Selected stories

Every year the Hawaii International Film Festival creates the most visible showcase for movies that feature local talent, directors and stories about the people who live here.

It’s a powerful draw for a growing pool of hopeful independent filmmakers because a screening can launch a career. Those chosen for the festival are a select group.

"I would say it’s pretty hard to make the cut," said Anderson Le, programming director for the festival. "We really want to showcase the best of Hawaii, and I think we go through a deep deliberation process."

This year the festival selected 25 films from 70 candidates. They’re scattered in several categories.

"I think the general theme is basically a sense of humanism," Le said. "I think they deal with ethics and the way we live our lives, especially when it comes to being from Hawaii and the values we are imbued with. How we treat each other or how we treat the land."

Three stand out, Le said, for the way they deal with that theme: "The Land of Eb," "Seeds of Hope" and "Jake Shi­ma­bu­kuro: Life on Four Strings."

"The Land of Eb," a feature film shot entirely on the island of Hawaii with local actors and crew, offers a "touching" story about a poor Marshallese community, Le said. The 88-minute film is a Halekulani Golden Orchid Award narrative feature nominee.

The documentary "Seeds of Hope" explores the state’s reliance on food being shipped to Hawaii. It’s also up for the Halekulani Golden Orchid Award for documentaries.

"It’s a very robust documentary, and I feel it is important for everyone to see," Le said.

The 90-minute film on Shi­ma­bu­kuro stands out because it goes beyond the typical music documentary and into the ukulele master’s roots, Le said.

"It really delves into his working-class, humble beginnings in Palolo and his drive and how he got into music and how he excelled," Le said. "He has a very spiritual, humanistic point of view. He is very sincere."

"The Land of Eb" was directed by Andrew Williamson, a 36-year-old Southern California filmmaker who moved to Hawaii island nine years ago. This is his first feature film.

Williamson had heard about a poor community of Marshall Islanders in Hawaiian Ocean View Estates in Kau and wanted to somehow tell their story. There, in 2009, he met Jonithen Jackson, an immigrant who wanted to make movies but just didn’t know how.

Jackson, now 56, became the star of "The Land of Eb" and helped produce the film.

"I think for me what I get out of the story is his tenacity for moving forward, for him, his family and the community," Williamson said. "His character, what he puts up above everything else, is to move forward. With assimilation and education. It touches on those things."

The film draws heavily from Jonithen’s life, and it was shot largely on his property using friends and neighbors from the Marshall Islands.

"It’s like a tapestry of fictional and real-life moments," Williamson said. "Some people who have watched the film said they thought it was a documentary until the end. To me that is a real compliment. We wanted to make it feel like real life playing out in front of you."

DOCUMENTARY filmmaker Danny Miller, the director of "Seeds of Hope," moved from Los Angeles to Hawaii island nine years ago and became active in causes to protect the environment. He made six films here but believes his latest could be his most important.

"My goal was to tell a more in-depth personal story from the hearts and minds of the farmers and the Hawaiian educators who are doing amazing things to help Hawaii’s agriculture and go back to traditional methods of growing food," said the 49-year-old Miller, who used to make short documentaries for HBO.

The soul of his story is the 60 people he interviewed.

"I think I like the personal stories when you are doing something with someone who really believes in something," Miller said. "That is what makes a really powerful film. People talk from the heart about the struggles they are going through."

Tad Nakamura, director of "Jake Shi­­ma­bu­kuro: Life on Four Strings," was the ultimate outsider when he began work on the film. All Naka­mura knew about Shi­ma­bu­kuro was what he had seen on YouTube, and he wasn’t much of an ukulele fan, either.

"After I got to know him, he just seemed like a local guy, and that fascinated me — what a modern-day virtuoso looked like," he said. "When you think of a virtuoso, you think of a classic protégé from an elite background, and here is this local guy from a regular, humble background. He was almost like a kid you could have gone to school with."

Nakamura said Shi­ma­bu­kuro’s life story isn’t widely known, despite his enormous popularity. The 32-year-old L.A. director spent 2 1/2 years shooting the musician in Hawaii, Japan, New York, San Francisco and Orange County, Calif.

At first Nakamura thought Shi­ma­bu­kuro’s easygoing, nice-guy personality was an act — and the filmmaker admits that’s a habit born of too many cynical encounters in L.A.

But Shimabukuro is genuinely sincere, Naka­mura said.

"I think people will understand his relationship with his family and how important it is to him," he said. "I think the film will definitely give people a deeper understanding of where he comes from and why he does what he does and what drives him."