A week before the national budget, and on Republic Day, on Sunday at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Port of Spain, two persons with experience working in, and with profitable creative industries internationally, clamoured for Trinidad and Tobago to tap its creative industries, as a low-hanging fruit, for economic diversification.

Costa Rican Ambassador to T&T Lilly Edgerton Picado said she finds T&T’s creative industries so enormous it is “mind-blowing”. She was sharing tips at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) event at the 2017 Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival, on what T&T could do to make money from its creative industries, based on her experience in her own country.

Costa Rica was one of the countries featured in the August-released IDB paper “The Orange Economy”. The “orange economy” covers the creative industries, including the arts.

After several months of teasing and hints, the 12th edition of the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival Festival officially kicked off on Tuesday at the Hyatt Regency with the promise to get the nation ‘high on film’.

From September 19 -26, film enthusiasts can expect a fully loaded schedule of films from Trinidad and Tobago, the wider Caribbean and the world. However, they can also expect to see and take part in several other activities aimed at developing filmmakers and fostering patriotism and generating discussions on social issues.

To ensure that as many people as possible have access to the Festival, MovieTowne San Fernando has been added to the list of screening venues.

The Festival will open on September 19 with Green Days by the River, the highly anticipated film based on the novel of the same name. The film was one of 15 films in development that participated in the Caribbean Film Mart in 2015. “It is such a joy to see the film come to fruition. It will no doubt play to sold-out audiences across the country. It is, of course, just one of the 100+ films we will be screening at five venues across Trinidad and Tobago,” according to a statement from tt/ff.

In celebration of Canadian diversity, on and off the screen, the trinidad+tobago film festival will host a screening of the Canadian film Two Soft Things, Two Hard Things – to highlight one aspect of that diversity. The screening, which will take place at the Hyatt Regency on Sunday 24 September, from 3.30pm, is free of charge and courtesy the Canadian High Commission in Port of Spain.

Allison Brewer, one of the activists who appears in the documentary, will be in attendance to introduce the film and participate in a Q&A session at the end of the screening, giving the audience the opportunity to further explore the issues examined in the film.

Two Soft Things, Two Hard Things, by  Mark Kenneth Woods + Michael Yerxa, explores a dramatic period in the 1950s when colonisation and religion shamed and erased traditional beliefs about sexuality and family structure among the Inuit population in northwest Canada.

What started as a film about a community’s LGBTQ pride celebration, quickly developed into a layered discussion of government colonial programs, Christian missions, language and the loss of cultural identity.

The trinidad+tobago film festival is partnering with UN Women and the Institute for Gender and Development Studies (IGDS), UWI  to present The Power of Women in Film, on Friday, September 22 from 9am, at the Hyatt Regency Trinidad.

The day of panels and presentations will include speakers from across the region who explore depictions of women and girls and how film can be used to address issues of violence against women, objectification, gender inequality and female empowerment. Short films will be incorporated into the programme to help illustrate some of the issues being discussed. The Power of Women in Film initiative is free, and individuals and organisations interested in the issues are invited to attend.

The Power of Women in Film will be followed by three days of feminist cinema, from September 22 – 24, also at the Hyatt Regency Trinidad.