The Harder They Come

The 2015 trinidad+tobago film festival (ttff) unveiled the first selections of ten classic Caribbean films for this year’s edition of the Festival.

These ten films will screen in a special sidebar to the main program, in honor of the ttff’s tenth anniversary. The Festival takes place from September 15–29.

“Many people are unaware that there has been a Caribbean film industry for quite some time, or that almost every country in the region has produced feature films,” said Bruce Paddington, ttff Founder and Festival Director. “We are therefore very proud to present ten of the very best classic films from the Caribbean that will help one to appreciate and enjoy the rich diversity of the region.”

Comprising films from nine different countries, the sidebar ranges across the English-, Spanish-, French- and Dutch-speaking sections of the region.

The lineup includes the Jamaican classic, The Harder They Come, and Bim, from T&T.

Memories of Underdevelopment, the oldest film in the lineup, is from 1968, while the most recent, Strawberry and Chocolate, was released in 1993. Both of those films hail from Cuba.

The full slate of films is as follows:

Memories of Underdevelopment (Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, Cuba, 1968)
The Harder They Come (Perry Henzell, Jamaica, 1972)
Bim (Hugh A. Robertson, Trinidad and Tobago, 1974)
One People (Pim de la Parra, Suriname, 1976)
Sugar Cane Alley (Euzhan Palcy, Martinique, 1983)
One Way Ticket (Agliberto Menéndez, Dominican Republic, 1988)
What Happened to Santiago (Jacobo Morales, Puerto Rico, 1989)
Ava and Gabriel: A Love Story (Felix de Rooy, Curaçao, 1990)
The Man on the Shore (Raoul Peck, Haiti, 1993)
Strawberry and Chocolate (Tomás Gutiérrez Alea and Juan Carlos Tabío, Cuba, 1993)

Caption: A still from The Harder They Come

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