Announcing the TT theatrical release of Unfinished Sentences

(Port of Spain, Trinidad) — On January 16th, 2019, SAVANT Films’ award-winning feature-length documentary, Unfinished Sentences will be released at the Digicel IMAX Theatre at One Woodbrook Place. The film will play for one week in the first instance.

The theatrical run follows on the heels of a stellar year for Unfinished Sentences. In 2018, the film screened at multiple film festivals including the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival and the Caribbean Tales Film Festival held in Toronto, Canada. It won big at both festivals, receiving the Best Trinidad and Tobago Feature Film and the Best Feature Length Film awards respectively. Unfinished Sentences has also screened at the International Film Festival of Panama in Panama City, as well as the Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano in Havana, Cuba, and is soon to appear at the Island House Film Festival in the Bahamas, and on screen at the Close Up Film Centre in London (UK).

Unfinished Sentences is a documentary that chronicles the life of the celebrated Trinidadian columnist and poet, Wayne Brown and explores the often tumultuous relationship between him and his filmmaker daughter, Mariel Brown.

“FATHER-daughter relations, the politics of being an artist, and poetry of breath-taking power converge in Unfinished Sentences, Mariel Brown’s moving new work about her late father, the acclaimed poet, writer and newspaper columnist Wayne Brown,” says journalist and poet, Andre Bagoo.

The Trinidad and Tobago Newsday’s BC Pires writes: “MARIEL BROWN’S film Unfinished Sentences was begun as a documentary about her father, the late Wayne Brown, one of Trinidad’s most influential newspaper writers, a public figure and a fitting subject for biography in any form. As the film develops, though, its focus changes before the eyes of the viewer. A documentary somehow becomes a memoir and a purportedly subjective portrait of a writer actually becomes a deeply personal map of a film-maker’s uneasy voyage into the creative mind of her greatest artistic influence, and out of the mental doldrums in which her father’s death had left her … The greatest strength of the film may not be emotional at all, but technical: the unfinished first film is connected to the un-begun second one by robust film-making know-how – this might be the best-edited film ever shot in Trinidad.”

Unfinished Sentences is funded, in part, thanks to the generous support of sponsors RepublicBank, the Ministry of Community Development, Culture and the Arts, Office of the PrimeMinister of Trinidad and Tobago and BP Trinidad & Tobago.

Unfinished Sentences opens on January 16th, 2019 and runs until January 22nd, 2019 at the Digicel IMAX Theatre at One Woodbrook Place. Tickets cost $50 and will be available from January 14th, 2019 at the Digicel IMAX Box Office.


Announcing the Canadian premiere of Unfinished Sentences

SAVANT Films is delighted to announce the Canadian premiere of award-winning filmmaker Mariel Brown’s film, Unfinished Sentences as part of the Caribbean Tales International Film Festival.  ‘FATHER-daughter relations, the politics of being an artist, and poetry of breath-taking power converge in Unfinished Sentences, Mariel Brown’s moving new work about her late father, the acclaimed poet, writer and… columnist Wayne Brown.’ Andre Bagoo reviews Unfinished Sentences.

Now in its 13th year, the Caribbean Tales International Film Festival celebrates the talents of established and emerging filmmakers of Caribbean heritage who practise their art across the Caribbean Diaspora worldwide 

When:
Thursday September 13th, 7pm

Where:
Revue Cinema, 400 Roncesvalles Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M6R 2M9

Tickets:
CAD$16.27

BPTT provides finishing funds for Unfinished Sentences

As we make final preparations to screen Unfinished Sentences at the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival later this month, we’re delighted to announce the generous support of BP Trinidad and Tobago (BPTT) towards completion funding for “Unfinished Sentences”.

BPTT’s approach to Corporate Social Responsibility is driven by the company’s aspiration, which calls on it to deliver extraordinary business performance, take part in the development of Trinidad and Tobago and impact the lives of every citizen. In areas of education, arts and culture, enterprise and manpower development and the environment, BPTT has established mutually beneficial relationships with the Trinidad and Tobago public, strategically focused on the long-term development of the country. BPTT continues to make tangible contributions to the development of storytelling via the ever-evolving medium of film, through its support of touchstone projects such as the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival, and the films “Green Days by the River”, “Mangroves” and “Unfinished Sentences”.

Don’t miss your chance to see Unfinished Sentences during the TTFF. Here’s a list of screenings and venues:

19th September, 6pm, Movietowne Port of Spain
24th September (Republic Day), 6pm, Movietowne Port of Spain

Announcing the T&T premiere of Unfinished Sentences

(Port of Spain, Trinidad) — On April 26th 2018, SAVANT Films and Bocas Lit Fest will host the Trinidad and Tobago premiere of award-winning filmmaker Mariel Brown’s new film, Unfinished Sentences. The premiere, which is part of the 2018 NGC Bocas Lit Fest Cine Lit series, will take place at the Central Bank Auditorium in Port of Spain and will begin with a cocktail reception at 6.30pm.

Unfinished Sentences is an intimate exploration of the often tumultuous relationship between filmmaker Mariel Brown, and her late father, Trinidadian columnist and poet Wayne Brown.

Of the film, Director Mariel Brown says: “I suspect the complexity of my relationship with my father is not unique in terms of father/ daughter relationships. But I was shocked by my own mental collapse in the years following his death, and the terror I felt at losing him. Initially I started to make Unfinished Sentences (then just a series of interviews with people who were close to him) as a place to put my unassuageable grief. The more work I did, the more I read his writing, the more I found him. It has been an enormous happiness to me and I know there are larger truths that I am exploring – about the nature of family, love and loss and art – than simply a story that is personal to me.”  

According to the Trinidad and Tobago Newsday, “Wayne Brown was a journalist and writer whose name still resonates with many younger Caribbean writers, having mentored several of them in his native Trinidad and Tobago, and in Jamaica where he later lived. His filmmaker daughter Mariel Brown’s new film Unfinished Sentences brings the private life of this touchstone literary father into focus and sheds new light on his relationship with his own daughters.”

Unfinished Sentences is funded, in part, thanks to the generous support of sponsors Republic Bank, the Ministry of Community Development, Culture and the Arts, Office of the Prime Minister and BP Trinidad & Tobago.

The premiere is a ticketed event. Tickets cost $180 (concessions $150) and are available at Paperbased Bookstore in the Normandie Hotel, The Frame Shop at 65 Carlos Street (opposite Brooklyn Bar) and the SAVANT Films office. Please call 222 0913 for more information.

 

 

 

 

 

And we’re off to the festivals!

SAVANT Films is happy to share the news that Unfinished Sentences will have its first festival screening at IFF Panama in April! This is particularly special to us as IFF Panama has been so supportive of the film, having shortlisted Unfinished Sentences to compete in the works in progress competition, Primera Mirada, in 2017. So we’re working on a Spanish translation and subtitles, and look forward to heading to Panama in April.

About Unfinished Sentences:
Unfinished Sentences is a feature-length documentary from veteran filmmaker, Mariel Brown, about her tumultuous relationship with her late father, Trinidadian columnist and poet, Wayne Brown.

About IFF Panama:

IFF Panama exists because of the immense passion of the Panamanian public towards the cinema. It is the audience of this country, always open to exchange with all the nations of the world, which gave rise to the festival in 2012 and which has made it grow, by recognizing it and supporting it as an essential cultural nutrient.

With regards to Central America and the Caribbean, IFF Panama shows the world a developing filmography, with a commitment to its own color and genuine taste that promises a new and fresh global offer.

 

Habanero Film Sales signs our film!

Unfinished Sentences, a feature-length documentary from veteran filmmaker, Mariel Brown, about her tumultuous relationship with her late father, Trinidadian columnist and poet, Wayne Brown, has signed with Brazilian sales agents Habanero Film Sales. Unfinished Sentences, is Habanero’s first English-language acquisition, and their first film from the English-speaking Caribbean. Unfinished Sentences is one of fewer than a handful of Trinidad and Tobago films to attract the support of an international sales agent; Brown sees the move as an essential step for the success of her film, and a very positive indication of growing international interest in the films of Trinidad and Tobago. “Habanero represents incredibly strong, creative and award-winning films, and I’m delighted to be working with them.”

About Habanero Film Sales
www.habanerofilmsales.com
HABANERO is a Brazilian based international sales company specialized in quality films by Latin American & Caribbean filmmakers.  

Headed by veteran marketing & sales specialist Alfredo Calvino and festival & new media specialist Patricia Martin, HABANERO help producers design and implement co-production, festival and distribution strategies for all media platforms.

Excellent review of Unfinished Sentences

Memories playback like movies: a new personal documentary from Trinidad
by Jaie Laplante, Director of Programming, Miami Film Festival

‘In further creating the sensation of how memories work, a significant amount of Brown’s material is layered and super-imposed upon other visuals, creating a sense of the dense thorniness and complexity of how the mind seeks to reclaim and recast the past into the present. The results are mesmerizing and deeply moving. Brown is a born filmmaker, with an impressive eye and a deep sense of how to connect the intimate to the universal.’  Read more…

Unfinished Sentences heads to IFF Panama!

Unfinished Sentences was one of four films selected to compete at the works-in-progress competition, Primera Mirada, at the Panama International Film Festival (IFF Panama).

According to Variety writer, Martin Dale, ‘[Primera Mirada] attracts leading international sales agents to its screenings – projects will be screened in exclusive private sessions for sales agents, distributors, and film festival programmers – and has served as an important springboard for selected projects.’

Mariel Brown, the film’s director and one of its subjects, presented Unfinished Sentences in Panama in April.

Studio Sessions

Over the past week, we have been recording much of the narration for Unfinished Sentences.  We’ve had the great pleasure of working with actors Nigel Scott and Nickolai Salcedo.  And director Mariel Brown, who is also one of the central characters in the film, was coached through her narration by the talented director, Juliette McCawley.  The process continues!  Huge thanks to Karan Mahabal and Carl Henderson at Hot Music Studio for working with us.