THE Creative Production and Training Centre (CPTC)/Media Technology Institute (MTI) will conduct the next three of four advanced film workshops over the next few months to train Jamaican and Caribbean nationals in the field.

The work is being paid for through the ACP Films Project, which is funded by the European Union. The course is free for participants. However those who wish to benefit from the course must satisfy a prescribed criteria, including:

* more than five years of experience working in film;

* ability to produce a show reel;

* a detailed curriculum vitae; and

* a personal letter detailing why he/she should be selected to participate in the workshop and the anticipated benefits.

“The whole idea is to have a core of persons suitable trained in film so that if anyone flies into Jamaica and wants to produce a film, you have a ready workforce,” said MTI principal Lorna Napier.

Meanwhile, noted film director Dr Richard Kwietniowski, from the London Film School, conducted the first workshop last week. The subject of the workshop was directing for drama and was held at the CPTC’s Wycliffe Bennett Studio.

Kwietniowski’s debut feature film was Anglo-Canadian co-production Love and Death on Long Island (Skyline/Imagex productions), based on his own adapted screenplay, and starring John Hurt and Jason Priestley. Its awards include the Prix Pierrot for Best European First Feature at the Cannes Film Festival, the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best First Feature, an Excellence in Film-Making award from the US National Board of Review, and the Carl Foreman BAFTA for Best Newcomer in British Film.

Sold worldwide, it made many Top Ten Films of the Year lists, including the Independent, Newsweek, New York Post, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, LA Weekly, and Village Voice.

His second feature Owning Mahowny (Ed Pressman Productions/Alliance Atlantis), starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Minnie Driver, premiered at the Sundance and Berlin Festivals, and was released by Sony Pictures Classics in the US and Momentum in the UK. It was nominated for four Genie awards.

Whilst working extensively in Britain’s Independent Film Sector and Higher Education, he made a number of acclaimed short films, including Alfalfa and Flames of Passion, which received international exposure and acclaim.

Subsequent work as a director for British television won Royal Television Society and D&AD (Gold and Best of Year) awards, and a Prix Italia nomination.

He regularly contributes to teaching programmes on writing and directing at the London International Film School, and the London Film Academy, and served as creative adviser on European script-writing initiatives Scenario at London’s French Institute, and ScriptEast in Poland.

The other workshops — to be completed before the end of April — will cover such subjects as lighting, production management and advanced film editing.