By Annette Hinkle
People who love nature and also enjoy watching films about far flung places and the rare animals that populate them should be sure to be in Sag Harbor next weekend when The Hamptons Conservation & Wildlife Film Festival comes to town.
More than 50 films representing 20 different countries will be screened from September 24 to 26 at Bay Street Theatre. Presented in two hour film series featuring four to 10 films each, themes include sharks and threats to their survival, conservation and preservation efforts on land and in coastal environments, and documentaries both long and short about animals around the world including wombats, elephants and sea turtles, as well as little known and seldom seen species under threat from habitat destruction.
An opening night reception at Bay Street Theatre on Friday, September 24 will include cocktails, hors d’oeuvres, and a talk by keynote speaker Fabien Cousteau, grandson of Jacques Cousteau and a filmmaker himself who recently traveled to the Arctic to document narwhals and beluga whales. A silent auction at the event will benefit Cousteau’s new non-profit organization “Plant A Fish.” World premiere screenings of two films will follow — “Cotton Tops” about the endangered Cotton Top Tamarin, a primate that lives in Colombia, and “Lolita the Orca” a short film about Miami Sequarium’s captive killer whale and efforts to release her back into the wild. The directors of both films will be on hand for a Q&A session after the screenings.
Christopher J. Gervais is the lead founder of The Conservation & Wildlife Film Festival. The newly formed festival is based in Pennsylvania and unlike most film festivals which are defined by the town or city in which they are held, in its inaugural season, The Conservation & Wildlife Film Festival will take place at five different venues from coast to coast between now and May 2011. Sag Harbor is the festival’s first stop, and it will also be offered in Eureka, Calif., Tucson, Ariz., Beaufort, S.C. and finally Colorado Springs, Colo.
“It’s educating people about endangered species and endangered habitats,” says Gervais of the festival’s mission. “People will protect what they love. If they’re not aware the animal exists, they won’t protect it.”
Gervais is a member of the fabled Explorer’s Club in Manhattan. Founded in 1904, earlier generations were admitted as members after accomplishing illustrious feats of discovery — being the first to reach the poles, for example, or the summit of Mt. Everest and even the surface of the moon.
The club still focuses on the spirit of discovery, but today members are individuals who have documented unique scientific exploration in their field research. Gervais, for example, was the first to merge vertebrate paleontology and marine biology by studying marine paleontology. In his work, he focused on the fossils of mammals from the Pleistocene Epoch in the inland waterways of Florida, and Cretaceous period marine reptiles that populated the western interior sea which once covered much of the western U.S.
With this film festival, Gervais sets his sites on other species — those that have not yet become extinct, but easily could without the understanding and intervention of concerned world citizens. He notes that the idea for the festival came about in late March after a discussion with several other members of the Explorer’s Club about what was missing on the film festival circuit.
“I had been attending festivals for over a decade,” he says. “Specifically, two film festivals out west that had in the past been wildlife film festivals. I went year after year and met a number of the filmmakers, some of whom are Explorer’s Club members.”
“I would get the same complaint from them every year,” he says. “Independent filmmakers rarely get the opportunity to show their films, unless they’re tied to a TV network.”
“In consulting with filmmakers, I also realized there’s really not any other conservation and wildlife film festivals on the eastern seaboard,” adds Gervais. “There are environmental film festivals, but it’s not the same. Those tend to have a political message. Our festival is not about that. It’s about the conservation of wildlife and its habitat.”
Taking the festival to multiple venues is another unique twist on the traditional model. Gervais notes that in today’s economy, it is becoming increasingly difficult, both in terms of dollars and the time commitment required, for filmmakers and audiences to travel to places like Jackson, Wyoming or Missoula Montana for a film festival.
The model of this festival also makes it more flexible in terms of content. Because it is offered every two months in a new location, films can be still be submitted for upcoming festivals. Which means, Gervais notes, that the films audiences will see in Sag Harbor are not necessarily those that will be screened at the festival’s next event.
“Some filmmakers only want to show their films at a location they can travel to,” explains Gervais. “We’ll have about a dozen filmmakers in Sag Harbor. At the end of a session, there will be time for a filmmaker to do a Q&A with the audience.”
“At our next festival in Eureka in November, we will show some of the same films as Sag Harbor, but also we’ll be showing some others,” explains Gervais who adds that, based on early feedback, there is a great demand for a festival with this focus.
“We’ve had probably a dozen communities and some foreign countries ask us if we’d bring one to their location,” says Gervais. “I’ll certainly consider it, but I don’t want to bite off more than we can chew.”
Though he stressed he and the other founders are committed to bringing the festival back to each of the venues, including Sag Harbor, on an annual basis, much will depend on the support of the communities. Gervais notes that Sag Harbor was chosen as a venue not only because a number of the festival’s board of advisors have homes in the area, but because the area also fits the festival’s demographics with wildlife oriented people and organizations like Group for the East End that are focused on conservation issues.
“I’d be surprised if we don’t get a lot of support in the Hamptons,” says Gervais who would like to expand the festival in Sag Harbor to three full days next year. “I hope we’ll be there for many years to come.”
The Hamptons Conservation & Wildlife Film Festival’s opening reception at Bay Street Theatre is from 6 to 9 p.m. on Friday, September 24. Tickets are $85. The festival’s film series will run in two hour blocks from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, September 25 and 26. Tickets are $15 for each series. To reserve tickets call 725-9500. For a full schedule of screenings visit www.conservationwildlifefilmfestival.com.
Top: A production shot from “The Last Elephants in Thailand” a short directed by Donald Tayloe and Michelle Mizner.
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