The Chesapeake Film Festival opens at the Avalon Theater on October 27th with a cocktail party at 5:30 p.m. Opening night festivities bring together filmmakers and buffs from across the region and from far distances.
Opening night features Gary Jobson, the pre-eminent American ambassador for sailing, Jobson serves as ESPN’s sailing analyst and NBC ‘s Summer Olympics sailing correspondent. He is joined by award-winning nautical cinematographer, Alexis Andrews.
Ticket Price: Included in $85 All Access Pass Adults; $45 All Access Students with ID or $10 single film ticket, adult; $8. Student with ID. For tickets and information visit chesapeakefilmfestival.com.
The Magic and Mystery of Sable Island, directed by Gary Jobson, 6:15 p.m.; Q & A at 7:15 p.m. with Gary Jobson
Gary Jobson presents his latest project, an environmental documentary comprised of video, historic film and stills, set against one of the world’s most remote and beautiful landscapes. Sable Island is the newest gem in the Parks Canada array of a nation’s natural wonders.
A small, intrepid band of six sailors heads into the North Atlantic, bound for one of the ocean’s most remote and inaccessible islands. They leave Halifax, NS on the 36-foot slope Tazzarin to explore the past, present and future of one of seafaring’s most feared places and its haunting past a feared mystery. Known as the “Graveyard of the Atlantic,” Sable Island is infamous for hundreds of shipwrecks over four centuries. Perched between the conflicting flows of the warm Gulf Stream and the icy Labrador Current, Sable, with her frequent storms and ever shifting shoals becomes the byword of those “in peril on the sea.” Shipwreck survivals, wreckers, sealers, explorers and lifesaving crews intertwine in the distant island’s history. The team’s archaeologists uncover Sable’s past amid a backdrop of endless sand dunes, wildlife and ocean.
Ted Turner’s Greatest Race: 1979 Fastnet, directed by Gary Jobson, 7:00 p.m.; Q & A with Gary Jobson at 7:15 p.m.
The famed Fastnet Race is held every two years by the Royal Ocean Racing Club on a 605 miles from Cowes direct to the Fastnet Rock and then to Plymouth via south the of the Isles of Scilly. When the winner of the 1977 America’s Cup Ted Turner entered his 60-foot yacht Tenacious in the 1979 race, a freak storm turned the Celtic Sea into chaos, wreaking havoc on over 306 yachts taking part, resulting in 18 fatalities (15 yachtsmen and 3 rescuers). Emergency services, naval forces, and civilian vessels from around the west side of the English Channel were summoned to aid what became the largest ever rescue operation in peace-time. This involved some 4,000 people including the entire Irish Naval Service’s fleet, lifeboats, commercial boats, and helicopters.In this film, the victorious crew of the Tenacious relive the voyage, of which Turner famously said: “I was more afraid of losing than I was of dying.”
Vanishing Sail, The Story of a Caribbean Tradition, written, firmed and directed by Alexis Andrews, 7:30 p.m.; Q & A with Alexis Andrew and Gary Jobson at 9 p.m.
Sail was once the lifeblood of the Caribbean, and hundreds of wooden schooners were once launched in the Lesser Antilles, more than anywhere in the West Indies. Today, locals struggle to keep wooden boat building alive for the survival of the island’s fisherman.
The Chesapeake Film Festival is funded in part by a grants from the Maryland Firm Office and the Talbot County Arts Council, with revenues provided by the Maryland State Arts Council.
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