2023-10-14 19:44:08
The 5th edition of the Amazon Caribbean International Documentary Film Festival ends this Saturday, October 14. This year, organizers received 100 more films than last year for the competitions. A look back at the beginnings of the event which takes place every year at the transportation camp.
Since its creation in 2019, FIFAC has grown. During the first edition, 22 films were screened, according to the organizers. In 2023, 40 films are scheduled. Moreover, 25 films are in official competition, among the 230 documentary films that responded to the call for films of FIFAC (i.e. around a hundred more than in 2022).
“In 2019, there was a pooling of the know-how of the camp, of all the town hall services (the CIAP, the museum, the library, the Kokolampoe drama center) and of course, the Maroni Image Center which is responsible for this project […] We jumped on the challenge and it resulted in the first FIFAC“, remembers Serge Abatucci, president of the AFIFC and director of the Kokolampoe theater.
The idea came to fruition at the end of 2018, during the Doc Amazonie Caraïbe International Meetings, in parallel with the 10th edition of the America Molo Man municipal film festival. Following on from FIFO (Oceanian International Documentary Film Festival)France Télévisons wanted to set up a festival in each of the three overseas basins: Atlantic, Indian, Oceanian.
Of course, there were bugs, misunderstandings, but it happened. We were able to receive the FIFAC.
The first edition, in 2019 • ©FIFAC
The second edition was impacted by Covid-19, but the teams insisted that it take place. It was a hybrid FIFAC: outdoors, but also online. “In 2020, we resisted, in 2021 we resisted once more (with a 100% connected edition, Editor’s note)“, says Serge Abatucci. “In 2022, phew! A breath of fresh air, we started once more“, he continues.
Today, the president of AFIFAC believes that the event is a showcase for Guyana and its inhabitants, but also for its neighbors. However, “I ask myself the question ‘who is watching’? For the moment, these are informed people, then we have a captive audience, like professors and specialists… But to what extent does FIFAC reach the people of Mana, of Apatou, of the West?“, asks Serge Abatucci.
According to him, there is mediation work carried out by the Maroni Image Pole, but it is necessary “act so that le FIFAC is increasingly an actor, triggering desireto be able to give people a voice and question our control of the image“His dream, he says, is to open an educational space and bring people there to give them the keys to mastering images.
We need to open spaces like this to have more proximity with people and for them to understand that films are accessible to everyone, that they have the right, that they are welcome. It’s their space and it’s high time they make it their own.
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