There's a movie premiere at the Princess Cinema in Belize City on Friday night, and no it's not the classic cancellation of a Hollywood flick due to a non-functioning film, instead, it's a movie called "Let Us Make Eve" filmed exclusively in Belize.
It stars local actors Indira Andrew, Miriam Abdul Qawiy, and Horatio Guerrero as well as a smattering of US actors who filmed on location in Belize.
Yesterday director and co-writer Mark Harris as well as one of the film's stars and producers stopped by to tell us more about the project.
Mark Harris, Director/ co-writer, Let Us Make Eve
"Let Us Make Eve Is about a woman by the name of Eve and what happens is that she comes to, she leaves America and moves to Belize which is the island of Caye Caulker, and when she moves there her friends come over and when her friends come over she starts to actually kill her friends off but there is a particular reason as to why. So, it's a thriller and it's going to be very fascinating for people to watch."
"With this Eve character it's not just about her killing off her friends, it's about her killing off in order for her to become the second coming of Christ. This is what she is moving towards, she has to kill off those demons and those evil characteristics inside and her friends represent those demons."
"The pre-production part was basically what we had to do was get the resources and it's still an independent film, we didn't have the resources from Hollywood so this film was not backed by anyone in L.A. it wasn't booked by the Hollywood system, it was an independent film that we pooled our resources that we had together in order to get this film made, now when it came to certain investors, they wanted to shoot this film in Puerto Rico because of the tax incentive, they wanted to shoot it in Atlanta, they wanted to shoot it in Miami, Florida to make it look like we were shooting in Belize, I said no to all of that. I said if we are going to shoot a movie in Belize, it has to be in Belize."
Starlin Angelique, Actress, Let Us Make Eve
"My character, young Eve, is a very strong-minded leader of the group, she is also the main character but just as a young girl she has always had this leadership quality that all of her friends tended to follow and she definitely, um, she played that role. Like she took that role as the leader of her group."
"It's pretty much just getting the back story like I had to develop her characteristics, I worked a lot with Jasmine who plays the older Eve and we just got her characteristics down and just processed how she would see the world because she has always been who she is, she's always been like you will see from the beginning of the movie to the end she remains herself."
"I had heard of Belize, never been honestly it wasn't a place where I was like ahh I have to go there before I actually came here but since I've been here it's like I can't come back ever, just work related vacation, you have to. I tell everybody about Belize. This is a lovely, lovely, lovely, place ad I would recommend it to everyone."
Niguel Miguel, Producer, Let Us Make Eve
"To me this was a joy, to get the opportunity from a film-maker of his level to come in here and share, teach, he is an incredible storyteller, um, this is a movie that I believe Belizeans will be proud about because the scenery the look the feel how he captured Belize as a character in the movie. Caye Caulker plays a role in here so it's something that we should all support and we will be proud in seeing how it came across and the actors, the local actors they did an incredible job, um, I always concern myself with your putting up a professional US actor as opposed to some of our local actors who have talent but they just haven't had the opportunity to work at such a high level and I will say that our local actors held their own."
Mark Harris, Director/ co-writer, Let Us Make Eve
"It was challenging but it was beautiful, you know, because it was a challenging experience because I've never shot outside of the country, this was my first time but I had been to Belize, I'd been coming to Belize for the last 13 years, either San Pedro or Caye Caulker and so I always wanted to shoot a movie like the first time I said I want to shoot a movie here but it was challenging because when you shoot on Caye Caulker and I know Caye Caulker is the much smaller island and we don't have a lot of resources so when things happen we have to make do with what we have that was actually on the island but then, when you look at the ending product of the film, you'll see how beautiful it is and how beautiful Caye Caulker is."
"We're sold out already but what we are doing is we're working on a second screening and so it's going to be at the Wydham hotel, the theatre this January the 20th at 7:00 PM but the first screening is sold out but we are working on getting a second screening going on because the first one sold out so quickly."
Let Us Make Eve premieres at the Princess cinema on Friday night but that first screening is already sold out.
The director says he's working hard to set up a second screening, and we'll let you know when that's announced.
