‘DESTINATION Guyana’ will receive another major international boost as a France-based production company, Bo Travail, is currently in Guyana filming part of a television magazine documentary series called “Echappees Belles”.
The production company, created in 2005 by Georges Bonopera, produces the first French TV magazine aimed at travel enthusiasts.
According to a press release from the Guyana Tourism Authority (GTA), the documentary will certainly help to promote ‘Destination Guyana’ in France, which is an emerging market the GTA is looking to tap into.
Minister Manniran Prashad said he is very happy with the popularity that Guyana is gaining as a tourism destination, and noted that this will add to the country’s growing international exposure, the release added.
“Echappees Belles” is a 90-minute magazine composed of two parts, which provides practical and cultural tips to help discover, understand, and imagine this wide world.
The first part is all focused on the weekly destination: discovering a new world in seven or eight different places in the same destination, taking the viewers into many cultural spots and social aspects of the destination.
For the second part, a crew composed of three persons – Jean-Michel Ferrault, Maxime Fevre, and its Director Francois Fevre – is going through Guyana, French Guiana, Suriname, Brazil and Venezuela for a film documentary following a labour camp escapees route.
On the tracks of few escapees who succeed in regaining their freedom, they also follow the route of Henri Charriere, who was a convicted murderer, popularly known as the author of Papillon, a hugely successful memoir of his incarceration and escape from a penal colony in French Guiana.
This segment features a road movie “Mythical Routes” divided into four serials of 15 minutes each. The production of these routes has been entrusted to filmmakers and seasoned travellers, each with their personal writing style and vision, and these fantastic routes are seen through their eyes and from their points of view.
During their five-day stay here, the group which journeyed to Guyana via the Suriname ferry, visited various places and did filming in the capital city of Georgetown, and at Kaieteur Falls and Lethem.
They then headed to neighbouring Brazil from Lethem, via the Takutu River bridge, the release added.
The Director, Francois Fevre, said that there is hardly any information about Guyana in France, hence, this series will help to showcase the country to the French.
He revealed that although he has travelled all over the world, he would rank the famous Kaieteur Falls among the top five best attractions he has ever seen.
Praising the Guyanese hospitality, he pointed out this exposure will help to dismiss some negative perception about Guyana in France, and will promote the country in a positive image.
He noted that in addition to Guyana’s attraction and its biodiversity, he admires the capital city, its layout and architectural beauty.
The road movie will be broadcast on November 2011 on the French National Channel France 5, one of the leading French television networks, reaching a 1.2 million household audience.
Additionally, Guyana will be featured in the popular television series “Alone in the Wild,” in September; and also, in the British Broadcasting Corporation’s ten-part series retracing the footsteps of Sir Walter Raleigh in search of the fabled City of Gold, El Dorado, will be aired in October of this year.