While traveling to visit friends a week ago, filmmaker Raven Irabor received an Instagram DM, "Congrats, my Trini sister!". Initially confused, she soon realized she had been announced as the winner of the Tongal x Black Film Space Finishing Funds Grant.
"'I'm just so grateful! I've been applying to so many grants with no luck", says the Nigerian and Trinidadian filmmaker (photographed above by Thalía Henao) who will use the $3,000 grant to finish post-production and start marketing her film "She Island."
"She Island" explores what makes a Caribbean woman. Through the main character, La Diablesse, a character familiar in folklore stories of Trinidad and Tobago, Irabor centers on the duality and spiritualism in Caribbean culture. Irabor came across the folklore of La Diablesse while on a month-long trip to Trinidad to visit her grandmother. She immediately knew this was the character she wanted to focus on.
La Diablesse, which translates to "she-demon," is often villainized in folklore for luring men. However, the men she pursues are those who have committed wrongdoings.
A shot from Raven's film, She Island (Photo: Olajuwon Scott)
In the film, La Diablesse is reframed as a guardian character who guides a mother and daughter on a journey to Ouidah, the forgetting tree, to break a curse. The Oiudah tree is based on the history of the tree of forgetfulness in Ouidah, Benin, where enslaved peoples were made to walk around several times. The Kings of Dahomey (a kingdom located in present-day Benin) believed marching around the tree caused the enslaved to forget their home and never return. Unfortunately, for so many, the latter was true.
The journey portrayed in "She Island" beautifully illustrates Caribbean women's integral role as guardians and preservers of culture.
Being an independent filmmaker who largely self-funded her project, the grant arrived at an essential time for Irabor. Having lost her job in December 2023, Irabor lost her income and primary funding source. Like most setbacks, it came at an inconvenient time. Irabor was in the thick of post-production, which was already causing challenges.
"The hardest part was the post-production. Venturing into VFX for the first time consumed significant time and set me back. Initially, I aimed to release the film by the end of 2023. I also had to replace the original editor, and there was a lot of problem-solving to be done. Ultimately, it was a big learning curve to lead a team creatively and have a team that understood my vision. I also learned that my community has my back."
A shot from Raven's film, She Island (Photo: Olajuwon Scott)
A community that held her down domestically and internationally. From working with her pro-bono, sending her resources to crowdfunding sites like Seed & Spark, who would only let her publish her campaign once it was just right! Irabor's community helped her raise $16K towards the film through crowdfunding. Although many have a lot of pride surrounding crowdsourcing and asking for money, that wasn't Irabor. "Any pride I had was short-lived. Because what are the other options?" Irabor raised the money just shy of a month before shooting, but she says she'll start raising money as early as a year before in the future.
Shot in Trinidad, "She Island" utilizes local actors, crew, and locations sourced by family and friends. A cousin served as a cultural consultant for the film, an aunt acted as her Production Manager, and she was able to film in her grandmother's Spiritual Baptist church. A Spiritual Baptist church maintains many African traditions while also adhering to the fundamental concepts of the Bible.
Another costly lesson learned from shooting internationally was the exuberant wire and transfer fees that come with paying people internationally from a US bank. These unexpected costs added another line item to the budget.
A shot from Raven's film, She Island (Photo: Olajuwon Scott)
From "She Island", Raven hopes Caribbean people can see themselves and resonate with the characters depicted. The Caribbean is a beautiful melting pot that is not only made up of Afro-Caribbean inhabitants. Along with its European influence from colonization, the region bears a significant Asian influence, which she incorporates by featuring a Trinidadian voice-over actor of Indian descent. The film's score consists of Latin sounds, and Haitian Creole, Papiamentu, and Patois are spoken throughout the project. Although shot in Trinidad, this film is for all of the Caribbean.
And for non-Caribbean viewers, she wants to show that the islands are not just vacation locations but a place of rich and diverse culture from island to island.
Irabor plans to premiere "She Island" with a screening in September during New York Fashion Week. In the meantime, she's using her media background in marketing to start advertising and getting prepared for release.
As she enters the festival circuit, Irabor is excited to see what's next for the film, her baby, as it's released to the world. And if nothing else, the words of pride she received from her loved ones in Trinidad, who also participated as extras, were honor enough. She beautifully says, "We're now forever written in each other's stories."
The finishing funds grant is the latest initiative in Tongal's ongoing partnership with Black Film Space, in which we work with the non-profit to offer support and opportunities to filmmakers within their community.
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