An epic tale of Caymanian turtlers, based on US author Peter Matthiessen’s novel ‘Far Tortuga’, will begin filming this year, with an anticipated 2024 release.
Caymanian filmmaker Badir Awe, owner of Awesome Productions, and US-based independent filmmaker Jack Evans, of Another World Entire productions, are teaming up to bring Matthiessen’s ecological adventure thriller to the big screen.
“It’s just been an exciting ride because it is an authentic, real Caymanian story that I was not aware of before,” Awe told the Cayman Compass in a joint Zoom interview with Evans on Monday.
Far Tortuga, which is set in 1968, follows nine men from Grand Cayman on a late-season turtling expedition that takes a turn while on the high seas.
Evans, who has written the screenplay for the movie, said while the story will connect with Matthiessen’s novel, there will be a creative twist to how the novel plays out onscreen.
“The novel is long and slow and beautiful, very immersive. But I have a passion here to make something that’s genuinely thrilling, morally challenging, aesthetically gorgeous, but exciting. Readers of the novel can look forward to a very different story being told because we’re making the form of it much more a thriller than an abstraction piece,” Evans said.
True Caymanian story
Awe and Evans connected in February through Caymanian filmmaker Frank E. Flowers and, since then, Awe said they have been working toward beginning production.
“We met, I learned about the film, and I learned about the novel, which was all new to me,” Awe said, adding that he was looking forward to being a part of telling a story so connected to Caymanian culture.
Evans, speaking with the Compass from New Mexico, said the journey to make the movie into a reality has been “interesting,” as he first read ‘Far Tortuga’ when was a 13-year-old growing up in Tennessee.
“For some reason, it spoke to me. It was the most visual novel I had ever read. I could see every step of it. It was very beautiful in my mind’s eye and since then the Cayman Islands was kind of this dream world I had imagined through this true history. I was always aspiring to actually lay eyes on the place,” Evans said.
They have been piecing the project together step by step over three years, he said. His team shot the short film ‘Eden River’, inspired by the world of turtles in Belize, last year. That movie won awards at international festivals and is opening the Caribbean Tales International Film Festival in Toronto this month.
‘Far Tortuga’ will mostly be shot in Belize, as most of the story does not really take place in Cayman, Awe explained.
“The film/story begins in Hog Sty Bay but 90% of the film takes place on a boat off the Central and South American coasts. The story is all Caymanian characters, but they are away from Cayman for basically the whole story,” he said.
Though the novel is told from an outsider’s perspective, as Matthiessen was an American author, Awe notes it is a very important production for the local Cayman community.
“I think that the film is a warning to Cayman. I think the film speaks about a lot of our nation’s ills that we also speak about and that we’re aware of, but that hasn’t often been portrayed in an artistic format,” he said, acknowledging that it was a “tough pill” to swallow.
Caymanians, he said, would prefer to see films that portray Cayman more positively. “So would I, I mean, why not? There’s room for that, but I think there’s also room for us to look at what’s holding us back and I think that that’s what this film explores.”
Support of the Matthiessens
The production team has secured the support of the Peter Matthiessen Center, a family legacy foundation started in the late author’s memory, and now Evans said they are on the path to put together the right people to tell the story.
“It’s my personal hope that this whole film and this whole project becomes quite a bit more Caymanian,” he added.
A trailer for the movie has already been released, starring actors Ramsden Madeus, Joe Taylor and Gildon Rowland. It was shot partially in Grand Cayman and in Belize.
However, casting calls are in the pipeline for the remaining actors, Awe added.
Evans said he has been spending time in Cayman “to get as much cast crew and investors from the Cayman Islands” as possible.
“‘Far Tortuga’, as one Caymanian described it to me, is sort of the national epic because generations of turtlers made up the ancestry of Cayman Islands, and this is the richest, brightest, most powerful educating and beautiful story to have come out of their history,” he said.
Awe said he looks with pride at Cayman’s budding film industry, and the successful productions of ‘The Baker’ and ‘The Retirement Plan’, both of which were shot locally, give him hope.
“We don’t need the films to be about Cayman if they’re filmed here… But this [project] is obviously a special piece because it’s personal, it’s Caymanian, it’s authentic, and it’s a different angle. It’s not about tax evasion. It’s exciting,” he said.
Evans is hosting a trailer screening of the film, a theatrical performance and live reading of the script on 8 Oct. at The Church Sag Harbor in New York.
Anyone interested in getting involved and want to learn more about the production can email [email protected] and [email protected].
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