Movie lovers are in for a treat this week­end when the Trinidad and To­ba­go Film Fes­ti­val (ttff) rolls in to pub­lic spaces along the East/West cor­ri­dor, with the bpTT Com­mu­ni­ty Cin­er­gy Out­door Cin­e­ma Se­ries–three nights of free screen­ings of great films.

Among the films to be screened is Play­ing Away (1987), by pi­o­neer­ing British-Trinida­di­an film­mak­er, Ho­race Ov�, on Sun­day from 6 pm, at Adam Smith Square in Wood­brook, Port-of-Spain.

"Au­di­ences are wel­come to bring their own seat­ing. Vend­ing is not al­lowed at this venue, so please bring along your own re­fresh­ments," says the ttff in a re­lease.

Star­ring the late Nor­man Beat­on (of tele­vi­sion's Desmond's fame), Play­ing Away cen­tres on the res­i­dents of the fic­tion­al British vil­lage of Sned­ding­ton, who in­vite the Caribbean Brix­ton Con­quis­ta­dors–a crick­et team from South Lon­don–for a match to com­mem­o­rate African Famine Week.

Mem­bers of both teams have their reser­va­tions and the week­end in the coun­try pro­duces un­ex­pect­ed re­sults both on and off the field of play. Play­ing Away sub­tly ex­plores and un­der­mines stereo­types about race, and suc­ceeds in link­ing two fa­mil­iar but strange cul­tures through the sim­ple de­vice of a crick­et match.

This com­e­dy of man­ners has an ar­ray of British tal­ent, in­clud­ing Ross Kemp (Eas­t­En­ders) and Neil Mor­ris­sey (Men Be­hav­ing Bad­ly) at the start of their ca­reers, and a poignant per­for­mance by the bril­liant Beat­on. Born in Bel­mont in 1939, Ho­race Ov� moved to Britain in 1960. His en­try in­to film came through work­ing as an ex­tra on the set of the 1963 epic, Cleopa­tra. In 1969 he made a short film, Bald­win's Nig­ger, in which African-Amer­i­can nov­el­ist James Bald­win dis­cuss­es black ex­pe­ri­ence and iden­ti­ty in Britain and Amer­i­ca.

Ov�'s next film, shot at a con­cert in Lon­don's Wem­b­ley Are­na in 1970, was a doc­u­men­tary called Reg­gae, which was suc­cess­ful in cin­e­mas and was shown on BBC tele­vi­sion.

In 1975 he di­rect­ed the film for which he is best known, Pres­sure–the first full-length dra­mat­ic fea­ture film by a black di­rec­tor in Britain. Telling the sto­ry of a Lon­don teenag­er who joins the Black Pow­er move­ment in the 1970s, Pres­sure's scenes of po­lice bru­tal­i­ty led to it be­ing banned for two years by its own back­ers, the British Film In­sti­tute.

It was even­tu­al­ly re­leased to wide ac­claim. Ov�'s oth­er tele­vi­sion work in­cludes The Equal­iz­er, about the 1919 Am­rit­sar Mas­sacre, which won two In­di­an Acad­e­my Awards in 1996.

In the 2007 Queen's Birth­day Ho­n­ours List he was made a Com­man­der of the Most Ex­cel­lent Or­der of the British Em­pire (CBE) for his con­tri­bu­tions to the film in­dus­try in the UK. Last year he was ho­n­oured as a Trinidad and To­ba­go film pi­o­neer by the ttff.

In ad­di­tion to Sun­day's screen­ing of Play­ing Away, there will be two oth­er Com­mu­ni­ty Cin­er­gy screen­ings this week­end. On Fri­day the Ba­hami­an fea­ture Wind Jam­mers will screen at the Trinidad and To­ba­go Sail­ing As­so­ci­a­tion (TTSA) in Ch­aguara­mas, from 6 pm.

Then on Sat­ur­day the Brazil­ian film Cap­tains of the Sand and the T&T short film Buck will screen at UWI, St Au­gus­tine, al­so from 6 pm.

For more in­for­ma­tion, vis­it www.ttfilm­fes­ti­val.com or call 621 0709.Play­ing Away: A scene from Ho­race Ov�'s Play­ing Away. The 1987 film will be screened on Sun­day from 6 pm, at Adam Smith Square in Wood­brook, Port-of-Spain.

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