the scottish screen industries magazine april - may 2009

technology
Co-presenter for the evening, Kingussie
High School's Liam O'Brian gets the
evening off to a great start
Glamorous guests enjoying
the chocolate fountain
while the bands played and
the judges judged
The opening Friday night of
the festival saw Kingussie High
School become a glamorous
red carpet venue for young
Highland filmmakers who had
made short films about food
and had entered them in the
newly launched Highland Youth
Award for Short Food Films.
Last September’s filmmaking
workshop which promoted the
new award was attended by
students from schools across
the Highlands and run by Triple
Echo Productions.
Places had to be limited due to
demand being over double the
capacity, and an even greater
demand is anticipated for the
workshop this year as interest
grows. Almost all the schools
attending entered films in
the competition, getting The
Highland Youth Award for Short
Food Films off to a great start.
Complete with red carpet,
chocolate fountain and
beautifully decorated candlelit
tables, glammed up participants
and guests from near and far
mingled at the reception to
enjoy drinks and canapés,
courtesy of the Auld Alliance
Gourmet Academy – the main
organisers behind the event.
Students from Kingussie High
School hosted the evening,
introducing all nine of the
films individually, and
encouraging feedback from a
panel of film industry judges.
Cromarty’s Lindy Cameron
of Move on Up TV joined
Newtonmore’s Meg Else from
Triple Echo Productions,
and BBC’s Craig Anderson
completed the line-up, taking
part in the festival for the
second year, having enjoyed
the inaugural festival of 2008 so
much.
The evening began with the
premiere of my own new short
film called Over The Bridge,
which follows the development
of The Auld Alliance Gourmet
Academy on a trip to Skye to
visit their patron, Lady Claire
MacDonald. The short films by
students that followed were
of a very high standard and
it proved extremely difficult
to judge a winner, especially
considering the variety in styles
from animation to documentary,
and from spoof game show to
love fantasy. The schools that
took part were from Farr, Wick,
Ullapool, Culloden, Fortrose,
Grantown and Kingussie.
While the judges selected the
winning entry, local young
people performed live music to
a packed and enthusiastic
audience. The winner, Fergus
Thom from Carrbridge, had
made an excellent 5 minute
documentary about the World
Porridge Championship in
Carrbridge called The Golden
Spurtle. Unfortunately he was
unable to attend the event
and collect his £300 prize, as
he was in Inverness collecting
another award at Eden Court as
part of the FilmG Festival!
Members of the audience were
delighted with the glittering
event and thrilled to be part
of something so enthusiastically
supported by young people,
many of whom had roles
behind the scenes, and all of
whom behaved in an exemplary
manner.
The festival continued the
following day with more of an
emphasis on the food side of
things. An indoor food hall with
a great variety of local food
producers both demonstrating
and selling their goods brought
crowds to the High School
on another day of wild snow
storms. Well known Glasgow
cook Jacqueline O’Donnell
was an inspiration with her lively cookery demonstrations, and
Lydie Bocquillon, founder of the Academy, hosted a hilarious Blind
Tasting competition.
In the early evening, the festival moved back towards films, and
Craig Anderson hosted a screening of short food films from around
the world – including Yasmin Fedda’s award-winning Breadmakers
and Edinburgh food writer David Barras’ This Little Piggy. David
battled bravely through the weather to attend the festival and
had an interesting Q&A with Craig. The showcasing of this
more professional level of short films at the festival provided an
inspiration for those just starting out in filmmaking and wanting to
develop further in the industry.
The festival closed with a screening of the popular food film
Chocolat, to a delighted audience who sat round the glamorous
tables in a completely transformed school hall, with free chocolates
being offered throughout the film.
This coming May, I will be attending the Slow Food on Film Festival
in Bologna in my role as a member of their international Food
and Film Academy. One aspect of this role is to join a panel of 150
others in the food and film industries around the world and vote
for the best food feature film of the year. Another is to recommend
films for screening at the festival - and I have already recommended
some of those seen at Kingussie. The festival will also give me a
great opportunity to see a wide range of new films about food,
as well as meeting international filmmakers, some of whom will
want to have their films screened at Kingussie’s next Food on Film
Festival. The best of the documentaries from the Italian film festival
will be screened this summer at a Food Documentaries Event in
Kingussie, arrangements for which are still to be finalised.
Organisers of Kingussie’s Food on Film Festival are delighted to
see the way the event is growing and gaining wider recognition
and support, and look forward to developing all aspects of it for
the next festival in February 2010. Funding by Scottish Screen,
The Cairngorms National Park and the Kingussie Business Forum
has been a great encouragement, and really enabled this unique
event to take place in what is quite a rural area of the Highlands of
Scotland.
Kingussie Food on Film Festival 2009 was supported by
Scottish Screen National Lottery through the Audience
Development Fund.
For more information about investment
opportunities at Scottish Screen, please see
www.scottishscreen.com/investment.
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