out and see the best of world cinema in nine days.”

One of the most frequently asked questions is how the organisers manage to keep an operation that’s so reliant on volunteers running smoothly. As explained by Mrs. Ratteray Pryse: “People always want to know, ‘What things go wrong?’”.

“In retrospect, the whole thing is pretty funny but one of the closest calls we had (involved) a series of shorts that we were screening on a Saturday evening probably four years ago now, Mama Africa. We had one of the films. The other three were coming from a festival in Italy and they got held up in Italy because the courier office couldn’t figure out where Bermuda was. So instead of someone phoning and asking us, the film just sat in the office.

“The (Italian) festival kept telling us it had been collected but we couldn’t see what had happened to it. Anyway it was a long kerfaffle of trying to get these three short films from Italy to Bermuda in time for the screening. And by Friday morning, the courier was telling us, ‘I don’t think this is going to happen’. They had had guys trying to do all sorts of things — driving from airport to airport in the United Kingdom trying to get them on a flight that would get them to New York so they could come in on the American flight on Friday night. In the end they came in that Saturday on (British Airways) which left late and landed late — and this was an eight o’clock screening at the Liberty Theatre.&21;Added Mr. Hall: “(The English director) John Madden was also on that plane for (a public chat), ‘An Evening with John Madden’. So Saturday there were a lot of crossed fingers. We had a full house waiting at the Liberty Theatre for the Mama Africa film series and a full house at City Hall for John Madden. John was picked up at the airport and whisked off — nobody in the audience was the wiser, he was fantastic. But hearing the BA plane had landed was some of the best news of the day.”The pair confessed they’ve become accustomed to a certain degree of stress but its impact has lessened as their experience has grown.

“For some of the films, certainly the larger titles, we’re in a row of film festivals that are screening the same film and sharing the same print. So there is a certain amount of stress but it’s not an unusual situation if you’re organising a film festival. So we receive it from one place, we screen it on the days we have and then we have to send it off to its next location. Almost by definition — these are independent films — they’re not coming with a huge studio backing so there aren’t a lot of prints. So basically the person responsible for festival coordination would usually have a print that’s flowing around the northern hemisphere and another that’s flowing around the southern hemisphere.”

As an example, 12:08 East of Bucest <$>is being screened by four festivals this month, Mr. Hall said.

“So we’ve had to coordinate with the rights holder in the US, Tartan Films, and the other three festivals have wedged a slot. And so we’re showing it on opening night, we’re showing it on the weekend, we’re shipping it out on Monday and it’s going to the next spot.”

Added Mrs. Ratteray Pryse: “There’s a print traffic coordinator, Jeff Arnst, and that’s all he does. He makes sure we receive the prints. He makes sure they screen on the day they’re supposed to be screened and he makes sure they get to their next destination. And then there’s a small contingent that works with Jeff — because we’re screening in two different venues on two different days — that drive these prints around from location to location for nine days.”

Such volunteers are essential to BIFF, Mr. Hall added.

“Although the growth came about in the years immediately following the festival hiring staff who were able to devote more time to growing and developing (BIFF), this festival will always run on volunteer power. There are volunteers who sit on committees year round. There are others who sit on committees for close to six months, others for three months, and then there are people who step in and help us present the festival. But if you total it all up, there’s somewhere in excess of 150 volunteers who give of their time in exchange for a t-shirt and a wrap party ticket and also, obviously, the enjoyment of being at the festival and seeing the films. But it’s quite extraordinary I think. Bermuda’s one of those places that runs on volunteer power in a lot of ways and we’re very grateful for all the support we receive.”

Said the director: “If someone said, ‘No volunteers, Aideen and Duncan, you’re on your own’, it wouldn’t happen.”

The future looks bright for BIFF. As explained by Mr. Hall, as long as there are films, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t prosper.”I think we’ve laid a foundation for future festivals,” he said. “We’ll always tweak it somewhat every year but I think we’ve kind of found the formula that works and is received well. The great thing about film is that there are new ones produced every year and so there’s always something to look forward to.”

Tickets for BIFF 2007 go on sale March 5 at 10 a.m. both online at www.biff.bm, as well as at the festival’s physical box office at # 6 Passenger Terminal, Front Street, Hamilton.