THE Fremantle Underwater Film Festival is set to return for its 10-year anniversary, running from October 31 to November 2.
However, this year it’s being hosted in Hamilton Hill by the City of Cockburn after Fremantle council dropped its support.
Festival creator and organiser Tania Braithwaite, who grew up in Fremantle, began the event to raise funds for marine wildlife.
The majority of this year’s donations will go to help critically endangered Maui dolphins, which inhabit the waters of New Zealand.
Ms Douthewaite said she launched the festival because films communicate morals and ethics, and prompt conversations between the audience and the big ideas being put forward on screen.
“In a way we sit together and have a shared experience… we have an opportunity for the stories to travel around the world, and so film is just a very powerful instrument for that,” she said.
• Find out how citizen science is helping us understand scalloped hammerheads.
Alongside film screenings, the event will host the Mermantle Men, a choir with sights on positive mental health for men.
Along with crowd favourites, the group will debut a handful of songs which connect familiar local themes like going to sea, sharing a beer at Gage Roads, and of course the iconic Freo Doctor.
A silent auction will also be held, with pieces from local artists up for grabs, and proceeds going to various marine conservation projects.
Ms Douthwaite says red tape at the City of Fremantle prompted her to reach out to Cockburn, which was very supportive
“It’s incredibly tiring and time-consuming,” she says of the paperwork, “and if it doesn’t seem like they’re going to give support then I don’t follow through.
“I have to work very hard – not paid – to demonstrate the festival’s capacity and every year it just gets harder and harder.”
Ms Douthewaite said the lack of support was disappointing, especially for a grassroots festival where the community benefits.
“It sounds like just a film festival but it’s very much an expression of Fremantle’s heart and identity as well, and it’s a shame that it’s not getting the support that it could have.”
Ms Douthwait said this year’s theme was A Fish Called Wonder, a play on the name of the ‘80s film starring John Cleese and Jamie Lee Curtis, and would focus on “science stories” from Western Australia.
One story recounts a citizen science project involving scalloped hammerhead sharks, which in the last decade or so have started appearing off the coast of Perth.
“We have [Dr] Naima [Andrea López] from UWA who runs a marine citizen science project spotting scalloped hammerhead and helping the community to be a part of important science for conservation of that species,” she said.
Head to http://www.fuff.com.au for tickets and more information.
by APRIL LINKERT