Bahamian Nominated For “Best Film” By Toronto International Nollywood Film Festival

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NASSAU, THE BAHAMAS – Bahamian life is no longer just lived here at home – it’s now being projected on screens across the world.

Visa Blue, the short film by Bahamian film maker Nathan McPhee, has landed a nomination for best film Caribbean and international by Toronto International Nollywood Film Festival and will be shown there September 8th.

It’s a milestone moment for local storytelling, and our Evlynn Ferguson tells us more.

Behind that nomination is a creative journey years in the making. Bahamian filmmaker and creative entrepreneur, Nathan McPhee says his film, ‘Visa Blue’, grew from his drive to build a platform where local stories could be shared on the global stage. He explains how it reflects everyday Bahamian life and why that authenticity helped the project break through.

“Getting the parent, child, relationship, right. Which Hartman and Ajai Culmer would have displayed very well on TV in the performances, right. Is that current relationship between how do you break the news, see your parents, that you want to study something that’s in a completely different abnormal field, right. You know, he wants to be a writer and his dad is like, hey, man, what happened about the athletic, James, man. You won’t be a hooper. And so, the story is very grounded in behaving and reality. Is grounded in a lot of our experiences that we share as a people.” – Nathan McPhee

According to McPhee, coming back home gave him a new lens on what Bahamian stories could mean abroad.

His short film ‘Visa Blue’ is already proving that local experiences can resonate globally. He says the journey reflects how students push for opportunities beyond our shores.

“It really was inspiring to just come back home and realize that, hey, there’s a unique experience here that I can tell through the lens of students, you know, Bahamian students, you know, going through that process of wanting to become better, wanting to study abroad and gain new experiences and explore, you know, different opportunities, and through that, you know, you have to go through the visa process.” – Nathan McPhee

And the creative drive didn’t happen overnight.

McPhee credits his upbringing for fueling his filmmaking. He shares how those lessons helped him today as a storyteller.

“My mom was a linguistics teacher, studied linguistics on English, and so she was very instrumental in, you know, allowing for me to learn more about how to write, how to, you know, speak, how to develop stories, how to even frame stories, you know, from different elements of character building to literary devices, and using that in my writing.” – Nathan Mcphee

And he’s already partnered with a well‑known international company to push Bahamian stories further. And with a strong team of actors and producers, including his mother, the executive producer behind Visa Blue, he says it marks a proud moment for Bahamian film.

“Additional producers are Ren Wilson, Tyler Rahming. its starring very prominent actors that you may also be familiar with AJai Culmer, who’s also very, very well known in the Cyrest crew and then of course Haran Brown, who was apart of Tyler Perry’s productions. In the Bahamas as well. Also doing some amazing stuff in the branding content space too. So we’re privileged to work with a great team. I was also assisted by camera operations with Laron Bossfield, who also works a lot of with branding content and media as well and so yeah it just a really exciting moment for Bahamian film.” – Nathan McPhee