The audience in the cinema knew the film was about surfing in a subarctic sea. Yet, when surfers emerged with ice around their beards and stalactites around their eyebrows, the audience still let out an audible gasp.
Corners of the earth: Kamchatka was one of seven films showed during the Ocean Film Festival. And it reminded us how the ocean offers endless possibilities, from the Australian coasts to the cold waters of Russia. This year, the festival celebrated its 10-year anniversary, showing that the interest for this last frontier of the earth has not dwindled down.
While touring multiple countries including Australia, Mexico and Italy, the festival made a stop in Randwick last Wednesday. Jemima Robinson, the festival director, seems satisfied. The crowd showed up, and this year, five of the seven films are directed by Australians: a record. Those Australians’ filmmakers really are ocean-afficionados. One of them filmed the first man to cross the Bass strait on a Wing Foil. And all of them went at sea and explored the world to deliver unique images.
While the films all had the ocean as a common denominator, they each approached it from a different perspective. “You want to show a broad diversity of topics” reminds Jemima Robinson. Indeed, different filmmakers followed different adventurers, and each displayed their relation to the ocean and its wildlife. “That’s the beauty of it, it’s never the same two years in a row”. The ocean is diverse, and as such can be of interest for everyone. But the organisers still had to find the right pearls among multiple passionate filmmakers. To get there, Jemima used the website FilmFreeway (“like Tinder”) that matches filmmakers and festival organisers.
She notes that with technological improvements, more people can now produce good quality underwater footage, with a GoPro for instance. As such, maybe having the ocean more visible actually raises interest for this part of earth. Despite being very much around us, it seems the ocean always has a corner left to be explore. During a Q&A session, the adventurers of the Kamchatka film were asked why they went all the way to eastern Russia in order to catch some waves. Why not a sunny and warm destination? “The Winter swell” was part of the answer. And the desire to go out and “find unexplored waves”.
Exploring new areas might also be the reason why people come to such film festivals. For now, the audience of the festival predominantly comes from coastal communities. But Jemima Robinson’s experience with audiences from landlock communities led her to believe that they are also likely to look for a form of escapism.
And the festival aims at catering for all lovers of the ocean with themes ranging from a focus on marine life to human marine adventures and sports such as surfing, wing foiling or free diving. Out of the seven movies, four were more nature-centred while three were people centred. They all took the viewer along. With personal testimonies around how freediving provides unique and liberating feelings and a camera following fishes around a shipwreck. The mediation of the camera giving the viewer access to points of view that would be unattainable for non-professional. Maybe expending the public’s perspective on the ocean. Overall, among all 7 unique films, Jemima Robinson believes that “Corners of the earth: Kamchatka” stands as a crowd favourite. It is indeed the longest film, with strong images and charismatic characters going to an original place. This feature had everything to please ocean and adventures’ lovers alike.
Lovers of ocean music, if that genre exists, were also in for a treat as ukulele musicians were here during audience seating and the break, in order to keep some of the 670 people entertained. The musicians were not the central part of the festival, but they certainly added to the relaxed atmosphere of the event. And sung along tubes like “Sloop John B” or “Surfin’ USA”.
After the musical break and the Q&A, the films viewings started again. The idea remains to showcase a story “that might get people to interact with the ocean in a different way”. “That feeling that it [the ocean] gives you: that’s the common element”, as Jemima Robinson sums it up. With different themes, viewers realise how full of possibilities the ocean is. And that’s probably why it is so fascinating.
The ocean covers most of our planet, but still provides different forms of escapism due to its size and number of related activities possible. This festival aimed at showcasing some of these possibilities. It also reminded us that to produce such strong images, adventurers and filmmakers sometimes have to face difficult conditions, such as surfing in a cold ocean. And from the public’s perspective, it’s not just about looking at the surfer, but also at the effect the -freezing- ocean has on him.
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