Film festival ends with a flourish

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MOSSEL BAY NEWS - The awards night of the Garden Route International Film Festival (GRIFF) was interesting and organised with flair, with a variety of trailers and short films being shown.

It was held at the Diaz Hotel, Mossel Bay.

The hero of the night was "elephant man" Ryan Davy, an environmental journalist and filmmaker, who made headlines when he succeeded in tracking down and photographing the elusive last elephant left in the Knysna forest.

Davy's short film, portraying his feat, seeing elephant dung and finally the majestic female elephant, was shown and elicited huge applause.

The elephant, aged 35, has been alone for 20 years in the forest, a travesty and indictment of humankind, elephants being highly sociable creatures and female elephants being known for their leading, matriarchal status in herds.

Introduce herd into forest

Davy is desperately fighting to introduce a herd into the Knysna forest before the elephant is too old to produce offspring. At the age of 35, she can still breed.

The heroine of the evening was Lieschke Steven-Jennings, the chief operations officer of Tourism Mossel Bay. She was lauded more than once by speakers for her huge effort in marketing and assisting the organisers of the GRIFF, which is a huge event to organise.

In her own speech at the event, Steven-Jennings said of the tourism office staff: "We are detectives. I encourage everyone who wants to make films here. We will help you. If you want it, we will find it for you."

PHOTO GALLERY: GRIFF comes to an end

Kobus Meiring, a Garden Route District Municipality councillor and convener of the Garden Route Environmental Forum, noted that this is one of the most beautiful places in the world.

The natural beauty is definitely an attraction for filmmakers. Meiring writes prolifically about conservation in the Garden Route.

Children

A highlight was the three short films made by children, marketing Mossel Bay. They were produced in a short time and under pressure, but had an exciting, upbeat holiday feel and truly conveyed the spirit of the town.

Loretta Cunningham of the Garden Route Film Commission told of her enjoyment, working with another group of children to produce a short film about cellphone use. Much of the film was set on Dias Beach.

In total 143 films were entered for the film festival and these had to be reduced to 35.

The awards were handed out by GRIFF director Patrick Walton and Hollywood actor Hakeem Kae-Kazim, who starred in the movies, Pirates of the Caribbean and Hotel Rwanda.

He has also starred in a number of television series, including the 2002 series, Dangerous Liaisons.

Kae-Kazim's home is in Cape Town.

Some of the notable winners in the GRIFF competition were the film 1960, about an aspiring singer in Sophiatown; a documentary on lion hunting, Lions, bones and bullets; a poignant short film called Father's Day; We cry together, which won two awards; and Time spent with cats is never wasted, which was shown after the awards ceremony. For more information, see www.griff.co.za.

Patrick Walton and Hollywood actor Hakeem Kae-Kazim.