Forbes By Michael Reckord,
Contributor
THERE HAVE been two instances recently of attempts by other countries to strengthen cultural ties with Jamaica. One is the mounting of the European Union Film Festival, the other the decision by the Mexican Theatre Centre of the International Theatre Institute (ITI) to honour an outstanding Jamaican theatre personality on International Theatre Day, Tuesday, March 27.
The film festival, which started a year or two ago, stretches this year from March 21 to March 27 and involves the screening of 12 movies. Its sponsors include the British High Commission, the embassies of France, Germany, Italy, the Nether-lands, Spain and Sweden
and the European Union, all
of which have films in the
festival.
I was able to see only one, 'La Fausse Suivante' ('The False Servant'), a French film of a play by the French playwright-novelist Pierre Marivaux (1688-1763). Best known for his comedies, Marivaux's works deal chiefly with the rising middle class. His heronies are generally elegant, intellectual and clever, their speech refined.
So it is with the main character, referred to as the Chevalier, played by Isabelle Huppert. She disguises herself as a man in order to check on the character of the man to whom she had become engage, sight unseen.
Director Denoit Jacquot sets the entire film inside a theatre and when the characters are not walking up and down the auditorium or backstage, they are on the stage itself. The setting plays no part in the story and, in fact, quickly gets boring. Essentially, the action of the film consists of talking heads. It reminded me of television soap operas, though the dialogue was more interesting.
My French is rusty and though I could appreciate the beauty of the language's cadence, I had to rely on the English sub-titles to understand the story. It shows the five main characters scheming to get their desires money, love and information.
Though the acting showed talent and class, I got the impression that the work was shot on a shoe-string. Verbose and claustrophobic the opposite of your average Hollywood motion picture the film interested me mainly because of its novelty. Many in the audience left at the intermission.
Actress Leonie Forbes, who have been selected by the ITI (Mexico Centre) for an award, is expected to take part in a week-long programme of theatre-oriented activities in Veracruz, Mexico.
High points of the programme are the celebration of World Theatre Day and the awarding of medals on Tuesday, March 27, a conference on 'ITI-UNESCO in America and the Caribbean', hosted by ITI International president Andre Louis Perinetti on Wednesday, March 28 and an international panel discussion on theatre and globalisation on Thursday, March 29.
Delegates to the conference will also partake insight-seeing trips, visits to the theatre, discussions of theatre and video presentations.
Unlike the ITI (Jamaica Centre) which in recent years has focused on one event, the staging of the Annual Actor Boy Award for Excellence in Theatre, the Mexican ITI-UNESCO Centre organises a host of activities through its numerous affiliates.
They include the International Puppet Association, the International Theatre Association for Children, the International Association of Amateur Theatre, the International Association of Theatre Critics, the International Association of Designers, Architects and Theatre Technicians, the International Dance Committee, the Mexican Mime Association and the Mexican Theatre Research Association.
I find the centre's holistic view of theatre to be admirable. It considers, according to its 2000 general report, that "its present and future work cannot be separated from the country's needs and cultural progress."
