Moooovies, Muppets, Puppets and Shakers...

I've been rather preoccupied over the last ten days, so forgive ANOTHER short break in posts, but we have just wrapped the annual Bermuda International Film Festival and it's taken up a lot of my head space since I volunteered to be PR Director back in January. My, my, what a challenge, particularly with a full-time job, but loved every nano second!!


Not only have I been busy with the press releases, Facebook posts and tweets but it's also taken up a lot of my free time this week as I managed to catch a lot of films and I've certainly had my mind expanded. Saw my first subtitled firm, my first shorts, a very interesting documentary about the racial undertones of the post-Hurricane Katrina elections in New Orleans, a great film directed by David Schwimmer from Friends and my first ever sex scene involving a dead body. All very enlightening and now I'm a total convert, not to Necrophilia I hasten to add, but to this whole indie film scene. 


As a fellow Brit expat in Bermuda bloggers writes in "Dog or Affair", it is not till you are starved of culture, that when you get offered a smidgen you star jump on it from a great height. I lived in London for nearly four years and when you are spoilt for choice, you barely notice culture in a crowded room. I worked on the same road as the theatre where Phantom of the Opera played for over a year and still I've never seen this West End classic (although I have seen the film and know all the words to all the songs of course). My taste in film has always been very mainstream but I now definitely see the value in catching a movie on the road less travelled. 


And it's not just the films, BIFF brought some fascinating people to Bermuda and some of the fascinating people already here, out of the cedar woodwork. The jurors for the competition features alone were an interesting bunch including Oscar-winning producer Hans de Weers (Antonia’s Line, Best Foreign Language Film, 1996) and screenwriter Larry Gross (48 Hours, Streets of Fire, Another 48 Hours and Geronimo). Then I was attending one of the post-film social events and I was introduced to Whitney Kimmel from the jury, an entertainment and awards publicist from L.A. who has represented The King's Speech, Buitiful, and Precious, to name a few, as our introducer said "we do the same thing." Now this was a huge compliment for me but for her I imagine not so much. I PR insurance, cable TV and financial planning; she PRs Colin Firth and Javier Bardem. Some people have all the luck!! 


But as I sat hearing about the time she met Tom Cruise, on the other side of me, a new good friend of mine who I've been working alongside for weeks happens to mention she is daughter of the co-creator of the mighty Fraggle Rock, Michael Frith. HOLD THE PHONE, MAKE LIKE TOM & CRUISE. Now this is cool!! He was also editor of the Sesame Street book series and was employed by Jim Henson as a creative consultant for The Muppet Show and Muppet Babies. And I learned something I never knew, the Rock setting in Fraggle Rock is inspired by Bermuda's Crystal Caves. As a HUGE Sesame St./Muppets fan, this was bigger news than any Hollywood star sighting. As a youngster I used to turn down offers to go out and play because I wanted to stay home in my Burt & Ernie slippers to watch the latest happenings from the Street and learn the alphabet/how to count along the way :-)





And if that wasn't enough exciting and wonderful randomness for one week, this is the moment when Star Wars met Stargate at our private filmmakers' dinner on Sunday night...

On the left is Kathy Mullen, a puppeteer whose accomplishments including working with Yoda in Star Wars: The Empire Strike Back. On the right is actor, Peter Williams, from BIFF Jury, who played arch-nemesis Apophis in the internationally syndicated sci-fi series Stargate SG-1 for five seasons. 


David Poland from BIFF's international advisory panel members was also in town for the festival.He is editor-in-chief of www.moviecitynews.com and for his online feature DP/30 he has interviewed huge names in the world of film including most recently Jeff Bridges, Natalie Portman and Sofia Coppola. Also in Bermuda for BIFF 2011 was Peter Rainer, a veteran broadcast who only this week wrote a glowing tribute to Elizabeth Taylor for Bloomberg.com.


I think that's enough name dropping for one post so I leave with the presentation of an Oscar Award for Best Headline of the Week to Bermuda Sun for a story about a floating farm of 1,500 cows arriving in Bermuda: "Cattle moo-ve across Atlantic to Bermuda" 


That's all for now moooovie fans :-)

Angloviles

So I, the lone Brit, was out for dinner with a bunch of Canadians on Friday night (not that unusual a scenario in this expat melting pot) when one gave the reason for not wanting to step foot in a particular ski resort: "agh, no way, too many Brits." Far from being insulted, that's just not me, I was intrigued. What's not too love? There's plenty I miss about my own people, the apologising for everything, self-deprecating humour, underselling one's self, the willingness to queue, sharp wit. So why they hatin' on us??

Then it dawned on me as I sat in front of the tele and saw the trailer for "William & Kate: the movie" Yikes!



This is why and the actors aren't even British! The scene of Kate crying in the bath about her relationship is akin to a scene from Bridget Jones. No wonder British women have a bad name.

No matter where you're from you're likely to think that your country is centre of the universe. This is particularly true if your from the U.K., with the arrogance of the British Empire rule still prevailing in our  subconsciousness. However, I can probably count on one hand the number of Brits I've seen in the media here on my ten digits. William & Kate on E! and Piers Morgan with his new chat show on CNN, Kate Winslet and Hugh Grant somewhere, all perpetuating the stereotype of middle/upper class old skoolism.

Then you have a handle of Brits that may just as well be American as they've been so Americanised, making you wonder why they even hired a Brit in the first place. Cat Deeley on Dancing with the Stars for one. I nearly choked on my tea-dunked hobnob when I caught sight of Vernon Kay presenting on U.S. TV What the hell is that accent all about?? It's not Barnsley that's fo shizzle. The Beckhams, though not true Brits through and through anymore, are at least projecting a positive image in the sports and fashion arenas. The likes of Jamie Oliver, Ricky Gervais and Gordon Ramsey are keeping it real but still giving legs to the cockney wide boy stereotype.

It's not till you live outside of the UK that you realise how little of British culture makes it to the mid-Atlantic, let alone all the way across the pond. Mention the mighty Take That to any non-Brit and you are met with crossed-eyes and confusion. Such a shame for this fine specimen of Anglo talent to be unknown, while, bogglingly, Natasha Bedingfield has somehow exceeded any fame she had in her home country over in the States. Although thank god Craig David and Blue never really made it big in the U.S. of A.

I do revel in our supposed sensibilities and stiff upper lip though. One of my American friend's husbands happened to, god forbid, swear in front of me and my English buddy. He got a brisk slap on the arm: "Don't talk like that in front of these guys, they are Brrrrritish!" I guess I should thank my beautiful country for exposing me to so little cursing before, it's usually drowned out by all the clay pigeon shooting, the barking foxhounds, the brass band, the clang of the dinner gong and the whistling of the kettle for another pot of tea.

Luckily, Prince Edward and Sophie Wessex land in Bermuda tomorrow to present the Duke of Edinburgh Awards so the English stereotype will get redressed then. Ho ho ho.

Tempestuous times

...And the budget beat goes on! That is until it is ratified by the House of Assembly at the end of the month.  I won't bore you with the details but this little tit bit caught my eye regarding a certain 'Hustle Truck.' The locals are up in arms about it and the fact there is no $$$ for it in the budget, so it sparked my interest. 


Well, after some googling it appears that it is indeed a real shame that this is being cut, along with many other charities' budgets. Introduced by the previous Labour Minister in 2007, the Hustle Truck was billed as the answer to "one of Bermuda's most enduring social problems of wall-sitting." H.U.S.T.L.E stands for Helping Unemployed Sustain Themselves Limited Employment. The truck picks people up willing to work but unable to get jobs for various reasons, e.g. criminal records, illiteracy or age discrimination etc., in the morning and takes them to work sites to perform casual landscaping, cleaning and general manual labour. Some days as many as 100 people hustled onto the two tonne trucks for a chance to earn up to $550 a week. Tasks completed over the years include a Boaz Island Youth Centre, removing rubbish at Gulf Stream in Soutside and removing graffiti from school grounds. Seems like a win-win to me and sad that it's losing out.

Also, wasn't I only saying in the last post how rising gun crime was one of the island's biggest issues? Well, someone give me a parliamentary seat as sadly last week saw the second shooing fatality of 2011. A 26 year old guy, who's girlfriend was expecting their baby - a true tragedy. A 29 year man was also fatally shot on February 4. A court case running at the moment on a murder that took place last year has heard that the gun in that shooting has been linked to February murder, along with others. This confirms Police suspicions of a small number of guns being recycled within gangs as the tit-for-tat killings go on.  It will be interesting to see if the huge Police budget cuts are still passed at the end of the month.


Continuing this stormy waters theme, we move onto art. It is expected that the "Tempest" exhibition from Bermudian artist, Rebecca Hanson, will create "a storm of interest" (nice pun www.bernews.com!).  Inspired by the three most destructive recent hurricanes, the show is named after the Shakespeare play that it is claimed is based on the real-life ship wreck of the Sea Venture in 1609 leading to the settling of Bermuda. Yep, you heard it right fact finders, another claim to fame for this little island.

So that's earth (landscaping), wind (hurricane art) and now fire! Bernews is reporting a large-scale fire at Riddell's Bay Golf Course this evening. The extent of the damage is at this stage is unknown but I doubt it risks Bermuda's reputation as home to more golf courses per square mile than anywhere in the entire world. And another claim to fame... they just keep on coming!!