The Euro-East Africa Film Festival (EEAFF19) returns for a fifth edition with emphasis on young film makers.
Courtesy of European Union and British Council, this event was formerly dubbed Euro-Uganda Film Festival. It has since re-branded and expanded to reach out to all film makers around the East African Region at their fourth coming fifth edition.
EEAFF19 will kick off on August 27 up til September 1 and shall be held at different venues. These include National Theatre (Aug 27, 29, 31 and Sept 1), Alliance Francaise on Aug 28, and Kamwokya Play ground on Aug 30.
Fiona Inci, the Country Director of British Council Uganda, told press on Monday that this festival will feature only short films from mainly young film makers between ages 18-35.
“The festival will create an opportunity for young film makers between ages 18-35 to showcase their works in political unrest, life, insecurity, entertainment, educative film genres among others, and we believe that this festival will create a larger platform for them,” Inci said.
Inci stated that they choose to screen short films because most of the young film makers don’t have finances to produce long feature films.
“The festival will educate young film makers on how to transform from short films to feature films, our experts will teach them on how to choose the right themes, team, and location among others. This festival will also hold panel discussions from experts, film training and film screenings, which will be of a great importance,” she said.
According to Polly Kamukama, the Curator of this festival, some of the films run for less than 40 minutes. Thirteen of the 29 short films lined up for screening at the festival are Ugandan, nine are from Europe, and seven are from the rest of East Africa.
Kamukama also said that unlike in the fourth edition, Uganda’s films are worth a review.
“A call for submission was made and we received a great number of films. From Uganda we managed to select 13 films. What’s interesting about these films is that most of them were written, produced or directed by women. This has greatly addressed the issue of gender imbalance,” he said.
Kamukama noted that during the selection of these films, they chose those films that have strong social themes which people can easily relate with.
Rasheeda Nalumoso, the creative producer and Arts Manager at British Council said the festival will provide connections to participating film makers since it’s going to feature players from around the East Africa, Norway, Belgium and Netherlands among others.
