- Perry Henzell
Infobox actor
imagesize = 150px
name = Perry Henzell
birthdate =March 7 1936
birthplace =Annotto Bay , St. Mary's, Jamaica
deathdate =November 30 2006
deathplace =Treasure Beach , St. Elizabeth's,Jamaica
occupation =film director
spouses =
website =
footnotes =Perry Henzell (b.
March 7 1936 , Annotto Bay, St. Mary's,Jamaica - d.November 30 2006 , Treasure Beach, St. Elizabeth's,Jamaica ) was most famous for being the director of the first Jamaican feature film, "The Harder They Come " (1972).Henzell, whose ancestors included
Huguenot glassblowers and an old English family who had made their fortune growingsugar onAntigua , grew up on the Caymanas sugar cane estate near Kingston.He was sent to a
boarding school in theUnited Kingdom at fourteen and later attended McGill University in 1953 and 1954. He then dropped out of this school, choosing instead tohitchhike aroundEurope . He eventually got work as astagehand at theBBC .He returned to Jamaica in the 1950s, where he directed advertisements for some years until he began work on "The Harder They Come".
Henzell also shot some footage for what was planned as his next film, "No Place Like Home", in "Harder's" aftermath, but he went broke before he could finish the film. Fed up by this, and the lack of finance for further production, he went on to become a writer, publishing his first novel, "
Power Game ", in 1982. Both were meant to complete a planned trilogy of films centring onIvanhoe Martin .The footage for "No Place Like Home" was lost. Years later, he came across editing tapes in a lab in New York. Just to have a sense of completion, he worked on the project. When he showed it to a few friends, their response was enthusiastic. He eventually was able to retrieve the original footage. "No Place Like Home" was screened for the public at the 31st annual
Toronto International Film Festival in September 2006 at the Cumberland Theatre; it was sold out. Film leadsCarl Bradshaw ("The Harder They Come", "Smile Orange", "Countryman") andSusan O'Meara attended and answered audience questions with Henzell after the screening.The same film is scheduled to be screened at the Flashpoint Film Festival at the beginning of December 2006 in
Negril .He died of
cancer onNovember 30 2006 , aged 70, and is survived by his three children: Justine, Toni-Ann and Jason. [http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20061201/ent/ent2.html]External links
* [http://www.calabashfestival.org/authors/perry.htm Biography of Perry Henzell]
*imdb name|id=0378320|name=Perry Henzell
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0839928 "No Place Like Home" at IMDB]
* [http://www.e.bell.ca/filmfest/2006/films_schedules/films_description.asp?id=207 Toronto Film Festival Profile of No Place Like Home]
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