With over 120 films from 30 countries, the 7th annual Trinidad+Tobago Film Festival (ttff) kicks off today, September 19, and will run through October 2.

This year the Festival will screen more films – narrative, and documentary, both feature-length and short films – than ever before. More than half of these films are from T&T, most of which will be making their world premieres!

There will also be a special focus this year on the cinema of Canada, to mark 50 years of diplomatic relations and cultural and creative links between Trinidad and Tobago and Canada. This focus will include films by T&T-Canadian filmmakers, in T&T and in Canada.

The festival takes place at venues across the country, including MovieTowne (Port of Spain Tobago), the Little Carib Theatre, the University of the West Indies, Studiofilmclub and Medulla Art Gallery.

Tickets are $25 at MovieTowne and the Little Carib, while all other locations are FREE.

We've highlighted a number of films in this year's lineup, like the St. Thomas Drama Chance (a student enters a life of crime in order to earn money to treat his mother's illness), Cuban doc Motherland or Death (tackles the country's fading revolutionary mantra), Captains of the Sand (an orphan girl joins a boys gang in a Brazilian coming of age tale), and others.

The lineup is a strong one, and if you are in T&T (I know we have readers there as well), you should make an effort to see as many of these Diaspora films as you can, before they disappear.

For the festival's full lineup, click HERE.